WW: The 50th issue will be published on August 26 - will the anniversary be celebrated?

Mämä Sykora: Of course. On September 4, we're throwing a party for everyone. What's more, an - albeit rather small - section of the magazine is dedicated to the anniversary.

How did the whole thing actually start?

I have not been involved from the very beginning. I got involved early on, but I'm not one of the initiators. Funnily enough, it was a group of people who all come from the biggest soccer country in Switzerland ...

Aargauer?

(laughs) No ... Graubündeners who at some point were flushed out of Graubünden and then ended up in Bern or Zurich. Gian-Andri Casutt certainly played the biggest role in launching Zwölf. He connected interested parties and raised the necessary start-up capital. It was launched in 2007 and everyone thought the big euphoria would break out with the 2008 European Championship, so it was a good time to do it.

The euphoria then remained largely absent ...

Exactly. Fortunately, Twelve hit the mark anyway.

You joined the editorial team at the seventh issue and soon "worked your way up"?

Exactly, I slept my way up pretty quickly (laughs). At the time, the editorial team was based on the second floor of my Bombay Bar in Zurich's Kreis 4 - there was always a lively exchange. So I was involved in the magazine from an early stage.

Was Twelve modeled on the German magazine 11 Freunde, or is that a cliché?

The comparison is obvious. There are similar magazines all over Europe, but 11 Freunde is by far the biggest. They also started out like us, as an independent magazine, not a fanzine in the conventional sense. 11 Freunde is considered alternative, so the comparison is logical - and in terms of distribution and popularity, it's also a role model. Even though it now belongs to a large publishing house, which certainly limits its independence somewhat.

In what way?

The topics have to be entertaining, rarely go into depth. You can see that especially in the editions that come to the big tournaments: 180 pages, of which 100 pages are advertising and the rest branded articles - to put it exaggeratedly. In short: They've already monetized it a bit, too.

Back to Twelve: After 50 issues - don't you eventually run out of topics?

The Swiss football market is indeed very small. And our disadvantage - compared to 11 Freunde, for example - is just the historical aspect. In Germany, everything is meticulously written down. You could find material for countless stories in the club chronicles of every club. In Switzerland, on the other hand, there is very little documentation; you can't find things that are actually still there - that's why we often discover stories while researching other stories. As long as that happens to us, I'm not worried that we'll run out of topics. But of course we have to keep an eye on things, because: The Super League alone only has ten teams. The number of teams that attract attention and interest the masses is relatively small. That's why we try to make sure that we don't always focus on the same clubs. But that's the good thing about our readership: they're just as interested in a story about FC Brüttisellen as they are about FC Basel. Sometimes even more (laughs).

One of your core competencies seems to be data collection and analysis?

Mainly, we want to tell good stories. But it's important to us that all the key data is accurate. We are currently working with the Swiss Football League on an all-encompassing, public database on Swiss football going back to 1930. Our work is not limited to the magazine; we also do a lot of other work in the field of football and collaborate on projects.

It is noticeable, however, that you keep presenting statistics and data that no one else seems to have ...

This is not so much due to a secret database, but to the enormous effort that no one else wants to take on. For us, however, this is part and parcel of comprehensive research - everyone who works for us is a perfectionist.

You recently worked out how last season would have gone if there had been no wrong decisions - the story made it onto the wider media stage, so isn't it worth the effort?

This question always arises. If, for example, Blick online simply takes over a topic 1:1 and writes somewhere "as reported by Zwölf", very few people notice that it is not from Blick, but from us. You can see that in the comments below, when it says "once again typical Blick". It's always a tightrope walk between giving away content and hoping for an advertising effect.

Is Twelve still only possible because a few people have "en Egge ab", or would the product also work under "normal circumstances"?

