An additional radio station will go on air in Switzerland during the upcoming European Football Championship Euro 08. The project called "Radio 11 - The Rhythm of Football" covers the host cities of Basel, Bern, Geneva and Zurich, as announced by the Federal Office of Communications. Bakom has granted the station a license for 30 days. The temporary radio station will broadcast around the clock during the Euro. It aims to inform and entertain guests from abroad and Swiss football fans with music and information about the tournament. Presentations will mainly be in English, German and French. The most important information for tourists and fans will also be broadcast in the languages of the countries whose teams are playing in Switzerland.
According to 20 Minuten, Oliver Scotoni and Miguel Alvarez are behind the project. Scotoni already initiated the temporary radio station Rundfunk.fm, which goes on air in Zurich's National Museum every summer. With the football radio station, the two want to be "the acoustic host and constant companion of the Euro". The station's team will consist of 30 to 40 employees, including 15 to 20 presenters.
Euro 2008 has also awakened other radio enthusiasts. A further license application for the period of the European Football Championship is pending at Bakom, said spokeswoman Caroline Sauser at the request of SDA. The Federal Office is also in contact with another provider. The spokesperson did not provide any details due to the ongoing negotiations. It remains to be seen when decisions will be made. However, it is not easy to find free FM frequencies.

 The advertising agency Grey, with offices in Geneva and Baden, has won the mandate from the French-speaking Swiss daily newspaper Le Temps. It won the contract in a pitch against budget holder Rive Gauche and Saatchi & Saatchi Simko, as Grey announced. The new campaign will combine image and subscription advertising as well as below-the-line measures in a holistic appearance. It will be launched this spring to coincide with the tenth anniversary of the Geneva daily newspaper. Le Temps was created in 1998 from the merger of Nouveau Quotidien with Le Journal de Genève and Gazette de Lausanne. Its two main shareholders are the two media companies Edipresse and Ringier.

Ruf Lanz literally turns the customers of the Sport Factory Outlet in the Bally area in Schönenwerd into advertising media. The creative agency had 50,000 carrier bags custom-printed with luxurious ladies' handbags, imposing boomboxes and expensive mobile cams. So that it looks as if the customers are carrying these expensive items around with them. With its permanently low prices, the Sport Factory Outlet ultimately ensures that there is enough money left over for other things, Ruf Lanz said.
Responsible at Sport Factory Outlet:
Peter Wider (overall responsibility). Responsible at Ruf Lanz: Markus Ruf, Danielle Lanz (Creative Direction), Grit Wolany (Art Direction), Torsten Maas (Text), Michèle Leibacher (Consulting). Photography: Felix Streuli.

 Unilever is using an unusual form of advertising for its new Knorr campaign in Germany: The Group has booked a hinge island for January 28 on RTL at 6:40 p.m. in its entirety. All commercials will be shown in black and white - with the exception of the Knorr commercials. All content on the RTL.de website will also remain in black and white on this day between 4 p.m. and 8.30 p.m., with only the Knorr banner to be in color, according to Werben und Verkaufen. At the same time, Unilever is adopting the black and white look on Knorr.de. This form of advertising is intended to convey the color message of the new Knorr soups "Eat colorful". The idea was developed by Mindshare in Frankfurt and implemented by IP Deutschland together with Unilever.

 The Baden-based S&W advertising agency has added a new client to its portfolio with Altendorf-based PVA AG. PVA, a supplier of flooring, doors and wood-based materials, is building a unique new showroom, according to a press release. As part of the changes surrounding this construction project, PVA is also being given a new image, which S&W has developed as part of an integrated communication concept. The first measures will be implemented from spring. In addition to the communication around the new exhibition, the mandate includes the complete image and product communication and event organization.

