#OED
Allen – yup, you can play the numbers a lot of ways. In some ways the OED
situation resembles what happened with wristwatches back in the early 1980s.
The Swiss did not believe in quartz-driven electronics – in their minds,
watches were handmade, precision jewelry which was fairly accurate and high
priced.
Although the first quartz movement was produced in Switzerland, no one in the
industry there saw its potential. It took the Japanese to build the automated
production lines and produce mass market, highly accurate quartz digital and
analog watches and sell them to the world. Within five years Hong Kong was
the world's largest watch producer by volume; Japan the largest by value; and
the two largest Swiss manufacturing groups were in Central Bank receivership.
The Swiss came out of that debacle mostly because an outsider, marketing
specialist, was brought in by the government to head the combined company
formed from the two bankrupt groups; he pushed the "Swatch" watch line, which
sold cheaply, and outsold the Asian products. It combined excellent design
and quality with very good marketing.
I think OUP needs to take a similar tack – treat the CD version of the OED as
the "Swatch" and market it to the masses at an aggressive price; leave the
print version as the Longines/Omega/Rado (three of the higher priced brands
of the groups which went belly-up in Switzerland), selling at a higher price
in fancy, hand-tooled and gold-embossed leather bindings to those who want to
decorate their bookshelves.
Regds Ric