The printing center Birkhäuser+GBC, which belongs to Basler Zeitung Medien and is based in Reinach and Basel, is cutting 55 of a total of 420 jobs by the end of the month as a result of restructuring measures. This was announced by the company on Monday. Basler Zeitung had already cut 22 jobs in January and nine more at Birkhäuser at the end of March. Then as now, the economic crisis was cited as the reason for the redundancies.
The crisis must not become a cover for profit-oriented cost-cutting plans, according to a press release from the Comedia trade union. In October of last year, the annual report 07/08 of Basler Zeitung Medien reported a slightly improved business result and also highlighted the higher profits of the printing center. Apparently, however, these had not been set aside as reserves, but had disappeared into the pockets of the Hagemann family, the union continues.
In the event of mass redundancies, Comedia wants to ensure that both the Participation Act and the recently concluded collective labor agreement are complied with.

After the World Press Photo Awards 2008 were presented in February, the traveling exhibition is now coming to Zurich. From May 8 to 31, 2009, the award-winning photographs will be on display in the Papiersaal in Sihlcity, including pictures by two photographers from Switzerland - Jean Revillard and Philippe Dudouit. The organizer is Keystone.

EWL Energie Wasser Luzern has launched a new campaign to draw attention to its range of green electricity. The aim is to promote the two electricity products Lucerne hydropower and Lucerne solar power. Posters, advertisements and banners are being used. The energy service company has been offering locally produced green electricity for almost ten years.

Responsible at EWL: Iris Isenschmid (Head of Communications), Cécile Berlinger (Project Management), Peter Raas (Graphics).

Blick, Tagesanzeiger and NZZ can no longer be obtained via the traditional sales boxes since the beginning of May. Tamedia spokesperson Christoph Zimmer told SDA in response to an inquiry that readers were not using the service enough, so filling the boxes was no longer worthwhile.
On average, just one Tages-Anzeiger is sold per box per week, Zimmer said in response to a report by the Zurich-Schaffhausen regional radio station Schweizer Radio DRS. There are simply too many other ways to buy a newspaper. In the canton of Zurich alone, for example, there are 1,200 sales outlets, most of them kiosks.
Newspaper sales via boxes have been declining for at least ten years, Zimmer continued. This spring, together with NZZ and Blick, the decision was made to dispense with the boxes. Most of the boxes are located in the canton of Zurich. However, the boxes will not disappear from the streetscape. Sunday newspapers will continue to be sold in this way.

In the wake of the departure of ADC President Jean Etienne Aebi, the General Assembly of the Art Directors Club Switzerland decided on May 5, 2009 in favor of collective leadership. Markus Gut, Alexander Jaggy, Markus Ruf and Martin Spillmann will assume the joint presidency. They will cover the spectrum of interests of the diverse members, from freelancers to representatives of major agencies. Board members with departmental responsibility are Geri Aebi, Valentina Herrmann, Daniel Krieg, Andreas Prokesch and Urs Schrepfer. Helen Müller will remain in charge of management.
Several people are stepping down from the Board of Directors: David Allemann, Michael Conrad, Marion Marxer and Hanspeter Schweizer - together with outgoing President Jean Etienne Aebi. The change of course he proposed and adopted three years ago towards greater public impact and relevance of the ADC for all market partners has been extremely successful. Aebi now considers his turnaround job to be complete - and leaves behind a sustainably consolidated situation in terms of the club's reputation and image as well as its organization and structure.
His achievements also include a number of new activities for the ADC: Specialist events for executives, ADC Prediction by Publisuisse, special awards such as the Publicitas Press Prize and the Agency of the Year award, exclusive events such as the APG preview of the "Politicians' Heads" exhibition, the Young Creatives Award competition, collegial memberships for 39 strategists, consultants, media people, realizers and 26 sponsoring memberships of well-known companies to date.
The ADC community has changed significantly. The last two events in the "Backstage of Benchmark" series, one in cooperation with Handelszeitung and Bilanz, attracted a record number of participants from marketing and media circles. The same applies to the awards ceremony and the ADC Gala 09, as well as to the echoes of the unique festival medium "Brisanz", which appeared for the second time in a more journalistically sophisticated form. The 08/09 association year was also an all-time record for the ADC in terms of media presence, both editorially and in terms of advertising made possible by media partners.
In addition to its traditional core activities, the club was able to generate substantial additional funding, which has mainly resulted from the opening strategy for the past three years - and was even higher in the reporting year. Led by general sponsor PubliGroupe and multi-sponsor Publisuisse, financial contributions of CHF 311,000 came from sponsorship, supporting memberships and event participation. In addition, there were free benefits of CHF 313,000 from media and realization partnerships plus additional activities by sponsors. This contrasts with direct additional expenditure of 123,000 francs. However, the ADC is not unaffected by the current economic situation. Entries for the judging process fell by 28 percent compared to the previous year and the volume of advertising in the festival medium fell by 15 percent.
(Photo: Jean Etienne Aebi / Teaser image: Markus Gut, Alexander Jaggy, Markus Ruf and Martin Spillmann)

