It is rare to see any trade show come back from the dead. But we are associated with just such a show by the name of ISPCON.

A bit of history: ISPCON was started in the early 1990s by the publisher of Boardwatch magazine (no longer published). In 1998 my old company, Mecklermedia, purchased Boardwatch magazine and the ISPCON trade shows for $29 million. Mecklermedia was sold to Penton Media in November 1998. The key assets of that sale were the Internet World and ISPCON trade shows.

Fast forward to 2002 and Penton Media is in financial trouble. And both of these trade show brands cease operating --- an amazing decline as their aggregrate revenue in 2000 was in excess of $50 million!

Internet World no longer exists in any form other than as a Web site. But ISPCON was purchased and resurrected by its former head of booth sales, Jon Price. Jon then turned around and sold Jupitermedia a 49.9% interest in ISPCON. Together (though most of the credit belongs to the talented Mr. Price) we have made ISPCON a powerful brand once more. ISPCON runs twice per year in the USA and the next iteration takes place in Santa Clara in November. This show has over 80 exhibitors and more to come. Our first joint effort in the spring of 2002 had but 20 exhibitors.

ISPCON is now very profitable with terrific growth prospects as ISP's have had their businesses energized with the coming of WISPS (wireless ISPs) and the relationship of VoiP to this industry.

Part of the success goes to the traffic Jupitermedia has on its many ISP related Web sites, related email newsletters and discussion lists. This traffic gives us the advantage of very low promotion costs to a very targeted audience of wireless and ISP professionals. Of course we do this over and over again with our SES shows and now we are using this model to grow our image businesses.

This is all very exciting. ISPCON is a marvel in that it runs counter to all other tech shows that have died over the previous four years. Once again, a needed vertical focus combined with a powerful online audience have resulted in economic success.