It wouldn't work. Over time, our demands on a text have increased. If someone delivers an article and we think there's still some information missing, we expect him to look it up - even though this effort can't be paid for. Even if it is sometimes a completely exaggerated effort to find out whether XY has now made two or three games in the 70s for FC Brüttisellen. We expect that and our authors also have this expectation of themselves. Not every effort that people have for our magazine is paid in full - there's no other way. The lifeblood has to cover the rest. Even though it's extremely important to us that everyone who works for us is paid, both authors and photographers or illustrators - it's not always market rates, though.

Twelve is doing well. Apart from exceptions like Landliebe, no other print title manages to constantly increase its subscription figures ...

That is indeed special. We notice this, for example, in our kiosk neighbors: They have changed often in these eight years. Many magazines went out of business, new ones came in, these went out of business again - we're still here. So there must be something to it. But as I said, that's only possible because a lot of the work that's done is drudgery.

Have you exhausted the potential of subscribers yet?

No, there is still a lot of room for improvement. You always notice it in special campaigns. For example, if we discover something that is more Bundesliga-related, we sometimes pass it on to 11 friends. They post it somewhere and link us. The next day we have x new subscriptions. All people who knew 11 Friends, but not us. That's when you realize: there's still a lot in it.

Do you also have subscribers from abroad - not Swiss abroad, but "real" foreigners?

Yes, but only from Germany and Austria. Apparently they are interested in that (laughs). But of course there are only a few, most of them are from Switzerland. In general, however, there is still a lot of untapped potential. But it is difficult to reach this potential.

Why?

Because we put everything we earn into the magazine. There's nothing left over for marketing measures. But the scattering loss is also incredibly high. We've already done campaigns that were very costly, but had zero success.

For example?

Once, when Marc Zellweger played for Brühl, the club played St. Gallen in the Challenge League. We had an interview with Zellweger in the magazine and he was even on the cover. We thought it was worth going to this city derby and setting up a stand. The people from SC Brühl liked us, announced our stand several times over the loudspeakers. People truly snatched the free booklets out of our hands. We went with many booklets and did not come home with a single one. Result: one subscription. The effort was disproportionate to the income.

And the current promotion where you sent every subscriber an extra issue to give away?

It worked! We did the math and saw that if we could just get 50 new subscribers, the extra print run would be worth it. And it was worth it (laughs). Even though some people didn't understand the campaign at all. Some didn't even read the accompanying letter and contacted us to say they'd received two issues by mistake.

On the subject of newsstand sales, do you know what paid circulation depends on?

We'd love to know that, but we have no idea. We also think about the cover: Does it work on the newsstand? But it seems to have nothing to do with the cover. We once did an evaluation of what the best-selling numbers were at the newsstand. There were no conclusions about the type of cover. Symptomatically, the best-selling number in relation to the number of copies on the newsstand had a colleague of mine on the cover who was photographed from behind running out of the Letzigrund. That sold better than famous footballers on the front. We couldn't figure out what the reason was. But: We are not an extreme newsstand magazine anyway. Subscribers are more important to us, the newsstand is more of a subscription advertising tool. That's different in Germany, for example, which is more of a newsstand nation. That's why it's extremely important to 11 Freunde, for example, what they have on the cover and at which newsstands they're available. That's why there are almost only stars on the cover, often the big names. We would never have Shaqiri on the cover, that wouldn't suit us. When we had a Streller interview, Streller wasn't on the cover anyway.

What are the reasons?

Among other things, we want to set ourselves apart from the competition. In Switzerland, that's really only Eurosoccer magazine. But even that's not a competitor in the conventional sense, because they address a completely different target group. There, it's all stars, no research, and a Barnetta poster in the middle. We want to come across as different from a magazine that appeals to this target group.

Do you have any other mainstays, as is the trend in the media industry?

Our long-term goal was always to become a center of excellence for Swiss soccer. That's the obvious thing to do. Because there are so many people who do something with soccer but - without offending them - have no idea about it. They throw their money out the window and do something that doesn't work at all. So it wouldn't be bad to talk to someone in advance who has a little idea. We don't offer ourselves like an agency, but we advise a lot of companies and people or do research work, etc. We're not just a media agency. For example, if a media outlet wants to know what happened to all the U-17 world champions of all the nations, it's easier for them to ask us than if they first have to find out how to find out in the first place.

