Contexta has prevailed in a multi-stage pitch and won Touring Club Switzerland TCS as a new client. Jacueline Raemy Bessa, Marketing Communication Manager at TCS, was quoted in Thursday's press release as saying that the Bern-based agency impressed with its strategy and consistent implementation. Contexta, for its part, is delighted with its new client, which is headquartered in Vernier near Geneva. The versatility and club character of TCS are an exciting challenge.
The first results of the collaboration will be seen in 2009.

Roger Schawinski and his partners are also contesting the award of the concession to Radio Grischa for Südostschweiz. In particular, they criticize the monopoly situation created by the Südostschweiz media group. Schawinski and his partners, who came away empty-handed with the Radio Südost project, announced this on Thursday, according to SDA. The legislator had not wanted to cement monopoly structures with public fee money.
In the opinion of the complainants, significant factors were not taken into account in the case of Radio Südost. The Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications (DETEC) had failed to examine the threat to the diversity of offerings and opinions at all. In addition, several points in the assessment of the so-called input and output factors are objected to.
Schawinski had already appealed the licensing decision for the canton of Aargau to the Federal Administrative Court because he had lost out to the existing Radio Argovia with his Radio AG project. The Zurich radio producer had set out to break the monopolies of the local media houses in both Aargau and south-eastern Switzerland.

The St. Gallen Trendcommerce Group made it to the first place of the Pixi Awards 2008 in Chicago with the realization of the after sales program of General Motors in the category direct marketing.
Xerox's annual Pixi Awards (Printing Innovation with Xerox Imaging) recognize excellence and innovation in digital printing applications, according to a statement. Nearly 500 entries from around the world were submitted this year. The project submissions were independently evaluated by industry experts. Decisive criteria included innovation in the use of digital technologies, business efficiency and effectiveness, and aesthetics.

The Swiss Press Association published a communiqué on Thursday in which it comments on the demands made by the media union Comedia as part of the "Stand up for Journalism" day of action last November 4.
Irrespective of the looming economic downturn, the financial leeway of most media companies is also shrinking due to new media offerings, writes the association. Publishers and journalists are in the same boat.
They therefore have a common interest in finding sustainable solutions for their industry. According to the Swiss Press Association, journalistic quality and credibility are the most important foundations for the success of a publishing house. However, financial viability should not be disregarded either.

The registration deadline for the 16th International Sponsoring Award has been extended to December 22, 2008. This is reported by the professional association for sponsoring Faspo.
The best sponsorship projects of 2008 are being sought in the categories of sports, cultural, media and public sponsorship. In addition, an innovation prize will be awarded for new solutions and approaches in sponsoring. Sponsoring projects from Germany, Austria and Switzerland will be honored.
More information about the call here.

Complaints continue to pile up against the awarding of licenses by the Uvek. Now
Tele Säntis has appealed to the Federal Administrative Court. The Uvek had rejected the broadcaster's application for an independent regional television station for the coverage area of Region 11 Eastern Switzerland (cantons of St. Gallen, Appenzell Ausserrhoden, Appenzell Innerrhoden and parts of the canton of Thurgau) and granted the license to Tele Ostschweiz.
"The decision of the Uvek of October 31, 2008 in the matter of Tele Säntis AG and TVO AG is being contested due to the incorrect assessment of the qualification and selection criteria, which are to be qualified as violations of the law, but also as exceeding or abusing the scope of discretion and the improper exercise of the official freedom of decision," writes Tele Top, which launched the TV project Tele Säntis, in a press release on Thursday.
In the appeal, the previous decisions of the Uvek, Bakom and even the Federal Council and the Federal Supreme Court on safeguarding the diversity of opinion and offerings in Eastern Switzerland are cited as a comparison. It is incomprehensible why the Uvek concludes in the contested decision that "the applicant TVO AG documents that it does not endanger the diversity of opinion and offerings", after the Federal Council explicitly presents the example of St. Gallen (Radio Aktuell, Tele Ostschweiz and St. Galler Tagblatt) in the dispatch on the total revision of the RTVA as a "potential impairment of journalistic diversity", the press release continues.
Tele Säntis also complains that competitor Tele Ostschweiz made unauthorized improvements to the licence application during the submission procedure. It is regrettable, also in view of the licensing of the practically identical application from Tele Top in coverage area 10 (cantons of Zurich, Thurgau and Schaffhausen), that obviously for political reasons the licensing in the two important coverage areas 10 and 11 was not allowed to be awarded to the same broadcaster, the statement concludes.

The new gourmet bible has been published. In the current edition of the Gault Millau restaurant guide, 800 different restaurants are tested on 576 pages.
Publicis is advertising the print product from Ringier with a reference to the fine taste buds of the target audience with a tongue that can be pampered in a spa. The motif will appear as an advertisement and poster from mid-December. The Gault Millau 2009 is already available.
Responsible at Ringier: Urs Heller (Publishing Director), Nicole Wesche (Product Manager). Responsible at Publicis: Florian Beck (Creative Director), Ondrej Maczko (Art Director), Serge Deville (Text), Barney Rees (Graphics), Silvia Holend (Consulting), Vera Schmid (Art Buying), Oliver Nanzig (Photography), Patrik Rohner (Image Editing).