  The provisionally signed media agreement with the EU has already made headlines due to its implications for TV advertising. Jean-Frédéric Jauslin, Director of the Federal Office of Culture (Bak), has now described the EU's stance as "extremely inflexible". The talks on Switzerland's participation in this agreement after 2010 threatened to become "very delicate", explained Jauslin at the Solothurn Film Festival. Federal President Pascal Couchepin wants to discuss the issue at a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the fringes of the Berlinale in February. Jauslin emphasized the value of the agreement, which grants Swiss filmmakers access to EU funding programmes: "We must be present on the international scene." At least partial Swiss participation in the Media Agreement is essential.
In December, Parliament instructed the Federal Council to renegotiate the media agreement. It wants to retain the Swiss TV advertising bans on alcohol, politics and religion (see
).

 The two telecom companies Sunrise and Swisscom have recently stood out in the public eye by attacking each other. Both are trying to scratch the image of the other provider, with Sunrise being particularly aggressive. For example, no sooner had Swisscom announced on Friday that it would be lowering the wholesale prices for its existing DSL broadband offerings than Sunrise followed suit with a communiqué. This is entitled "Swisscom comes under pressure" and hardly leaves a good hair on the competitor's head. Swisscom had been charging wholesale prices that were too high "for years". Although the price reduction is a "first step in the right direction", the resale of ADSL is still a loss-making business for Sunrise and other providers. In addition, "the fundamental distortion of competition" remains. The communiqué ends with the implied accusation that Swisscom offers its subsidiaries better prices than the other providers. It will be interesting to see how the verbal battles between the two companies develop.

 The Swiss advertising blogger with the euphonious pseudonym "Paul Reinzeichner" is apparently throwing in the towel. For a good year and a half, he reported on good and bad advertising and criticized the latter without restraint. Now he is shutting down the blog at the end of January after becoming "famous and filthy rich" - which is probably meant to be as ironic as his other declarations of intent: "I'm going to retire to my finca in Andalusia, produce a wine that is scorned by the experts because it is totally unrecognized, dry hand-picked tomatoes, press fine olive oil and enjoy the good life". In a more serious tone, Paul Reinzeichner then writes that he simply doesn't want to continue blogging and wants to stop while the going is good. Reinzeichner explains on his blog that he has "worked his way out of the lead desert as a black artist into the colorful world of double-sided ads" and now feels called upon to comment on advertising in Switzerland (see also
).

 The French-speaking Swiss media and healthcare group Agen is ironing out accounting deficiencies in its 2006 annual report that were criticized by the Swiss stock exchange SWX. The departure of former L'Agéfi patron Alain Fabarez also caused a stir at Agen. Agen will correct and disclose the errors criticized by SWX with retroactive effect, the Swiss stock exchange SWX announced on Thursday. Agen will also pay CHF 20,000 to the accounting committee.
The deficiencies relate to the incorrect recognition of share-based payments and the non-compliant calculation and disclosure of impairment.
The error correction has positive consequences for Agen, which has been hit by losses: It will lead to a reduction in losses of CHF 2.7 million. After the correction, the net loss amounts to CHF 30.8 million, as Agen announced on Thursday.
The resignation of Alain Fabarez from the Board of Directors of the French-speaking Swiss company also made headlines. The former delegate of the Board of Directors and patron of the business newspaper L'Agefi resigned his mandate due to "differences of opinion".
According to the share guide, Fabarez holds 7.7 percent of Agen. When asked by the SDA news agency on Wednesday, Fabarez did not wish to comment further on the reasons for the separation. Agen spokesman Gerard Sermier explained that a deep rift had opened up between Fabarez and the Board of Directors regarding the Group's future strategy.
The Board of Directors, chaired by Raymond Loretan, intends to propose several new members for the Supervisory Board at the Annual General Meeting on June 11. Until then, the Board of Directors still has four members.