You probably enjoy a certain reputation in the sports journalism scene?

I find that difficult to judge. But we are certainly welcome and respected. Even among the footballers themselves. In the past, you've noticed that they've told us things in interviews that they wouldn't have told any other medium. Simply because we approached them differently, because we engaged them in conversation, because they realized that we didn't want to put them on the spot. Unfortunately, that has changed somewhat recently.

In what way?

It became much more difficult. That's one of our main problems. First of all, footballers today are not like they used to be, not as eager to give information, living in a kind of bubble that they leave briefly for an interview appointment and want to get back into as quickly as possible. They actually have no interest at all in talking to anyone. They are overprotective and tell much less on their own. Perhaps they also don't have as much to talk about because they are no longer as wild and fun as the earlier generations of footballers. They also experience less, are more even-tempered. Secondly, footballers are no longer allowed to say anything. Even if they tell us something spectacular, we have to submit it to a media spokesperson for proofreading and he will most likely delete it. We have to respect that if we want to maintain a good relationship with the clubs. The trend is toward overcaution.

In times of social media, shitstorms, etc., this is understandable to a certain extent ...

Still, just reading what Huggel or Smiljanić said in our interviews - that would no longer be allowed today. And that wasn't so long ago. So it's all the more pleasing when you find exceptions, like Markus Neumayr from FC Vaduz recently. Often it's those players who aren't usually interviewed like that.

You have consistently decided against online - was it a fundamental decision to dispense with all digital channels and, for example, not to offer an e-paper or a PDF edition?

Yes. Our core competence is a print magazine, and we want to keep it that way. If we were to offer additional things online - such as 11 Freunde, which has an online editorial team - that would affect the same people who actually have to write good articles for the magazine. That's why online is wishful thinking with us. It's an ongoing discussion, but we don't want it at the expense of magazine quality.

So there's a lack of resources to deploy?

First of all, there is a lack of resources and secondly, as soon as it costs something, it is ruled out in our country.

Isn't the fear of digital, unpaid distribution also the reason why no content is made available digitally?

Sure. We don't want to weaken our product; we want people to buy the magazine and enjoy a certain exclusivity. A magazine in the hand is still something different than on a tablet. Personally, I think a print product loses value if it is only presented digitally.

So do I. But whether the generation after us will see it that way is another question ...

True. Another problem for us in the future. Even in the past, many young people hardly subscribed to magazines, but I think there are far, far fewer today. The expectation that information is free is catching on. In addition, we have the problem with this generation that at some point they won't know what we're talking about. At some point, there will no longer be people who know who Heinz Hermann is.

Your expertise is becoming more and more useless?

In a certain sense (laughs). After all, we now have a young editor who calls us "80s sacks.

Okay, you get the daily news as well and you can tell them in 20 years - if you can still remember them ...

(laughs) That's how it is! But I also suspect that today's football doesn't offer as many stories as it did in the past. The wild stuff of the 60s, 70s and 80s will never happen again. If you describe Michi Lang's career 20 years from now, no one will say "What? Gross, you could do that back then?". But we have also adapted to the coming generations to a certain extent. We, who have been around since the first editions and are all about the same age, had to learn that first. Because for us it's as clear as day that people know Heinz Hermann. We used to put the names in the magazine just like that, without explanation. In discussions with younger people, we realized that they often had no idea who they were. Heinz Hermann, for example, played his last international match in 1991 - the young people of today weren't even born then. We have to take this into account. We can't just endlessly go down the retro route and exclude the youngsters right from the start. But that doesn't mean we won't dig up beautiful stories from the past in the future.

What are the concrete plans for the future? Next goal: issue 100?

