Circulation figures Circulation figures for the daily press continue to fall. The Sunday press also appears to be at its peak. As of October 1, the AG für Werbemedienforschung (Wemf) has published the certified circulation figures for Swiss print titles. The data is available on the Wemf website. The survey covers the period from July 1, 2005 to June 30, 2006 and, as always, the figures are based on the self-declared circulation figures submitted by the newspapers and magazines by September 15. The complete bulletin will not be published until November.  

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Click on image for large view
 
This explains why the St. Galler Tagblatt, for example, is currently still missing. In the case of the Basler Zeitung and the titles of the Espace Media Groupe, including the Bund and Berner Zeitung, there are other reasons for the absence. At Basler Zeitung, they first want to wait and see the effect of the recently launched Baselland offensive, which BaZ initiated in response to the cooperation between Basellandschaftliche Zeitung and Mittelland Zeitung. "With the BaZ's large circulation of 90,000 copies distributed on Fridays, we want to stimulate the reader and advertising market," says CFO Jürgen Hunscheidt. Of course, the circulation certification is in no way in doubt.
At Espace Media Groupe, an adjustment to the subscription database structures makes the declaration impossible. "We can no longer fall back on the old figures and will therefore suspend certification," says Group spokesperson Christopher Wehrli. As Espace reports the Bund in the total circulation with the Berner Zeitung, this information is also no longer available.
Blick is still losingThe circulation figures for most Swiss-German daily newspapers are pointing in the same direction. Only the success of the commuter newspaper 20 Minuten remains unbroken with a total circulation of 419,684 copies, making it the most widely consumed newspaper product in the daily press. The expansion into French-speaking Switzerland with 20 Minutes has increased the total circulation by almost 40,000 copies. This was already the case to roughly the same extent after the expansion to St. Gallen.
Blick remains the best-selling paid newspaper with 254,657 copies sold. However, the circulation trend of the tabloid continues to decline. Compared to the same period last year, Blick lost a further 7,605 copies (2003: 275,275).
In second place among the paid newspapers is the Tages-Anzeiger (210,142), but here too circulation shrank by 5,895 copies. For the first time, Tamedia's flagship newspaper reported a separate figure of 15,145 copies for the regional edition on the left bank of the lake.
The MittellandZeitung follows in third place, also with a decline in total circulation of 2,637 to 186,749 copies. The ranking continues with the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (146,729, down 4,216), the Südostschweiz (139,802) and the Neue Luzerner Zeitung (131,004). The Zürcher Landzeitung is new in the ranking with a circulation of 109,930 copies, which is now a combined newspaper consisting of the Zürichsee Zeitung, Zürcher Oberländer and Zürcher Unterländer.
In French-speaking Switzerland, circulation figures for the major daily newspapers are also showing a downward trend. While Le Matin was practically the only paper to report a positive circulation trend last year, it is now losing circulation slightly (76,194, minus 216). It is conceivable that some readers are turning to the free paper Le Matin Bleu from the parent company Edipresse, which has a provisionally certified circulation of 134,500 copies for the first time. 24heures remains the leader with a circulation of 95,315 copies. In third place is the Tribune de Genève, which continues to lose circulation (67,151, down 3,978). The independent La Liberté, on the other hand, remains stable with a minimal increase in circulation to 38,733 copies.
In Ticino, the largest daily newspaper Corriere del Ticino (39,061, down 237) lost ground, while La Regione Ticino (34,114, up 1,071) made up ground. The small Giornale del Popolo also made slight gains.
Economy on the riseThe Sunday press seems to have reached its zenith. The biggest title, SonntagsBlick, lost 7,855 copies (now 272,425), as did SonntagsZeitung, while NZZ am Sonntag gained 5,733 copies (now 121,204). In French-speaking Switzerland, Le Matin Dimanche lost 2,368 copies (215,024 new).
 
 
 
 
 
 
Click on image for large view
With the exception of Finanz und Wirtschaft, the circulation trend for business publications is pointing upwards with a slight drop of 665 copies (now 34,538). Bilanz is up by 1,440 (new 38,100), and Cash (61,547, plus 2,703) is also on the up.

 

 
 
Click on image for large view
A negative trend can be seen in the magazines. The Beobachter, which has the highest circulation, recorded the biggest drop in circulation of 11,223 copies (now 31,5081).
 

