The executive committee of the Zurich journalists was newly appointed on Thursday evening. The Zurich Press Association, the professional organization of around 2,000 media professionals in the greater Zurich area, elected four new and four existing members to the board of directors at its ordinary general meeting. Bernhard Sutter (freelance journalist, Zurich) was confirmed as President for a further term of office. Daniel Krähenbühl (editorial director of Radio Energy Zurich) was elected as a new vice president. Further members of the board are Anita Hugi (Sternstunden SF, new), Christian Maurer (Sonntagszeitung, new), Manuela Moser (freelance journalist, new), Sandro Stoll (Deputy Editor-in-Chief Schaffhauser Nachrichten, previous), Dominik Stroppel (Project Manager Endemol TV, new) and Barbara Weber (Zürcher Unterländer, previous).
The Zurich Press Association ZPV is the largest section of the national journalists' association Impressum and represents the interests of media professionals in the Zurich media center. The most important concern of the new board is the negotiation of a collective labor agreement with publishers and media houses.
With www.presseverein.ch, the ZPV operates a new platform for journalists. It offers information on the industry and services as well as the previous popular gossip section.

The watch manufacturer Swatch will produce its 333 millionth watch in May 2006. This anniversary and a new product line will be celebrated on June 1 in Lugano with a big festival, the "Splashtival". Among others, the Blue Man Group will be performing at the festival, which is open to the public and free of charge. They will create the latest watch model from the "Jelly in Jelly" collection live on stage during their performance. This event will also be attended by 300 journalists from 30 countries who have flown in especially for the occasion. The "Jelly in Jelly" collection represents a renewed blossoming of Swatch's old romance with art, according to a press release. Keith Haring, Tadanory Yokoo, Spike Lee, Vivienne Westwood, Paco Rabanne and Daniel Swarovski, among others, have already worked for the Biel-based watch manufacturer.

The Freddie Awards, an award for the best customer loyalty programs in the travel industry, were presented for the 18th time in Los Angeles on Thursday. SN Brussels Airlines Privilege and TAP Portugal Victoria each won three awards. Both airlines are managed by ICLP, an agency specializing in loyalty marketing, which is now based in Zurich. Victoria, TAP Portugal's program, won "Best Customer Communication", "Best Miles Redemption Reward" and the coveted "Program of the Year" award. Privilege, the SN Brussels Airlines program, won "Best Customer Service", "Best Co-Brand Credit Card" and, new this year, "Best Mileage Redemption Reward", as it did last year. In total, ICLP achieved 14 placings in the top three, making it the company with the most awards among companies specializing in loyalty marketing, according to the agency. Every year, over 315,000 frequent flyers vote for the best loyalty programs from airlines, hotels and credit cards in nine different categories on the Freddie portal.

World Television, a provider of webcasting and multimedia communication solutions, is now offering two new services. With "Podcasting" and "Multimedia News Release", the company is responding to increasing customer demand for web-based communication technologies, according to a press release. According to World Television, around 40 percent of globally operating companies are planning to increase their budgets for the use of online media in 2006 in order to communicate more effectively both internally and externally. The "Multimedia News Release" communication tool bundles text, video, audio, photos, logos, images and supplementary material such as electronic brochures on one platform, which is transmitted in HTML format to various user groups all over the world. World Television's podcast service is intended to make the possibilities of this technology available for everyday business use. The official launch was preceded by a test phase with a soft launch.

The financial services provider Postfinance is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year. Under the motto "We celebrate, you celebrate", the advertising agency In Flagranti, in collaboration with the event agency Eventicum, is organizing a big party in 26 Postfinance advice centers in Switzerland on 29 April 2006. With fun and games, food and drink and a big prize draw, as the agency announced. Postfinance is sponsoring a total of 100 customers' personal ideas for celebrations with CHF 1,000 each. In the run-up to the anniversary, the financial institution sent a special thank-you gift to around 18,000 Swiss Post employees for their commitment: a "Grand Cru" chocolate, specially developed and hand-molded for the occasion. From the selection of raw materials to the shape, packaging and distribution, the responsibility lay entirely with In Flagranti. As the agency reports, their premises still smell of chocolate today.

Radio and television presenter Mona Vetsch has been awarded the 2006 Radio and Television Prize of Eastern Switzerland by SRG Ostschweiz. The prize is endowed with 10,000 Swiss francs. According to the SDA, the award will be presented after the summer vacation. Mona Vetsch is a popular figure on radio and television and, with her unmistakable Thurgau dialect, marks the presence of Eastern Switzerland in the programs, SRG Ostschweiz explains the award. She shows sensitivity and empathy in her dealings with listeners. According to SRG, her interview skills are particularly evident in the talk program "Focus".