Michael Ringier believes in the future of the newspaper. In an interview in Monday's edition of the Mittellandzeitung, Ringier said that printed newspapers clearly have an edge in terms of quality. He assumes that free newspapers will have a positive impact on the reading habits of young people in particular. However, a newspaper has to present itself much more convincingly to young people today. This is only possible if good journalism is offered - better written, more exclusive, better researched, more well-founded, more surprising, more cheerful and more emotional. The Internet, on the other hand, is a "grab bag of nonsense, trash, trash, slander and slander", Ringier continued. Good journalism is rare on the Internet.
However, the future belongs to both the Internet and newspapers and lies in the networking of several media. For publishers, however, it makes no sense to put all content online for free. This will also change at Ringier. Ringier also assumes that there will only be two or three large media houses in Switzerland in the future. Very small local media with an emotional monopoly on catchment could also continue to exist. However, it will be very difficult for the larger medium-sized companies.

(Image source: Keystone)

Publication of the free newspaper .ch will cease with immediate effect and the last issue will be published on Monday, May 4. This was decided by the Board of Directors of Punkt ch AG after intensive discussions about the very difficult economic environment and the uncertain outlook, the company writes in a press release on Monday. The extent of the recessionary development could not have been foreseen during the relaunch in October 2008. In view of the severity of the economic crisis and the uncertainty about its duration, the Board of Directors no longer considers it realistic that .ch will reach the profit zone by the end of 2011 as planned. Investors would now have to inject large sums in the double-digit millions. They are not prepared to do this, Buob told SDA. The decision to definitively discontinue .ch is now subject to the participation rights of employees, who can make suggestions to save the newspaper.
" Discontinuation of .ch: trade unions demand social plan
The layoffs will affect 69 employees in the editorial and publishing departments. A total of 61 jobs will be cut. The free newspaper .ch, which is one hundred percent financed by advertising, was first published in mid-September 2007. After a difficult start-up phase, it was relaunched in October 2008. The new editorial concept and the exclusive distribution via boxes and colporteurs led to the number of daily readers almost doubling to around 400,000 within just a few months, the publisher continues. Due to the recession, however, the development of advertising was below plan.
Great consternation on the editorial team
Editor-in-chief Rolf Leeb said at the request of the SDA that the editorial team was deeply saddened. After the successful restart, the company was "well on the way, confident and full of energy". However, in view of the economic situation, he has a certain understanding for the decision of the Board of Directors.
No impact on the Tamedia free title News
Following the end of .ch, three national free newspapers now remain on the Swiss free newspaper market: Market leader 20 Minuten, News and Blick am Abend. The decision of the Board of Directors of .ch has no impact on News, Tamedia spokesperson Christoph Zimmer told Werbewoche. "And although it is often claimed, it is not true that News was launched as a competitor to .ch." The aim of News is to strengthen the media networks of the three daily newspapers Tages-Anzeiger, Berner Zeitung and Basler Zeitung. Commenting on the end of .ch, Zimmer says that as the number of titles continued to grow, it soon became clear that the market was too small for so many commuter newspapers. "Against this background, the end of .ch in the midst of the economic crisis comes as no surprise."
.ch was only able to survive for just over 1 1/2 years
.ch first appeared in mid-September 2007. After a difficult start-up phase and the failure of the home delivery concept, the newspaper was relaunched in October 2008. The shareholders had planned to increase the share capital of the old company from ten to 18 million francs. However, this plan failed due to the will of the investors. They only approved five million francs. Since its relaunch, the free daily newspaper has appeared in around 2000 newspaper boxes in public places in several Swiss cities.
" Last issue of .ch (Zurich)