The print market is notoriously difficult. When we started, the mood among advertisers was quite different. Comparatively many wanted to "be there," but we had comparatively few people who actually cared about getting the ads in (laughs). Now we have someone, but it's not getting any easier with all the competition. Print is almost a niche product itself, soccer anyway, and an alternative soccer magazine is a niche product within a niche product, so to speak. But we are very strong there and have a very well-defined, attractive target group. But the number of our potential advertisers is of course manageable. We don't even need to ask many companies because they don't do anything in the field of soccer. To make matters worse, the image of soccer has suffered in recent years and some companies no longer want anything to do with it. That's why we can already make plans for the future, discuss whether we should come out monthly or whether we want to add more value with adhesive binding - but these are all things that involve a big financial risk. Even though we're established and well-respected, it doesn't take much for us to get "gummed up" if we were to take over. So we're more like Aarau than Xamax under Chagayev ...

A relegated company with seriously managed accounts?

(laughs) Okay, let's better say Thun. In other words: We can make plans for the future, but we wouldn't be able to implement them at the moment.

So it should just continue as before?

Once we would have the certainty that we can take the next step, we are certainly not averse to change. But the next, most important goals are to reach the fallow subscribers, that is much more important for us than to appear monthly, even if many readers would wish for that. At the moment, we can't guarantee the quality at this scale.

Interview: Thomas Häusermann

Launched in 2007, the football magazine Zwölf currently has a circulation of 10,900 and over 4,800 subscribers. The typical Zwölf reader is male, lives in the city or suburbs, attends a university or university of applied sciences and reads all the articles. The independent magazine, which is published six times a year, is published by the "Zwölf - Verein für Fussballkultur" association. Zwölf has also been available on television since the beginning of 2013: In the "Zwölf Fussballbar", editor-in-chief Mämä Sykora welcomes leading and supporting players from the Swiss football world every week. The program is broadcast on SSF and can be viewed in the archive of Internettv.ch can be looked up.

Zwoelf.ch

With the exception of the traditional online advertising segment, all of the seven divisions covered exceeded the volume of the same period last year, Media Focus announced on Monday, based on expert estimates. The company's advertising statistics only include the display segment, i.e. advertising spaces such as banners or the integration of advertising content into the editorial section of online advertising media. Advertising on search engines was particularly strong, with sales of CHF 178.3 million. In 2014 as a whole, advertising on search engines generated sales of CHF 292 million. The online job market generated 51 million advertising francs, real estate ads 35.8 million, and car ads 22.7 million.

Traditional online advertising lost 4 percentage points, while search engine advertising gained the same number of points. In the classifieds market, real estate shrank by one percentage point, while online directories gained the same amount.

Eleven percent market share

In terms of online advertising's share of the total advertising pie, Media Focus did not take into account the classified ad market and online directories, since these are not covered for the other media either. This resulted in a market share for online advertising of 11 percent. Once again, the financial sector topped the rankings with CHF 15.5 million and an online share of 10.6 percent in the media mix. Compared with the first half of 2014, this represents an increase of CHF 5 million. The automotive industry improved from 3rd to 2nd place and put CHF 14.5 million into online advertising, which corresponds to a 6.2 percent share of its advertising print. The service providers dropped one place to third place. They put 10.3 million francs, or 9.1 percent of their advertising print spend, into the Internet in the first half of the year. (SDA/pd/hae)

Parliament passed the so-called «Swissness» bill in June 2013. It stipulates that, for industrial goods, at least 60 percent of the manufacturing costs must be attributable to Switzerland in order for the product to be sold under the “Swiss” label. For “Swiss made” food products, at least 80 percent of the raw materials, by weight, must come from Switzerland.