Click on image for large view

The other major publication, Schweizer Illustrierte, also lost 7,721 copies (now 232,519). Even Fémina, the most widely read magazine in French-speaking Switzerland, has had to drop by 4,183 copies (now 213,662). The Swiss Family, on the other hand, is up (plus 3,738, now 175,643). In French-speaking Switzerland, the news magazine L'Hébdo increased (plus 959, new 44,870), as did Facts (plus 106, new 73,140). Finally, Weltwoche increased its circulation (plus 2,413, new 82,849), while the weekly newspaper lost circulation slightly (minus 366, new 13,866).
René Worni

Roger Köppel is still on an acquisition spree for his Weltwoche. After steering Peer Teuwsen away from the Tages-Anzeiger magazine, he is now buying again from Tamedia: As of February 1, 2007, David Schnapp, Head of Production at SonntagsZeitung, will also be working for Weltwoche. As Persoenlich.com reports, he will be working there in a similar role to that at SonntagsZeitung. 

The Holmes Group, publisher of the PR trade magazine Holmes Report, has named the PR agency Weber Shandwick "Pan-European Consultancy of the Year". The award was presented for the third time as part of the European Consultancy Report. For Paul Holmes, editor-in-chief of the Holmes Report, the agency's business activities over the past twelve months were the decisive factor. New projects have been landed for American Airlines, BBC, the Euro 2008 football championships, Kellogg's, the Royal Bank of Scotland, Tchibo and Warner Bros, among others. The company is currently working on 24 multinational projects within Europe.
Weber Shandwick has the largest PR network in the world with over 81 offices in 39 markets, according to a press release. This year, the company expanded its activities in the EMEA region to include the Nordic region and Central and Eastern Europe.

Guide The Zurich-based publishing house Gourmedia has commissioned the advertising agency Reinhold to better communicate its nightlife magazines "Zürich geht aus!", "Das Tessin geht aus!" and the new magazine "Basel geht aus!", which will be published in December. The magazines have what it takes to become bestsellers. "We reach several million pick-ups with the Zurich edition alone. Anyone who has this magazine will pick it up no less than 36 times a year," says Ralph Lindemann, Publishing Director of Gourmedia. For the Basel edition, which will be published before Christmas, the testers visited over 200 restaurants, pubs and clubs in Basel and the region, Alsace and southern Baden. "My belt buckle is in the last hole," groans chief tester and editor-in-chief Wolfram Meister. Advertisements for the Basel edition and for the Basel/Zurich/Ticino combined edition can still be booked until mid-October.

Paul Reinzeichner has been having some after-work fun. He has a blog and it's all about advertising. About good advertising and about bad advertising. Good campaigns are praised, bad ones come off very badly. Thank goodness Mr. Reinzeichner is totally subjective and therefore totally entertaining. Only one thing spoils his refreshing performance: He doesn't exist. At least not in the Swiss telephone directory. Because Paul Reinzeichner is a blogger, and they only exist on the web. In his Technorati profile you can read: He came from the bottom. But he wanted more. And as a black artist, he worked his way out of the lead desert and into the colorful world of double-page ads. Based in Zurich's Seefeld district (where people have always known what good advertising is), he feels called upon to comment on the advertising business in Switzerland. Werbewoche thinks: Hossa! Take a look and write your comments! 

