For more than two centuries, Encyclopaedia Britannica was the standard-bearer collection of knowledge in the English-speaking world, sold only through its own sales force at a premium price.
But now the publication is on the verge of becoming the buggy-whip manufacturer of the Information Age.
A shell of its former self, Britannica is taking the risky step--starting today--of posting the entire contents of its 32-volume set on the Internet for free. It hopes to make money by selling advertising on its Web site, a well-worn but still unproven business model.
"There are so many sites competing for your attention that to try to rise above the noise and cacophony is going to be extremely hard," said David Sanderson, head of the electronic commerce practice at consulting firm Bain & Co. "This is going to be very, very tough for them to do."
It is a risk Encyclopaedia Britannica officials feel they must take.
At its peak in 1989, the Chicago-based company had revenue of $650 million and a sales force of 2,300. The privately held concern no longer releases financial results, but officials concede that sales have dropped precipitously, and the work force today numbers just 350.
Industry experts say that with its powerful brand name, Encyclopaedia Britannica might have ruled the Internet. Instead, it has lost its online birthright to young companies that have oddball names like Yahoo Inc., which Wall Street currently values at $44 billion.
The decline of the 231-year-old Encyclopaedia Britannica "illustrates how the most stable of industries, the most focused of business models and the strongest of brands can be blown to bits by new information technology," a pair of management consultants write in a new book, "Blown to Bits." The first chapter of the book on corporate strategies, which was published earlier this month by Harvard Business School Press, is devoted to Britannica.
Now Britannica is hoping to transfer its unimpeachable reputation as a source of information from the paper world--where its product sells for $1,250--to the online realm. Although the Internet contains more information than could ever fit in any encyclopedia, digital or otherwise, the quality of that information is often dubious. And for researchers--an important potential online market for Britannica--it's not always clear that the information available on the Internet is complete.