Companies decide

Companies decide for themselves whether to comply with the guidelines and advertise using the «Swiss» brand or whether to forgo the “Swiss Made” label. According to a report by FH on Monday, 90 percent of respondents in Switzerland would attach exceptionally high importance to better protection for the “Swiss” brand. No group or political party’s supporters opposed the implementation of the Swissness bill by a majority. And more than two-thirds (70 percent) want the bill to take effect as planned in early 2017. In the eyes of the majority of respondents, the strong Swiss franc is not a reason to delay the bill’s implementation. From their perspective, stricter protection of the “Swiss” brand represents more of an opportunity for Swiss companies, the press release stated. The bill’s implementation is controversial: In June, some members of the Council of States criticized the regulations as being too complicated. Hannes Germann (SVP/SH) had sought to ask the Federal Council how much “Swissness” was costing companies and how many businesses were therefore opting out of “Swissness.” However, his postulate was rejected. Previously, at the end of May, the National Council’s Legal Affairs Committee had decided to submit a motion to postpone the bill’s entry into force and to demand simpler implementing regulations. The background to this demand was the abolition of the euro minimum exchange rate on January 15, 2015.

Extra effort and additional costs

A survey conducted by Promarca, the Swiss Association of Branded Goods, among 89 CEOs of Swiss companies revealed that «one-third of the association’s affected members intend to stop promoting Swiss origin if the bill comes into effect in its current form.» Promarca wrote in early August that this opposition stems less from the companies’ failure to meet the criteria than from the increased administrative burden and additional costs. The association includes companies such as Nestlé, Rivella, Victorinox, and Ricola. On behalf of FH, the research institute gfs.bern surveyed 1,003 Swiss citizens eligible to vote between July 20 and 24. (SDA)

The response takes no longer than five minutes and is possible via any device (PC, laptop, tablet, mobile). To ensure full anonymity, no information is identified that allows any conclusions to be drawn about the sender, such as name, e-mail address or IP address. Only USI has access to the data.

The project is supported by the same organizations that regularly publish the "Practice Monitor" as part of the "Swiss Corporate Communication and Public Relations Observatory", the only comprehensive survey on the development and current trends in the Swiss PR and communications industry. In the interest of the quality and relevance of the results, the sponsors hope for the highest possible response rate.

About this link you will get to the survey.
 

It all began relatively unspectacularly in 1965. Walter Feldmann Junior (2nd generation) was managing the Schwanden book printing company at the time. He had taken over from his father in 1959. At this time, the company's main focus was on printing. As there was a lot of paper waste, Feldmann decided to put it to good use. This is how Fridolin was born - initially an advertising paper - which over the years increasingly became a popular weekly newspaper for the people of Glarus. With its own editorial team, various freelance journalists and thanks to the many contributions from readers, Fridolin offers a wealth of information from and about life in the Glarus region in all its facets, week after week. Fridolin can justifiably be described as the mouthpiece and mirror image of the people of Glarus. Last but not least, the people of Glarus have confirmed this by awarding the official gazette to Fridolin.

Today, the title has a circulation of over 31,000 copies. According to the press release, Fridolin has had an extremely stable Wemf readership of between 80-90 percent in the Glarnerland region for years.

In recent years, the newspaper has become the mainstay of Fridolin Druck und Medien, Walter Feldmann AG. In Maya Ziegler, the current owners Walter Feldmann Junior (3rd generation) and Philipp Theiler have brought on board a competent, versatile and committed publishing manager. She has had overall responsibility for the company since 2011. Together with a team of around 30 full-time and part-time employees, she has successfully taken on this responsibility. This has enabled Fridolin and the print shop in Schwanden to remain stable over the last few years, despite the economic turbulence. The company looks to the future with economic independence and financial health.
 

While a 7.3% decline in the volume of communication in the Swiss economy was forecast at the beginning of the year, clients are now only expecting a small further decline of 0.9%.

The communication volume available to the Swiss advertising industry for the next 12 months amounts to CHF 5.41 billion. This represents a volume reduction of almost half a billion compared to 2014. Even compared to the first survey this year, this results in a further reduction in volume of CHF 40 million (-0.9%).

