Product life cycle - Encyclopedia Brittanica

The news that Encyclopedia Brittanica will cease their print edition after 244 years will probably come as a surprise to young people today only because they were probably unaware that it existed. For us older folk who were forced to do research for school projects at libraries and without internet it is the true end of an era!

My classes are about to look at the product life cycle so it is a perfect time to discuss this in the context of withdrawing a product from a market and perhaps even us old-timers would be surprised that the EB hasn’t been withdrawn earlier.

This link takes you to 2006 e-mail exchange between EB editor in chief Dale Hoiberg and the founder of a then relatively new website which was looking to provide collaborative, free access to the world’s information - I am sure you can guess what it is!

More information on EB’s decision can be found here. They are not closing down - they still offer access to their digital version for $70 per year and claim to have been profitable for the last 8 years.