Weltwoche opens its current issue with the story "Panic among the oil sheikhs", which focuses on alternative fuels. The cover picture shows hand-wringing sheikhs lamenting their plight. If you turn the page, you will find a panoramic advertisement for Volvo on pages 2 and 3 - and immediately recognize the graphic elements. The oil sheikhs on the cover are from the car manufacturer's latest ad, developed by the Spillmann/Felser/Leo Burnett agency. The subject advertises environmentally friendly engines. Although the Arab men on the Weltwoche cover are grouped differently, the visual language is unmistakably the same.
"This is a playful, creative collaboration," Weltwoche editor-in-chief and publisher Roger Köppel tells Werbewoche about the creation of this issue opener. It came about by chance; Köppel calls it a "lucky punch" and a joke that was allowed to happen.
The "exact course of events" went like this: Köppel had talked to Volvo marketing boss and former ORF journalist Georg Redlhammer about the Austrian media landscape. In the course of the conversation, Köppel asked about Volvo's advertising plans, "whereupon Redlhammer pulled out a folder and showed me the sheikhs". The Weltwoche editorial team was already considering a story about alternative energies at the time and Köppel therefore asked if he could use the picture as an illustration. "A cover illustration like that is expensive! Redlhammer agreed and thought that Volvo would then also place an advertisement," says Köppel. The Weltwoche crew subsequently received the graphic material from SFLB and used it to create the illustration.

The car company paid for the Panorama advertisement on pages 2 and 3, but no money was paid for the front page. "It's not a cover or jacket ad, but an illustration," emphasized the Weltwoche boss. For Volvo, however, the resulting attention was of course "gratifying". And he himself is pleased with the beautiful cover, Köppel continued. "The only pity is that our title is not the first in which the ad appears. That would have been a great premiere".
He sees no reason to fear that this would violate the separation of editorial and advertising content. "Every newspaper has to be attractive on the advertising market, but always remain credible," says Köppel. There was no influence from Volvo. "I probably wouldn't have used this illustration if the article had been about the car industry or even Volvo. And we only recently criticized the alternative fuel bioethanol, which Volvo mentions in the advertisement, in the magazine." He does not believe that he would have acted differently if he were not also a publisher in addition to his role as editor-in-chief. Whether the combination of cover illustration and advertisement on the following page will be used again at Weltwoche remains to be seen: "It's probably the exception that everything fits together so well," says Köppel. However, he is always open to "attractive advertising solutions".
Volvo marketing boss Redlhammer also explains that the story came about by chance. Could Volvo's image suffer from the possible accusation that the company is crossing the line between editorial and advertising with this campaign? The former journalist doesn't think so. "This boundary is also sacred to me. The editorial team must not be influenced under any circumstances. Besides, the current Weltwoche article on alternative energies would have appeared anyway." Redlhammer is delighted with the cover illustration and says that the collaboration went exactly as he would have wished as an advertising client: "We are more of a partner than a client
at Weltwoche". He is still looking for innovative placements and ideas with which he can bring Volvo into the conversation: "Publishers are challenged here to make exciting offers to customers". Carole Scheidegger

 Now it's out: despite their numerous appearances in television commercials, the brothers Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko are not actors in terms of social security law. The Federal Social Court in Kassel has clarified in a landmark ruling that advertising professional athletes are not artists and therefore do not have to pay social security contributions for artists.
"Athletes like the Klitschkos are not hired because of their performing skills, but because of their celebrity and their role model function. This means that they are not artists," it said in the grounds for the ruling. The claim in question amounted to around 25,000 euros.
It's too nice to think that every socially recognized actor would be hired for their acting skills and not for their celebrity...

From January 25, 2008, the investor magazine Stocks will appear in a new layout. Launched in 2000, the magazine aims to bring more research, topicality and investment tips into the magazine. In future, the magazine will comprise five clearly separated sections: Markets, Structured Products, Funds & Bonds and Stocks. This should make it easier for readers to find their way around. Each chapter will be introduced by separate opening pages; these will contain news as well as short interviews and assessments of current market events.
In future, the expanded share price section will include more stocks than before, including those from the emerging markets. As a result, Stocks offers price data and valuation ratios that are otherwise not freely available to private investors, according to a press release.
Stocks remains true to its philosophy as an investor magazine that consistently focuses on the personal investment success of its readership. The title has a certified circulation of 20,736 copies and a readership of 55,000. Matter & Gretener is currently running a campaign to promote the investor magazine (see
).