Wochenpresse The weekly newspaper institution is celebrating its first quarter of a century, including a big anniversary issue. The youth unrest at the beginning of the 1980s gave impetus to numerous projects that have long since become permanent institutions of socio-cultural and political life. Their founding motives are hardly familiar to the next generation. One of these institutions is now celebrating its first quarter of a century: The weekly newspaper - always WoZ. On October 2, 1981, a small group of founders brought out the first issue in the wake of the Zurich riots. "There were a lot of young people back then who wanted to say and write something. This was not possible in the other newspapers, as they were very hostile to the youth movement," says co-founder Marianne Fehr, now editor at Weltwoche, in the current WoZ anniversary issue.
Since then, the self-managed newspaper, which still belongs to its creators today, has had an eventful history. In contrast to other newspapers, which can no longer be clearly located in the political spectrum, the WoZ has always been considered left-wing. It remains to be seen whether Weltwoche will become the antipode of the right under its new owner Roger Köppel.
WoZ as a launch padThe WoZ and its history give rise to their own myths and legends. They are entwined around the impressive group of writers who have helped shape the past 25 years during a brief guest appearance or a period of life as part of the collective. Some of them now hold key positions at various media outlets. "The WoZ is a training center, we train cracks," says editorial director Susan Boos. Unfortunately, transfer fees are not common in this business.
After all, former readers wrote the anniversary issue, which consistently follows the layout of the first issue from 1981 - with 56 pages, one of the thickest WoZ ever. And it has some special features: for the first time in 16 years in a Swiss-German medium, former military commander Efrem Cattelan talks about the background to the P26 secret army in an interview with Roger Monnerat, co-founder, long-time WoZ editor and now a writer.
Res Strehle's interview with SVP National Councillor Christoph Mörgeli, conducted by the ex-WoZ co-founder and current editor-in-chief of Das Magazin, also deserves attention. The SVP mastermind and Weltwoche columnist comes out as an admirer of Niklaus Meienberg, counts Karl Kraus among his role models and settles accounts with the '68 movement.
From today's perspective, things were sometimes strange in the editorial offices of the WoZ. Three WoZ employees from the early days (Marianne Fehr, Adrian Schmid and Alexander Grass) recall in the anniversary WoZ how things used to be. The creators threw themselves into the business with little knowledge of newspaper publishing. Who would have thought that layout designers would be needed for the young newspaper, let alone a proofreader?
Everyday editorial work during the founding phase was characterized by endless discussions of principle. One of these revolved around whether or not the WoZ, as the largest self-governing organization, should purchase computers - a synonym for the surveillance state par excellence in times of German dragnet investigations. Shortening texts was often a problem because certain writers felt that this restricted their freedom of expression.
But the debates were never isolated. For example, the Poch tried to prevent the introduction of computers in parliament at the time. Later on, the "fiche state" broke up. "Many subtle perceptions were correct, even if the fundamental resistance was absurd," says Adrian Schmid, former Vice President of the Swiss Green Party and now in a leading position at the VCS.
In the meantime, the WoZ has weathered some serious crises and is on the upswing thanks to restructuring and cost-cutting measures (see
). But even Switzerland's largest independent left-wing newspaper is tormented by the question of how long the newspaper as such will continue to exist in the face of free content and the boom in electronic communication. "Without a newspaper - it's almost unimaginable," says Susan Boos, adding that there will always be people who are prepared to pay for a medium that explains the world to them.René Worni

On October 1, Peter Siegenthaler took over as head of the German-language editorial team at Swissinfo/Swiss Radio International. He replaces Rita Emch, as Swissinfo announced on Wednesday. Siegenthaler studied economics and began his journalistic career as business editor at the daily newspaper Der Bund. In 1988, he moved to Swiss Radio DRS, where he held various positions. He was producer of the program Rendez-vous am Mittag as well as editor and later head of the consumer magazine Espresso. In 2002, he became Head of Public Relations for the Swiss Landscape Fund, of which he was a member of the Executive Board. Swissinfo/Swiss Radio International is the corporate unit of SRG that fulfills the foreign mandate.

Postpress Muller Martini celebrated its 60th anniversary with an open house event at its headquarters in Zofingen on September 22, 2006. Muller Martini took the opportunity to demonstrate its globally recognized technical expertise to customers. A tour of the company gave visitors the opportunity to gain an impression of the company. Muller Martini gave visitors an example of its technical expertise and innovative strength with live demonstrations of the BravoPlus saddle stitcher. This fully automatic saddle stitcher was presented in combination with a Bograma inline punching machine and "Pick'n'Place" dispenser. Manufacturers of wire-stitched products benefit from the added value. The example of an inline configuration, which enables stitching, cutting and punching in a single pass, showed how a variety of creative die-cut, perforated and perforated products can be produced efficiently.

Pleon C-Matrix, the Swiss organization of the European communications consultancy Pleon, is strengthening its range of expertise in the healthcare sector. Since the beginning of October, Wolfgang Schweiger has been driving this business area forward as Head of Healthcare at the Zurich office. In addition, he continues to be responsible for the business development of Pleon's healthcare business in Munich.
 
Schweiger established Practise Healthcare as a senior partner at the Munich office and managed it for ten years. In this role, he worked for various pharmaceutical, biotech and medical technology companies as well as clinics. His main task in Zurich is to develop national and international mandates, and he will also continue to look after German clients.