Twice a year, the Media Research Group surveys the top 750 advertising clients about their communication behavior over the next 12 months. The data collected at the beginning of the year is valid for the current year, while the data collected in the middle of the year is valid for the second half of the current year and the first half of the next year. In the first survey, 366 clients disclosed their communications and in the second survey, which has just been completed, 375 clients did so.

In addition to the amount of the available communication budget, the survey also asks about its distribution across the individual media and communication categories. This shows that the forecasts made at the beginning of the year for 2015 need to be corrected slightly. This applies in particular to the statements on the development of online media and direct advertising. Although the direction of development is correct, the course of this development is less pronounced than originally indicated. For advertising in online media, this means that it is rising out of the hole predicted at the beginning of the year. But it is still in it. However, this is enough to achieve a share gain of 0.7 percentage points in the media mix. The situation is somewhat different for direct advertising. While it initially seemed as if it would be the only category to survive unscathed, it is now also suffering losses (-60 million francs).

Although traditional communication fell by CHF 50 million overall, it was able to increase its share of total communication by 0.4 percentage points to 51.9 percentage points. TV advertising made a significant contribution to this, increasing its share of the media mix by 0.4 percentage points. The biggest sufferers are magazines, whose share fell by 0.9 percentage points. Newspapers have escaped virtually unscathed this time. This is a ray of hope. Out-of-home advertising, whose market share in the media mix remains at 11%, is neither in the shade nor in the sun, simply in the middle.

In the first two waves of the survey, the Omnicom Media Group, which was commissioned, used online interviews to investigate two key questions. Firstly, who, with what and when radio is listened to nowadays, and secondly, what effect the generic advertising has in terms of buying impulse and brand perception. For this purpose, around 1,000 participants were interviewed in German-speaking and French-speaking Switzerland respectively, with the sample covering the population group between 15 and 64 years of age. A total of twelve campaigns have been studied so far, seven of them radio only and five radio/TV combined.
The study confirmed the trend that radio has long since ceased to be a singular reception device, but rather takes place as a companion throughout the day on a wide variety of platforms. For example, IP-based channels already account for 35 percent in cars, and 65 percent among listeners who are on the road without a car. Nevertheless, one third of those surveyed still remain accessible only via FM.

The survey also revealed that radio is listened to in roughly equal measure both at home (55 percent) and on the move, for example in the car (52 percent). One of the most important findings is that the medium reaches around a third (35 percent) of its listeners at work. Last but not least, the study provides initial indications of the additional reach provided by IP-based channels. For example, the reach of a classic radio campaign during drivetime can be increased by double-digit percentages through web radio pre-rolls during office hours.

Radio influences brand awareness and buying impulses

The results show that radio has at least as strong an effect as TV in terms of unaided brand awareness. In the media combination radio/TV and with singles spots, these values can be increased even more significantly. In this context, it was also noticeable that the respondents' recall of the medium was much stronger with singles spots than with commercial break contacts. In addition, it was shown that radio advertising influences the willingness to buy and has a positive effect on decision-making. For example, the willingness to buy of radio listeners is up to 22 percent higher than among customers who did not experience radio contact. And this despite the fact that the spots were rated as rather average across the board.

Radio enjoys a loyal listenership

The study produced clear results that highlight the impact of radio advertising. The medium can count on a loyal, ritualized and receptive listenership. With the two waves of studies still to come this year, the growing database will enable an even more precise analysis. In this way, links and dependencies between the place, device and time of advertising reception and the industry, budget or duration of a campaign can be precisely identified.
 

Responsible at Salt: Antoine Caffin (CMO), Sabine Kuszli (Director Brand & Marketing Communications), Nora Urscheler (Advertising Manager), Yann Gurtner (Sponsoring & Events Manager). Responsible at Publicis: Thomas Wildberger (CCO), Daniel Ahrens, Thomas Schöb (CD), Jan Kempter, Christian Stüdi (text), Regine Cavicchioli, Sandy Pfuhl (art direction), Anatole Comte (graphics), Candido Righetto, Manuela Schikor, Christine Rainford, Alain Götschi (consulting), Cem van der Schaar, Benjamin Kägi (TV/art buying); production: Chocolate Films (film production), Marcel Langenegger (direction); Judith Affolter, Melanie Hofmann (photography), Luxwerk (image editing).

