The German news magazine Der Spiegel intends to close its two foreign offices in Vienna and Singapore. Austria is to be covered by the Munich office, while the Southeast Asian region will be covered by the new editorial office in Bangkok, the magazine told the Süddeutsche Zeitung. Singapore will not be closed for another two and a half years.
There can be no talk of job cuts. The online editorial team will set up new offices in India and London. The editorial decision was made long before the 2008 financial crisis.

Bernische Kraftwerke (BKW) has been presented with the Public Eye Award by the WEF counter-event Public Eye on Davos. The negative prize for "irresponsible corporate behavior" was awarded to the energy company in an Internet vote because it is planning to build a coal-fired power plant in Dörpen, Lower Saxony, for 1.6 billion Swiss francs, while at the same time presenting itself as a green energy supplier in its advertising. In Switzerland, the company is promoting itself as a promoter of renewable energies, while abroad it is financing a polluter, according to a Public Eye press release. According to the communiqué, the 900-megawatt coal-fired power plant would produce 4.6 million tons of CO2 per year, which corresponds to around ten percent of Switzerland's total annual CO2 emissions.

Valencia Kommunikation has won the Kuhn Rikon advertising account. The advertising agency will now successively revise the communication presence of the traditional Swiss brand and redesign the packaging, according to a press release issued on Wednesday. The first advertising materials will be in use from mid-February.

Advertising and marketing have an easier time when the mood in the country is good. Because those who are confident are happy to spend money. That's what market researchers say. In America, the level of hope could not be higher after the inauguration of the first black president, Barack Obama. After the Bush slump, people are finally ready to trust their government again and invest in their country. Perfect for anyone who wants to sell something. Pepsi, for example.
Cheerfulness as an attitude to life
In the service of sales, the beverage company and its advertising agency TBWA Chiat Day from Los Angeles are banking fully on the Obama hype. Pepsi's new TV commercial and the accompanying poster campaign are riding the wave of positive sentiment that is currently sweeping America. Since Obama's inauguration, the fizzy drinks producer has been advertising on TV and on large-format posters with messages (like) from the president's mouth: "Hooray", "Change", "Hope" and "Yes you can". The creative team replaced individual vowels of the words with the Pepsi logo. Confidence and cheerfulness as an attitude to life - and Pepsi is right in the middle of it.
The logo also has a new smiling look: the broad white line that previously separated the red from the blue area is no longer S-shaped, but has a banana shape reminiscent of a smiling mouth. Overinterpreted? Not at all. The agency itself describes the new Pepsi icon as a "smiling logo". It is also remarkable how similar it is to the O logo from Obama's election campaign. Pepsi's claim is also new: "Every generation refreshes the world" is now the beverage manufacturer's hopeful slogan. On its website, Pepsi also presents the hopeful with great advance confidence: "Refresh America!", the company calls out to the president. "You can", you almost want to add in the maelstrom of euphoria.
Dear Mr. President
But that's not all of the advertising coup: Pepsi's Refresh campaign is coupled with a campaign on YouTube, which is promoted via the Pepsi website. "What would you want to say to the man who is about to refresh America?" asks the drinks manufacturer. As in an open letter, anyone who likes can answer this question and give Obama their hopes, wishes and fears - in the form of a video they have made themselves that can be uploaded to YouTube. According to Pepsi's message, the private films are intended to help the new president "refresh" America. A very American version of participation. And it is well received: More than 100 videos are already on the website. Let's get to work, Mr. President! Hopefully you won't be watching videos all the time instead of solving problems.
It will also be interesting to see whether the Oba¬ma euphoria campaign also boosts consumption of the soft drink. Pepsi's image has already benefited from the clever link with the nation's most popular figure and the spirit of optimism he spreads. And TBWA Chiat Day didn't even have to shoot an expensive commercial for this. A few words on a colorful background are enough - it just has to be the right words in the right place at the right time.
Well done!
Other companies in the USA are also using Obamamania to their advantage: Ikea is advertising with the slogan "Change Begins at Home", Dunkin' Donuts is launching a red, white and blue speckled stars-and-stripes donut and Ben & Jerry's a flavored ice cream called "Yes Pecan". Bon appétit! The German youth magazine Bravo has also been infected by the presidential hype: On January 14, the popular poster in the middle section of the magazine featured a likeness of Mr. Future himself, Barack Obama. Never before in the past 52 years has a politician made it to the poster position. But now. Bravo editor-in-chief Tom Junkersdorf explains the exceptional case: "With Barack Obama, the world has a new mega-star, no one currently has more fans." True. Hopefully Mr. President also feels at home among the movie stars and singing stars on the nursery wallpaper. But why not?
Anne-Friederike Wilhelm