Computer to Plate Heidelberg presents new CtP and workflow solutions for small and medium formats Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) is responding to the needs of traditional SME print shops by expanding its thermal CtP platesetter family with the Suprasetter A52/A74. According to Management Board member Jürgen Rautert, these smaller and medium-sized commercial print shops expect "a reliable, high-quality and future-oriented platesetter with thermal technology that is suitable for the mostly smaller print formats".Expansion of the "A-Class "Although Heidelberg has not compromised on the quality of the platesetters, the new platesetters in the same configuration are offered at around 20 to 30 percent less than the faster Suprasetter S74/H74, which is designed for higher throughput and also developed and manufactured entirely by Heidelberg. Conceptually, the new platesetters complement the Suprasetter A105, which was presented at the Ipex trade fair in April. The A105 is also an entry-level solution, but for large format.
Product Manager Andreas Forer cites the small space requirement as one of the advantages of the newly introduced A52/A74 platesetters, which are available immediately. He emphasizes that the Suprasetter A52/A74 is the most space-saving, fully automatic CtP platesetter in its class. At the same time, the Suprasetter A52/A74 is not a slimmed-down version in terms of quality. The finest resolutions up to 160 raster (400 lpi) can be output. If supported by the software, frequency-modulated screens (FM) and Heidelberg's hybrid screen Prinect Hybrid Screening can be imaged in addition to normal screens (AM).
Of particular interest to SMEs is the fact that the platesetters can initially be purchased as Suprasetter A52s and therefore for the small format. If the print shop opts for the next larger medium format, it can upgrade the platesetter to Suprasetter A74 simply by installing new (chargeable) software. In addition to the format, the platesetter can also grow with the plate handling. It is possible to order the platesetter as a manual CtP system and later upgrade it to a fully automatic unit by installing an Auto Top Loader. "In this way," says Forer, "print shops can gain experience with direct imaging and thermal technology and decide to upgrade to a fully automatic machine at any time as plate volumes increase."
The platesetter can be ordered with standard die-cutting systems or retrofitted according to customer requirements. Heidelberg has also paid particular attention to the reliable removal of the intermediate release paper, which can be removed "with 100 percent reliability" thanks to special sensors. Also to increase the reliability of the platesetter, Heidelberg technicians can connect to the machine via remote services and rectify minor faults without having to call out a technician.
New entry-level rip solutionHeidelberg has put together a workflow package to match the Suprasetter A52/A74 platesetter, especially for SMEs working in small format. This consists of the Prinect MetaDimension 52i rip software and the Acrobat plug-in Prinect Imposition Editor. The latter Acrobat extension is used to impose the PDF pages. Various page formats, folding schemes and print sheet definitions can be stored here. The settings for impositioning the print form can be saved in the Job Definition Format (JDF) and these templates can be used for similar jobs. Finally, Prinect MetaDimension 52i is a rip based on Adobe technology and is used to convert prepress data into imageable output signals.
Free choice of systemThe thermal platesetters have been tested by Heidelberg with all common "digital" plates. Depending on the customer's requirements, process-free and chemical-free offset plates can be used. Heidelberg also offers its own plate for this purpose. However, this chemistry-free plate, called Saphira, is not an in-house development, but is offered by Heidelberg under its own label (as an OEM product). "This means that the customer receives a complete solution from us on request, which represents a reliable and economical solution from the Acrobat plug-in to the rip and the plate through to plate imaging," Heidelberg explains.
Heidelberg relies on CtP instead of DI "The GTO DI spark, a first direct imaging machine,
which Heidelberg launched on the market in 1991, was of below-average quality from today's perspective," said Jürgen Rautert, Member of the Management Board of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg), summarizing the company's entry into imaging technology at the time. The machine used a spark erosion process that did not allow for better results in terms of quality. Only an imaging unit developed together with Presstek made the later GTO DI successful. At the beginning of this year, Heidelberg has now moved away from the
direct imaging in the press; the Quickmaster DI 46 and Speedmaster 74 DI products have since been discontinued. "This is not to say that DI technology was the wrong way to go. Technologies are now available that are more flexible and more productive.
Since IPEX, we have been offering our Anicolor inking unit technology for short runs," adds Rautert. At the same time, Rautert leaves a back door open: "This does not mean that we have said goodbye to direct imaging for all time with this step."
Heidelberg's entry into computer-to-plate was with the monstrous "Gutenberg" platesetter, launched in 1995. Although around 100 machines were sold, production of this early generation of platesetters was soon discontinued. The termination of a technology partnership with and by Creo was a setback for Heidelberg. Since then, Heidelberg has increasingly relied on its own developments in this area, with great success.
Jürgen Franck

Those responsible in the Bernese Oberland are responding to surveys and are beginning to cultivate the Bernese Oberland brand more actively again. To this end, the Chamber of Commerce presented a corresponding marketing concept on Wednesday. It provides for the establishment of a joint communication platform. Furthermore, the business promotion services are to be expanded and tailored to the needs of companies in the Bernese Oberland. The concept also aims to strengthen the population's identification with their region; hospitality should also play a role here. A corresponding campaign is intended to raise awareness among the population and institutions. Before the concept comes into force, it will be subject to a broad consultation process.

  Management consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) is presenting itself with a new creative concept in the increasingly fierce competition for qualified employees and talent. The recruitment campaign developed by the Festland advertising agency surprises with innovative features that express the deeper qualities of a career at PwC: Behind descriptions such as "future founder", "career ladder" or "concept creator", specific job profiles in PwC's three areas of expertise - auditing, tax and legal advice and business consulting - are revealed.