With Katharina Burckhardt, the agency has gained an experienced project manager with many years of professional experience in the communications industry, according to the press release. The all-rounder has experience in planning, organizing and managing projects. She worked for several years as an assistant in an advertising agency, acted as the right-hand woman to the editor-in-chief of Cash, was involved in setting up the online financial portal Moneycab.com in the role of management support and managed her own projects at a Zurich-based financial PR agency. Since 2012, she has been self-employed in the area of administration and organization. Katharina Burckhardt has completed further training in business management. She joined b-public on September 1, 2015.

According to the press release, the expansion of staff and strengthening of the back office is part of a growth strategy. Founded in 2012, the agency has already expanded its partnerships after just three years and extended its network abroad in the financial centers of Germany and Austria. B-Public offers a seamless service package for domestic and foreign banks, fund companies and asset management companies, covering the entire German-speaking region. "Our team continues to expand and will grow to a total of ten people this year. We are strengthening our team in a targeted manner to ensure quality, expertise and accessibility to meet growing customer demands," explains agency founder Markus Baumgartner. He is joined by marketing specialist Thomas Egger and IT specialist Daniel Jazbec as equal partners.

It has developed from an avant-garde festival for connoisseurs and enthusiasts into an industry meeting point and crowd-puller that is respected beyond the country's borders, it was said at the program presentation in Zurich on Monday. The festival is taking place for the 13th time - in the first few years it was held every two years. From September 1 to 6, 260 films from 34 countries will be presented in five cinemas in Baden and Wettingen, 84 of which are in the running in the three competition categories. Fantoche has never shown so many feature-length films as this year, namely on the occasion of its 20th anniversary. 17 of them are current international productions. The range of topics is broader than ever before, said festival director Annette Schindler. Bold and witty auteur works as well as major studio productions, playful and fantastic films for the whole family as well as sophisticated and profound works for adults can be seen. Some of the films by top directors have already won their first festival prizes.

According to Schindler, the entire spectrum of animated film content is also covered in the competitions. 35 works with a length of between 2 and 18 minutes have been selected for the International Competition, four of which are Swiss productions or co-productions. The competition films were selected from 1377 entries, more than ever before. There are 21 films in the running for Best Swiss Film. 28 animated short films were nominated for the children's competition. An international jury will award the prizes for both the International and Swiss competitions. A children's jury will select the film that receives the "Best Kids Award". There is also an audience winner film in all three competition categories.

Polish filmmaking in focus

As Poland has repeatedly been represented with outstanding films in the Fantoche competitions over the past few years, an in-depth look at the Polish animated film scene was a logical step. The "Focus Poland" program includes both historical and contemporary productions. The festival organizers gave a second focus programme the title "Family Sweet & Sour". The family stories highlight "the sweet and sour sides of family life". In addition to brand new films, the program also includes animated film classics.

Generate electricity for film projector yourself

As an anniversary surprise, the festival is presenting an open-air bicycle cinema on Bahnhofplatz. Instead of paying for admission to the cinema, visitors will be paying with sporting performance: they will generate the electricity to run the film projector themselves. Schindler said that Fantoche was opening up to commercial animated film for the first time with its offer for the specialist audience. A program of commissioned productions has been put together, but the networking of commercial film exponents from this field is also being promoted. In recent years, the number of entries has stabilized at between 20,900 and 22,600, with a budget of around 1.6 million francs. Half of the funding for the Festival of Animated Film comes from the public purse, 30 percent from sponsors and foundations and 20 percent from festival proceeds. (SDA)