The JWT+H+F advertising agency has created an advertisement for the Impuls Mittelschule project group. It is intended to draw attention to the exhibition of the 50 best Matura theses. For once, the seventh exhibition from May 6 to 19, 2009 will take place in the ETH Zurich and not, as usual, in the Stadthaus. The motif illustrates the parade of the brightest minds. Posters, flyers and various printed materials will be used.
JWT+H+F has held the mandate of the project group, which is responsible for the joint public relations work of Zurich's secondary schools, since the beginning.

Responsible for Impuls Mittelschule Zürich: Alexandra Siegrist-Tsakanakis (Head of the Maturity Thesis Exhibition). Responsible for JWT+H+F: Remy Fabrikant (overall responsibility), Grischa Rubinick, Enrico Bachmann (CD), Reto Baumann, Jennifer Rimann (consulting), Mathias Bart (text), Sebastian Day (graphics), Felix Streuli (photography). Image processing: Rohnerretouche.net.

A fiber optic connection will be more expensive in Switzerland's peripheral regions than in cities. According to the head of the Communications Commission Comcom, Marc Furrer, the network cannot be built without these differences.
Politically, this is feasible: "The fiber optic network is not part of the basic service," said Furrer in an interview with the Sonntagszeitung. Demand will generally be greater in the cities. The heads of the telecom providers have now accepted the multi-fiber model, Furrer continued. "There will be at least two fibers throughout Switzerland, along the entire route between the socket and the local exchange."
Swisscom and the electricity companies, which operate fiber optic networks in parallel, would have to standardize their technology, says Furrer. Providers without their own infrastructure, such as Sunrise, should be able to access the transmission lines without additional investment. Furrer is expecting proposals on this from a working group.
Alternative providers such as Colt and Green are dependent on a central purchasing point. This would give the electricity companies a chance, said Furrer. However, they would have to harmonize technical standards and commercial offers.

Pharmaceutical companies may only present their Internet advertising for prescription drugs to doctors and pharmacists in a password-protected area. A mere warning is not sufficient to keep laypersons away. This was decided by the Federal Supreme Court.
In Switzerland, prescription medicines may only be advertised to specialists. In order to enforce the ban on general advertising to the public on the Internet, the Swiss Agency for Therapeutic Products Swissmedic requested the pharmaceutical industry to password-protect such advertising on their websites. The Federal Administrative Court has now dismissed the appeals lodged against this by two affected companies. They had argued that warning notices should suffice to ensure the ban on advertising to the general public.
According to the judges in Bern, however, mere warnings do not constitute an effective access restriction. Internet content that can be accessed by simply clicking on a declaration of consent should rather be considered generally accessible. The decision can still be appealed to the Federal Supreme Court.

Walker Advertising Agency's Ebay Attack campaign has been nominated at the UK's D&AD creative awards. Around 20,000 entries from all over the world were evaluated this year by the international jury of experts. Only 0.04 percent of the entries made it into the D&AD yearbook - Walker as the only Swiss advertising agency. The hat trick was achieved this year in the Direct category. The advertising campaign for Amnesty International was considered for the third time in a row. Which of the nominated entries will ultimately receive a Yellow Pencil will be announced on June 11, 2009 at the D&AD Gala in London.

New Rega film makes it onto the Shots reel
The TV spot for the Swiss Air Rescue Rega also made it onto the British Emap Media Group's Shots Roll. The film "Heaven Can Wait" was included in the archive of the best advertising films by British journalists. The spot, along with other films from the past quarter, will be published on the Shots DVD next month. The Rega film is already the third commercial from the Zurich agency to land on the Shots reel.

Responsible at Rega: Walter Stünzi (Head of Communications), Maria Betschart (Communications). Responsible at Walker Advertising Agency: Pius Walker (CD), Roger Beckett, Justin Barnes (text), Andrew Smart, Benn Callis (AD), Adrian Fluri (consulting director). Production Company: Academy Films, London, Martin de Thurah (Director), Simon Cooper (Producer).