The German weekly newspaper Die Zeit has launched its Swiss adventure with a dossier entitled "What the Swiss can do better than the Germans". From now on, the weekly will be published every Thursday with two Switzerland pages edited by former Weltwoche culture editor Peer Teuwsen.
Among other things, the authors of the first edition explore the question of where the secret of Swiss success in politics, business, science, culture and sport lies. The Swiss have serenity and pragmatism in their genes, they say. However, success is not only due to the fact that the Swiss work well. They also know how to integrate foreign workers. Switzerland as a whole can be seen as a well-functioning international consortium.
Under the title "Deep love for the railroads", Federal Councillor Moritz Leuenberger explains Swiss transport policy as a guest author. In his text, he discusses, among other things, the half-hourly and hourly intervals and explains the policy of shifting traffic from road to rail, which underlines the constructive cooperation with Europe.
The ETH as a top European university and the emigration of Germans to Switzerland are also among the topics covered.
Teuwsen is supported on his Switzerland pages by Zeit journalist Urs Willmann. Guest authors and columnists are Roger de Weck, Mathias Plüss, Roland Fischer and Silvano Cerutti. With the new extras tailored to local readers, the Hamburg-based newspaper plans to increase its circulation in Switzerland from the current 7,000 to 10,000 copies in the medium term. This should increase the number of readers to 40,000.

LZ Medien is investing around CHF 15 million in its Multicolor Print commercial printing plant and in Calendaria AG. This will create the most technologically advanced commercial printing plant in Switzerland in Baar.
The companies Multicolor Print and Calendaria, which belong to LZ Medien Holding, have ordered a total of 29 printing and 4 coating units from Heidelberg Switzerland. At the same time, the commercial print shops in Baar and Buchs will be equipped with two new digital printing presses. As a result, Multicolor can now offer the entire range of commercial printing services from digital printing to sheet-fed printing in any format to suit customer requirements, as LZ Medien writes in a press release issued on Thursday.
Multicolor Print and Calendaria are subsidiaries of LZ Medien Holding AG. LZ Medien Holding AG has around 550 employees and achieved sales of CHF 149.1 million in 2007.

(Image: They signed a contract for 33 printing units (from left): Philippe Andrey, Key Account Manager Heidelberg Schweiz AG, Regula Kurz, Managing Director Calendaria AG, Reginald Rettig, Managing Director Heidelberg Schweiz AG, Werner Amrhein, Production Manager Printing, Multicolor Print AG, Daniel Ettlinger, Managing Director Multicolor Print AG, Erwin Bachmann, CEO LZ Medien Holding AG)

The international vacation region of Lake Constance wants to market itself better in future with a uniform logo. According to the SDA, a study is currently being carried out to determine which features should be included in the "Lake Constance" brand and will be implemented step by step. The study will examine what role culture, culinary delights, wine, sport, conference and shopping opportunities will play in the future advertising presence. At the same time, the aim is to dust off the image of Lake Constance.
The IBT shareholders are providing around 200,000 euros for the Lake Constance brand study. This is supplemented by EU funding and the project partners' own contributions, for example from the universities in St. Gallen and Constance. The IBT was founded in 1997. The umbrella organization has ten members from the countries bordering Lake Constance: Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Liechtenstein.

Newsnetz supports the Adcare association and has signed a donor agreement for 40,000 ad impressions. This gives non-profit organizations the opportunity to place banners for their campaigns on the Tagesanzeiger.ch, Baz.ch and Bernerzeitung.ch websites free of charge.
Since 2006, the Adcare association has been placing banner ads for charitable organizations on major Internet portals in a monthly tendering process. While the Berner Zeitung and the Tagesanzeiger were already among the donors, the Basler Zeitung has now joined them via Newsnetz.

The two Zurich law firms Blum Attorneys at Law and RGS Rosenow Grob Schilling Attorneys at Law merged on December 1, 2008. In the spring of the current year, a pitch was held to evaluate the agency that would support the new company in terms of design and marketing. The Zurich agency By Heart emerged as the winner of this pitch. The agency has since developed the law firm's new image: From the logo, stationery and house lettering to various brochures, documentation, DM and advertising measures, the website was developed together with Eyecatcher.
Responsible at Blum & Grob Attorneys at Law, Zurich: Claude Blum and Hans-Ruedi Grob (overall responsibility), Valentina Pio-Loco (coordination/processing). Responsibility at By Heart: Hans Siegwart (CD), Markus Bircher (Strategy/Text), Jürg Riedweg (AD), Misha Gambetta (Consulting), Dominik Mory (Production Management). Photographer: Marc Straumann. Online: Eyecatcher, Zurich. Responsibility: Oliver Pel.