Obama's campaign icon and the new Pepsi logo could be fraternal twins. Pepsi is also celebrating the Obama euphoria with its optimistic Refresh campaign and Dear Mr. President videos.

"We love it, we insure it." This claim is now advertising history. The insurance group is now using the slogan: "Come to our site." But there is more behind the change than just a copywriter's idea. From January 23, 2009, Axa Winterthur will also be offering banking products via the newly founded Axa Bank in Switzerland. As a direct bank, Axa-Bank offers its customers simple products with attractive interest rates and low fees. The new offering brings the Axa Group in Switzerland into line with its offshoots in other European markets such as Belgium, France and Germany, where Axa is already active in assurbanking and therefore sells banking products via the insurance channel.
KSB/SJ is now using a kick-off campaign to promote the Savings Account Plus with 1.6 percent interest. At the center of the campaign is the "Axa switch", i.e. the "red line", which was introduced in the summer. This is more than just a logo or design element, but symbolizes the transition from an existing to a new situation in the customer's life. It also expresses Axa's new, global positioning for Axa Bank - "Savings / redefined".
All advertising material dramatizes this new positioning and the attitude behind it by showing people crossing the Axa switch and thus moving to the side of Axa Bank. In two TV commercials, we see these people obviously reflecting on their current life situation. Of course, they quickly make the decision to change something and immediately jump over the Axa switch. This is intended to symbolize the change from a common world to a world with better services. (pan)

The Lowe agency, part of the Draftfcb/Lowe Group, has designed a poster and advertising campaign for Cablecom. The aim is to promote the improved quality of the cable network. Four subjects dramatize the speed disadvantage of the other cable network providers. The ads are intended to visualize the feelings that arise from slower surfing, the agency wrote in a press release on Wednesday.
The campaign has been running throughout Switzerland since the beginning of the year and is also accompanied by a mailing and special formats in the free newspaper 20 Minuten.

Responsible at Cablecom: Oli Bergmann (Head Marcom & Brand), Anna-Marie Siroka (Marcom Specialist Broadband). Responsible at Lowe: Daniel Comte (ECD), Nicolas Vontobel (CD), Sebastian Hugelshofer, Patricia Harzenmoser (AD), Beat Egger, Boris Beuckmann (Text), Melanie J. Auerbach (Art Buying), Rolf Jeger, Gina Armellino (Consulting).

This can only be an advertisement
A new competition format, a new record for entries: 85 campaigns featuring 368 ads were submitted to the fourth edition of the «Das kann nur ein Inserat» competition. From these, an expanded ADC jury selected two winners. Silvio Seiler (left in the photo) is an all-around advertising professional at Wegelin & Co., private bankers. Bettina Klossner from OgilvyOne (center) collaborated with Laurie Morard from Advico Young & Rubicam. Each idea will receive a prize of 10,000 Swiss francs, plus an appropriate fee for the implementation of the campaign. In addition, the three will travel to London in May at the invitation of Publicitas Publimedia to participate in BestYET, a competition for young creatives from across Europe. The Swiss Press Association, as the competition’s organizer, plans to feature the two campaigns again starting in May with over 500 placements in approximately 100 publications. The exhibition of all submitted entries and the announcement of the winners took place at the Basilica in Zurich.

