Health insurance with a healthy attitude

Reto Flury, Managing Director EGK, Ursula Vogt, Head of Communications EGK , Otto Gmeiner, CEO Dachcom (right).

EGK-Gesundheitskasse has been a reliable partner for its policyholders since 1919. EGK has grown in a pioneering role that treats complementary and conventional medicine equally. Today, EGK is one of the 15 largest health insurance companies out of a total of 60 in Switzerland. It stands out because it is still one of the few health insurers that can really demonstrate a strategy in the area of complementary medicine. "We have been following this development for a long time and are therefore perceived as a strong brand in this area," says EGK's Managing Director Reto Flury. But anyone who is perceived as a pioneer also has a history. And therefore a somewhat more "mature" image. EGK's corporate image has followed a similar path for around 25 years. "Now we wanted to refresh and modernize it," explains Flury. "But it's not about changing the image completely. We want to preserve our qualities and place them in a modern context," says communications manager Ursula Vogt.

When EGK started with complementary medicine, it was quickly given the image of a "green health insurer" with "grain lickers" as customers. This was also reflected in numerous events with which the insurer advertised its views to the public in the form of information. Such events will continue to take place in the future. In the meantime, however, complementary medicine has arrived in the middle of middle-class society. "Today, every young family is concerned about the issue: does it have to be a drug every time? Aren't there other, gentler remedies?" says Vogt. And EGK's communication should provide contemporary answers to such questions.

"Our challenge is that we now have a much broader target audience thanks to our good strategy. We want to appeal to this audience. That was one of the reasons why we wanted to redesign our corporate image," says Reto Flury about the briefing. The health insurance company invited three "very different agencies" to pitch for the new image. The EGK Board of Directors and Executive Board then decided to work with Dachcom in Rheineck.

"The EGK has a great history. Its appearance has something almost sacred to me. That's why we didn't want to create a completely new brand, but instead opted for a typical redesign in close teamwork with the client," explains Otto Gmeiner from Dachcom. The new EGK logo stands for naturalness, lightness and joie de vivre and has evolved from the existing one. The new brand image is now being introduced in stages. The work includes the brand redesign, the brand presence and internal and external communication. In addition, the EGK customer magazine was redesigned in terms of content and visuals and is now published under the new name "Vivere". It communicates EGK's services in a lively and informative way and deals with insurance, health promotion and current topics relating to the healthcare sector. As a first step, the changes to the logo were communicated internally to the 220 employees throughout Switzerland in an original way using a flip-book. An animated version of this "development film" is also available online. The current EGK company brochure was created at the same time as the new corporate design and conveys the service profile combined with values that stand for EGK-Gesundheitskasse.

Andreas Panzeri