"The withdrawal at the level of German-speaking Switzerland means that Ringier Romandie is leaving Médias Suisses," said a media release from the Publishers Association of French-speaking Switzerland on Monday. The association regrets the step, also because Ringier Romandie has always been strongly committed. According to the statutes of the Publishers Association of French-speaking Switzerland, the withdrawal will take effect from December 31, 2016. The background is a dispute among publishers triggered by a joint venture between Ringier, SRG and Swisscom. The three companies want to bundle the marketing of their media offerings and advertising platforms in a new company (Werbewoche.ch reported). This new marketing organization led to a scandal in the Swiss Media Association (VSM) last Thursday. Because, according to Ringier, the VSM practically demanded a ban on advertising for SRG, the media company withdrew from the association with immediate effect (Werbewoche.ch reported).

Advertising alliance meets with criticism from publishers

Although the VSM regretted Ringier's decision to withdraw, it considered it to be logical. The publishers' association argued that the joint venture would further distort competition in the media industry. Médias Suisses took the same line on Monday. The association considers it unacceptable that SRG, which is financed by public funds, and Swisscom, which is majority-owned by the state, are interfering in an extremely tense market. This not only harms publishers, but also threatens the diversity of the media in Switzerland, he said. This episode shows that it is more necessary than ever to put clear limits on SRG. In French-speaking Switzerland, the newspaper Le Temps and the weeklies L'Hebdo and L'Illustré are thus no longer represented in the publishers' association. The director of Ringier Romandie, Daniel Pillard, also regretted the withdrawal. The problems in French-speaking Switzerland are different from those in German-speaking Switzerland, particularly with regard to training and the collective labor agreement, Pillard said in response to an inquiry from the SDA news agency.

Concerns about collective labor agreement

Unlike in German-speaking Switzerland, a collective labor agreement still applies in the press in French-speaking Switzerland. The social partner of the professional association Impressum and co-signatory was the publishers' association Médias Suisses. The professional association expressed its shock at the withdrawal of Ringier Romandie on Monday. Imprint would carefully review its strategy towards Ringier Romandie and contact those responsible in this sense. However, Ringier Romandie is still bound to comply with the collective labor agreement until the end of 2017, the professional association stated on Monday. The Syndicom union described it as an alarming signal if Ringier were now to say goodbye to the social partnership in western Switzerland as well. The dispute over the planned advertising alliance is a media policy dispute between the publishers, Syndicom said. This should not be carried out on the backs of media workers, nor should it lead to a deterioration in their working conditions.

Withdrawal also from journalism school

By leaving the association, Pillard will also have to resign as president of the Training Center for Journalists and Media (CFJM), as well as president of the Joint Commission of the Collective Labor Agreement. Until the end of 2016, he does not have too many fears, Pillard said in this regard. He hopes that for the time after that, solutions will be found for both the collective labor agreement and the training center. Then it will be seen whether the withdrawal of Ringier and Ringier Romandie is just a chapter or a historic turning point, he said. (SDA)

Most breakups occur every year after the summer vacations. This August and September also some with tears of joy. Because with Volkswagen's trade-in bonus, you have a good reason to part with your old car. And to fall in love anew.

In a nationwide tactical campaign, customer benefits are communicated differently for once. Instead of depicting vehicles and premiums, surprising subjects are shown for the car advertising category. The flirt offensive with billboards and print subjects is accompanied by radio spots and online measures.

Responsible at Amag Switzerland: Oliver Stegmann (Head of Brand VW PW, Director); Sandra Grau (Head of Marketing VW PW, Authorized Signatory); Nathalie Mösch (Head of Marketing Communication VW PW, Authorized Signatory); Jannine Müller (Advertising Specialist VW PW). Responsible at KSP: Sascha Borsai (creative direction); Kevin Zysset (art direction); Lea Baldinger (graphics); Bianca Jäger (polygrapher); Dominic Wirz, Fabrizio Bonifazi (text); Franziska Saxer (consulting management); Nina Stebler, Marc Gooch (consulting); Ansichtsache (image editing); Craft367 (prepress).