Crime Scene: Zurich
«CSI,» «Criminal Minds,» «Criminel Intend»: 3+ is the TV channel with the most crime series. To promote this special lineup, the young TV channel opted for an unusual installation. Crime scenes were set up at various locations in Zurich. Behind the police tape, however, there was no body—just a TV set showing U.S. crime dramas. As detectives have discovered, the Publicis subsidiary Fast Track is behind the campaign.

Expert Knowledge on Eastern Europe
All the key facts at a glance: With the “Direct Marketing Guide to Eastern Europe,” Swiss Post International has published a handy handbook for doing business in Eastern Europe. Spanning 160 pages, the book offers expert insights into print direct marketing and mail-order business for Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, and Russia. In addition to over 80 charts, it also includes useful links and addresses, as well as in-depth analyses of market opportunities. The guide can be ordered free of charge at www.swisspost.com/dm-pass.

Fashion for the Crisis
Style everyone can afford: The Swiss company Thatsuits produces high-quality custom suits at affordable prices. This means that elegant custom-made clothing is no longer reserved solely for the highest earners. Garbage collector, auto mechanic, deep-sea fisherman: For the AY&R campaign, suits were tailored to suit classic working-class professions. Because in a made-to-measure suit from Thatsuits, everyone looks their best. The visuals are used regionally as posters, advertisements, in-store displays, hanging boxes, flyers, and for PR purposes.

What will the weather be like tomorrow? This is probably the most frequently asked question in the world and we ask about the weather several times a day. It influences our lives, our behavior, our moods. "And that's precisely why the weather is one of the most exciting topics for customized advertising," says Sandro Proietto, Head of Sales at Mediabox.
It is therefore quite a bright idea when the specialist for below-the-line, trend magazines and online advertising now wants to launch Switzerland's first weather pool on the market. By booking in the weather pool, you can reach over 1.5 million unique users in one fell swoop. The weather pool includes Meteo.ch, the first weather portal in Swiss Internet history, as well as MeteoNews.ch, the winner of the federal government's forecasting competition. Swisswebcams.ch has over 1,100 webcams and Wetter.ch is the most popular weather platform in Switzerland, according to Wemf.
The new weather pool is particularly suitable, for example, for weather-related advertising such as sun cream, pollen allergy remedies, alternative leisure programs in the rain or a convertible test drive in the sunshine.
A new tool called PosterAd is also expected to contribute to further good weather at Mediabox, which saw growth of over 50 percent in all units last year. As with AdSpot, where customers can "recycle" existing TV commercials on the web, PosterAd now gives existing posters or advertisements a second life on the web. The technology makes it possible for a special program on the screen to search for the free space next to the existing content on the site for the PosterAd subject. A technology that comes into its own particularly with the increasing number of 23-inch screens. "Here, the placement looks like a poster," says Proietto, pleased with this technical advantage of Mediabox. (pan)

With the new PosterAd tool, a conventional advertisement (above) can be made to look like a poster using the videoscreen.

