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I used to enjoy watching a good boxing match. I rooted for the underdog who looked like he was down for the count after the third round but somehow brushed himself off, got that determined look on his face, rose to his feet and came back like a man possessed. He didn’t always win but he made a game of it when you would have said he had no chance.

Today, that boxer is print. Bullied, bloodied and beaten, print is on his butt in the middle of the ring but there are plenty of rounds left. The question is whether or not he will rise with a fury to win.

We have all seen print take a terrible beating over the last two years. The combination of the growing strength of the web and the low blow from the economy has almost been too much to bear.

Our clients have complained about their thinner and thinner print products—the same ones that just a couple of years ago were kings of the ring. As advertisers baled, the domino effect took hold. If my competitor is not advertising, that gives me license to drop out as well. As a result, many of these thinning magazines went completely bald and ceased publishing completely.

The real question here is whether advertisers are dropping out of print because “nobody reads magazines any more” as so many of them lament or whether advertisers are dropping out of print because other advertisers have dropped out of print and the remaining advertisers don’t have the belief in their own convictions to hold the line.

Well, finally magazine publishers have had enough and they’re not going to take it anymore. Five of the largest consumer print publishers have combined forces (and dollars) to launch a huge campaign to promote the fact that print is not dead. The five companies are Time Warner’s Time, Inc., Hearst, Advance Publications’ Conde Nast, Wenner Media and Meridith. The initiative was orchestrated by Jann Wenner, CEO of Wenner Media. Check out an article on this subject from the Wall Street Journal. Just as TV did not kill radio and video stores did not kill movie theaters, the web will not kill print. It may change reading habits. It may change how and when magazines are read. But it will not kill print. The fact is that print is already waging a comeback. As in any industry that has taken its lumps, many titles have died and will not return. In many markets, this was a necessary change, as few markets require four, five or even six titles to serve that market. But the top two or three titles should continue to thrive and serve their markets for many years to come.

If you’ve thrown in the towel on your print campaign, think again.

This fighter is not down for the count.

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