The lateral thinker
Regula Fecker has started her own one-woman agency and plans to continue developing strategies for major companies as well.
Regula Fecker has set up her own one-woman agency and wants to continue developing strategies for the big players, too.an old slate board from a school instead of a flat screen hangs in the meeting room. A dumbwaiter crammed with books shows that the room on the second floor once served as the "Säli" for a pub on Zurich's Langstrasse. At first glance, Regula Fecker's newly founded agency gives no indication that the newly self-employed strategist is a trendsetter in the field of cross-media. The furnishings also bear little resemblance to the fact that Fecker has already worked in the advertising mecca of New York and trendy Berlin. A sofa like something from a second-hand store and a table that looks more like a shared kitchen than strategy documents for big fish. But: "Customers really like coming here," says the young representative of a new generation of advertisers, noting that the office entrance right next to the sex store is actually positioned right in the middle of our society's milieu.Regula Fecker went into advertising straight after secondary school. She first worked as a consultant at a very small agency in Zurich. Then, at the age of 20, she switched to what was then Honegger von Matt. Fecker wanted to stay here for a total of seven years and thus "experienced the whole important part of this agency's history". After three years, she was able to switch to Planning, which was just being rebuilt. "I love racking my brains, tackling a communication problem from scratch and thinking about things that no one has thought before me," she says of this challenge.
She also likes to get to the bottom of things. That's why she wanted to further her education and flew to America for three months to the Miami Ad School run by Crispin Porter Bogusky. "The intensive course broadened my thinking," she enthuses. A well-known planner is flown in every weekend. A vacation home is available in Miami for the stars of the industry. Some of the lessons take place on the beach. "You get to meet the gurus in person like never before." Nevertheless, they work hard. Weekly projects with different focuses in the areas of brand management, market research, target group research and media strategy. Within the three months, the students also had to develop their own project together with creative professionals. Fecker's group developed a pitch for FedEx.
The final presentation was won by the Swiss girl. She was also the best of the year with her concept. Her idea was based on the fact that 80 percent of all customers track their parcels via the Internet. Why is that? "The fascination that customers feel when they can trigger the take-off of an airplane with the click of a mouse." This is how Fecker formulated the strategy: "FedEx enables even small fish to play God." SMEs naturally find this relevant because they are otherwise always the underdogs.
The idea landed her a job in New York. A lecturer called her - barely back in Switzerland: "Do you want a job in New York?" So she flew back across the pond and worked for TBWA\Chiat\Day for a year and a half as a planner in David Hackworthy's team. "Alongside Dominique von Matt, I learned the most from him."
In 2004, her mentor Hackworthy moved to London and founded The Red Brick Road there. The time had come for Fecker to return to Europe. She accepted an offer from TBWA Berlin. There she was allowed to take over the management of Planning. "During this time, we were able to win the account for Siemens worldwide," she says proudly. Nevertheless, she didn't want to stay in Berlin for longer than eight months because of her relationship in Zurich. That was possible with New York. It was simply far away. Berlin beckoned with a quick visit every weekend. But there wasn't enough time. In the end, Regula Fecker was welcomed back with open arms not only by her boyfriend, advertising photographer Jonathan Heyer, but also by her old employer Jung von Matt Limmat. After two years as a planner, she set up her own business, "Regula Fecker, Strategische Planung".
How can you motivate someone to do something? Regula Fecker always wanted to "do something that creates a connection between thought and action. That triggers something." With the experience she has gained in her previous work, Fecker felt it was "the right time to become self-employed". She finds it an advantage that, as an independent strategist, she can also guarantee media neutrality. Focusing on an idea and not asking right from the start: Is there a TV commercial or posters? There are more and more new media or at least differently fragmented media.
Her clients are advertising and media agencies, but also advertising clients. Some of them want research: How can I provide my agency with better foundations? Fecker sees herself as an interface between clients and agencies. She also wants to work internationally and has already received an order from London from her former boss.
Fecker can count on a good network of contacts. She is a member of the BSW training committee. She has also made many contacts as a course instructor at Sawi. There she set up the intensive Crossmedia Kompressor course.
In her area of expertise, she says that more and more customers are now intervening in content. They want to help shape broadcast formats, for example. A migration from the classic advertising section to content can be observed. This is sometimes cleverly done, as with 20 Minuten. In other projects, it still seems "sometimes awkward". YouTube or MySpace are being watched with suspicious eyes by the entire advertising scene and copied - but still not really understood. "You can tell when advertisers want to jump on a bandwagon." The same applies to podcasts. "I see a lot of opportunities there. But only the most obvious things are implemented."