Other topics in the 68-page first issue include Gunther von Hagen's Körperwelten exhibition, the folk theater play "Silo 8" and reports on Udo Jürgens and the Kastelruther Spatzen. For the sports enthusiasts among our readers, the coach of the Swiss ice hockey team, Ralph Krueger, sounds out his team's chances at the World Championships. Concert news, a competition, a ski extra with recommendations for the slopes and lots of CD, DVD, movie and reading tips round off the range of information. The most important and, at 16 pages, most comprehensive service element in the new magazine is an event guide, which replaces the Ticketnews event brochure previously published by Ticketcorner.
To members by home mail
In the "Member Special" section, Ticketcorner members are offered special extras, such as special discounts or exclusive events. In future, around 15,000 members of Good News, Switzerland's largest concert and event organizer, will also benefit from this. They have been taken over by Ticketcorner and integrated into the Ticketcorner VIP Member Club. Just like Ticketcorner VIP members, they will now find More in their letterboxes at home - as a replacement for the Good News Special from 20 Minuten Week, which was discontinued at the end of last year. "More offers added value on several levels," says a delighted George Egloff, CEO of Ticketcorner. "It is an independent magazine that editorially accompanies the offers and content of our ticketing customers and provides valuable information for a broad readership."
More will be published ten times a year with a total circulation of 22,000 copies, 200,000 in German and 20,000 in French. 100,000 copies will be enclosed with Schweizer Illustrierte, and 80,000 will be distributed at Ticketcorner ticket outlets and in the Hallenstadion Zurich. The editor-in-chief of the leisure magazine is Christoph Soltmannowski, Ticketcorner PR manager with many years of experience in entertainment and cultural journalism. He heads a team of five editors and two graphic designers. Soltmannowski uses freelancers for the photos. The Zurich agency Van Essel is responsible for the production and layout of More, while Publicitas Publimag AG is in charge of advertising acquisition.
Anne-Friederike Wilhelm

The Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM) has announced the main topic for media research in 2009. It is investigating how private
radio and TV stations must meet the requirements of the license with their information programming.
Private broadcasters must provide a public service at local level and, in particular, observe the diversity requirement. The performance mandate obliges them to provide a daily program that informs about the political, economic and social context and contributes to the development of cultural life in the coverage area.
The analysis of private radio and television stations complements the one that has been carried out at SRG since 2008. A representative survey of the audience is also to be carried out. Applications for contributions must be submitted by February 28. The cost ceiling for the radio and television analyses is CHF 150,000 each. The studies are to be carried out in 2009 and 2010, but an extension is not ruled out. The first results are to be presented in summer 2010.

The Agent Provocateur cinema commercial "Proof" from 2001, in which Kylie Minogue lolls around on a red rodeo bull in the manufacturer's sexy lingerie, has been voted the "Ultimate Cinema Ad". The vote on the British industry portal Brand Republic was launched by cinema advertising marketer Digital Cinema Media (DCM).
Kylie's hot bull ride was able to hold its own against ten other spots such as "Surfer" from Guinness, "Break" from Diet Coke and "Dambusters" from beer manufacturer Carling Black Label. The winning spot does exactly what a good movie spot should do, said Fleur Castell from DCM: it captures the audience and entertains them.

> To the spot

A phenomenon that is spreading faster than a flu epidemic: two million Internet users in Germany are now registered with Facebook. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg explained this at Hubert Burda Media's Digital Life Design (DLD) conference. In October, the figure was 1.2 million. According to Zuckerberg, around 150 million people worldwide use the contact network - and around one million new users join every week. Facebook is growing particularly fast in England. Despite the recession, ad sales are still going well, Zuckerberg continued. He is optimistic that Facebook will prevail over other portals such as StudiVZ or Myspace. The 24-year-old has no security concerns. Facebook gives users full control over their own data.
Facebook is also becoming increasingly popular in Switzerland and is increasingly being used as a means of exerting political pressure. For example, following a satirical column by Mario Güdel in the advisory magazine Beobachter, in which he made disparaging remarks about Valais, a Facebook group called "Mario Güdel läbt gferli und versteits nid" was formed. The group had over 1,500 members and prompted the editor-in-chief of the Beobachter to write a public apology to the people of Valais.
The Facebook group "Esther Maurer must go" is currently active and is plotting a coup against the politician. Whether the group will be successful is debatable. Mauro Tuena told the free newspaper 20 Minuten that the political pressure that such a group could exert should not be underestimated. The attacked Esther Maurer and Zurich SP President Koni Loepfe, on the other hand, are skeptical. All they have left for the Facebook campaign is a weary smile.