Michael Makin, president and CEO of Printing Industries of America has informed Printing Industries of America membership that Toshiba has agreed to halt the ill-conceived National No-Print Day campaign. In the letter Makin shared details on a conversaion he had with Bill Melo, Toshiba USA's senior vice president of marketing, services and solutions:

There will be no National No-Print Day on October 23!

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, June 20, 2012--This is a follow-up from our press release issued on June 13. The following message from Michael Makin has been sent to the Printing Industries of America membership.

June 20, 2012

Dear Member:

I am pleased to report that as a result of protests by Printing Industries of America, its members, and the industry as a whole, Toshiba has agreed to abort its National No-Print Day!

Last evening I had a lengthy conversation with Bill Melo, Toshiba USA's senior vice president of marketing, services and solutions regarding its ill-conceived initiative.

Mr. Melo was quite "concerned” with how the campaign had been received by the commercial printing industry and stressed it was never the intent of his company to disenfranchise or insult our industry. He explained that the campaign was always directed at the office marketplace where he opined there was needless waste.

My retort to Mr. Melo was that if this was truly the case, his campaign should have been more specific. It was not promoted as "let's save office waste day” but rather National No-Print Day. I argued this was tantamount to having a "Do Not Walk” day or "Do Not Eat” day and that the grassroots response from our industry was only to be expected.

I reiterated our position that Toshiba abandon the notion of a No-Print day. If it wants to focus its eyes on the office marketplace, its campaign should be centered there and not by extension implicate or disparage America's printing industry.

Mr. Melo did commit to going back to the drawing board and assured me the promotion on its website will be removed and that any re-launch of a campaign directed at office waste will explicitly explain that this in no way references the legitimate commercial printing industry and its importance to the American economy. I thanked Mr. Melo for his swift response to our concerns but cautioned that any follow-up campaign containing misleading statements regarding paper would be subject to similar scrutiny, particularly from the paper industry. He indicated he would be making an outreach to this sector as well.

Thank you to everyone who joined in our effort to protest this initiative. This is a major victory for PRINT IN AMERICA!

Sincerely,

Michael Makin
President & CEO
Printing Industries of America

As of this morning the National No-Print Day website is currently blank.

Hat tip to Dead Tree Edition, Richard Romano, Heidi Tolliver-Walker and other bloggers who turned this situation into a industry-wide conversation. Blogging killed the National No-Print Day campaign.