Regula Fecker is also involved in various areas of communication in her private life. She helped build up the Eleven snowboard label for friends and made the brand number 2 in Switzerland and number 8 in Europe in seven years. In the NPO sector, she works for "Tischlein deck dich", where expired food is distributed to people in need. She is also involved in promoting the ETH spin-off MyClimate, where people like her pay a fixed percentage of every flight ticket as compensation for CO2 emissions. And to relax, Fecker does "yoga - like everyone else in this world".
Andreas Panzeri
She also likes to get to the bottom of things. That's why she wanted to further her education and flew to America for three months to the Miami Ad School run by Crispin Porter Bogusky. "The intensive course broadened my thinking," she enthuses. A well-known planner is flown in every weekend. A vacation home is available in Miami for the stars of the industry. Some of the lessons take place on the beach. "You get to meet the gurus in person like never before." Nevertheless, they work hard. Weekly projects with different focuses in the areas of brand management, market research, target group research and media strategy. Within the three months, the students also had to develop their own project together with creative professionals. Fecker's group developed a pitch for FedEx.
The final presentation was won by the Swiss girl. She was also the best of the year with her concept. Her idea was based on the fact that 80 percent of all customers track their parcels via the Internet. Why is that? "The fascination that customers feel when they can trigger the take-off of an airplane with the click of a mouse." This is how Fecker formulated the strategy: "FedEx enables even small fish to play God." SMEs naturally find this relevant because they are otherwise always the underdogs.
The idea landed her a job in New York. A lecturer called her - barely back in Switzerland: "Do you want a job in New York?" So she flew back across the pond and worked for TBWA\Chiat\Day for a year and a half as a planner in David Hackworthy's team. "Alongside Dominique von Matt, I learned the most from him."
In 2004, her mentor Hackworthy moved to London and founded The Red Brick Road there. The time had come for Fecker to return to Europe. She accepted an offer from TBWA Berlin. There she was allowed to take over the management of Planning. "During this time, we were able to win the account for Siemens worldwide," she says proudly. Nevertheless, she didn't want to stay in Berlin for longer than eight months because of her relationship in Zurich. That was possible with New York. It was simply far away. Berlin beckoned with a quick visit every weekend. But there wasn't enough time. In the end, Regula Fecker was welcomed back with open arms not only by her boyfriend, advertising photographer Jonathan Heyer, but also by her old employer Jung von Matt Limmat. After two years as a planner, she set up her own business, "Regula Fecker, Strategische Planung".
How can you motivate someone to do something? Regula Fecker always wanted to "do something that creates a connection between thought and action. That triggers something." With the experience she has gained in her previous work, Fecker felt it was "the right time to become self-employed". She finds it an advantage that, as an independent strategist, she can also guarantee media neutrality. Focusing on an idea and not asking right from the start: Is there a TV commercial or posters? There are more and more new media or at least differently fragmented media.
Her clients are advertising and media agencies, but also advertising clients. Some of them want research: How can I provide my agency with better foundations? Fecker sees herself as an interface between clients and agencies. She also wants to work internationally and has already received an order from London from her former boss.
Fecker can count on a good network of contacts. She is a member of the BSW training committee. She has also made many contacts as a course instructor at Sawi. There she set up the intensive Crossmedia Kompressor course.
In her area of expertise, she says that more and more customers are now intervening in content. They want to help shape broadcast formats, for example. A migration from the classic advertising section to content can be observed. This is sometimes cleverly done, as with 20 Minuten. In other projects, it still seems "sometimes awkward". YouTube or MySpace are being watched with suspicious eyes by the entire advertising scene and copied - but still not really understood. "You can tell when advertisers want to jump on a bandwagon." The same applies to podcasts. "I see a lot of opportunities there. But only the most obvious things are implemented."
Regula Fecker is also involved in various areas of communication in her private life. She helped build up the Eleven snowboard label for friends and made the brand number 2 in Switzerland and number 8 in Europe in seven years. In the NPO sector, she works for "Tischlein deck dich", where expired food is distributed to people in need. She is also involved in promoting the ETH spin-off MyClimate, where people like her pay a fixed percentage of every flight ticket as compensation for CO2 emissions. And to relax, Fecker does "yoga - like everyone else in this world".
Andreas Panzeri