The polygraph profession is to be divided into three specializations: media support, media design and media production. This has caused some controversy. As Mediaforum.ch reports, the social partners responsible for vocational training, Viscom and Comedia/Syna, have drawn up a draft for the new training in a working group of the PBS (Paritätische Berufsbildungsstelle). This should have come into force on January 1, 2006. However, following the internal Viscom consultation and fierce protests from the industry, its introduction was postponed by a year. Opponents of the controversial training ordinance (BiVo) complain that the profession is being watered down and that the new draft does not reflect practical realities. It is feared that apprentices will learn too little of the actual craft in future. Furthermore, the distinction between media design and graphic design apprenticeships is unclear. The initiators, on the other hand, want to prevent current trends from being overlooked and want to integrate cross-media elements into the training. The new education ordinance will be submitted for consultation by the Federal Office for Professional Education and Technology by July 7, 2006, according to Mediaforum.ch. Management and those responsible for training in the companies are called upon to deal with the new Polygraf training ordinance and its guidelines and performance targets and to comment on them.

On Thursday, football's world governing body Fifa suffered a defeat at the hands of the German Federal Court of Justice in the dispute over the exclusive marketing of the World Cup. According to SDA, Fifa is now defending itself against the plaintiffs' argument that the association's behavior with regard to trademark protection was an abuse of rights. Their lawyer Herbert Messer said that the 2006 World Cup was clearly linked to the world football association. "The temporal limitation assigns ownership solely to FIFA. "FIFA Secretary General Urs Linsi is also of the opinion that the BGH's decision is not a good signal for the growth of the sport and for the organizers of major sporting events in general.
The organizational costs for FIFA alone amount to over 600 million euros (around 947 million Swiss francs). According to Linsi, anyone who profits commercially from the World Cup without making a contribution is "massively compromising the principle of partnership-based financing of the event."
The World Federation is concerned with protecting its fifteen sponsors and also the six national sponsors of the German World Cup organizing committee. Together, these sponsors have spent around 750 million euros to be able to advertise exclusively in their product groups worldwide or at national level.

Migros is now also launching its own credit card - shortly after Coop's announcement. The retail giant has been looking for a solution that offers the best value for money since last fall, according to a press release. On Thursday, the Migros Retail Trade Committee (ADHM) decided to launch an M-Budget MasterCard.  
The annual fee for the M-Budget credit card is CHF 4.40. The card is a MasterCard and can therefore be used worldwide. Cumulus points can also be collected with every transaction: For purchases within Migros, the customer receives one Cumulus point per franc spent as before; for all other transactions outside Migros, the customer receives one Cumulus point for every two francs spent.
Migros has secured GE Money Bank, the Swiss branch of the world's leading financial services group GE (General Electric), as a partner. According to the press release, GE guarantees the highest standards of security and customer service for credit card holders. The credit card will be launched this fall.
Coop is also launching its own credit card with an annual fee of CHF 9.90.

Creative Director Jean-Marc Demeulemeester worked for the Bern-based agency LangGysiKnoll for four years. During this time, the agency established itself as a national leader, according to Demeulemeester. He is now moving back to the Limmat, where he has already worked for other agencies such as Publicis and Advico Young & Rubicam.

Turnover in the graphic arts industry fell again in 2005 by 1.6 percent compared to the previous year, but the level of investment increased again. This was announced by the employers' association Viscom on the occasion of the publication of its annual report. The decline in employment in the industry has slowed, amounting to around 0.8 percent compared to the previous year. After a decline in exports between 2000 and 2003, an increase of 10 percent was achieved in 2005. At the same time, imports also rose by 6 percent. Last year, almost three times more printed products were still imported than exported. With the steady increase in the proportion of production for export, the graphic arts industry can also be described less and less as a classic domestic economy, Viscom announced. The association defines the reduction of administrative burdens in companies as a core issue. The flood of constantly new laws, regulations, rules and ordinances is making production in Switzerland more expensive and preventing necessary economic growth, writes Viscom in its communiqué. This is particularly true for the graphic arts industry, which has been exposed to enormous competitive pressure for years. The internal surveys required of companies would tie up important human resources.
An electronic education portal for basic vocational training was launched in the past financial year. This will improve the quality of training in Viscom member companies and simplify administration between the various contact partners.
Another focus for the association is the establishment of equal status for continuing vocational training and university education, which will be presented to voters in spring 2006 in the form of the new education constitution. Viscom will also push for the abolition of the current concordat agreements between the cantons, which are to be abandoned in favor of uniform, nationwide vocational training funding.
The employers' association praised the Confederation's new practice: From 2006, it will only award contracts to those graphic arts companies that comply with the labor regulations in the CLA. The extension of this agreement to the cantonal and municipal level is in preparation.

Rüdi Steiner, currently head of the business section at Blick, will become editorial director of the Cash daily media network. Dirk Schütz, the current editor-in-chief of Cash, will be responsible for the overall editorial management of the Cash network. Advertising management, now in the Ringier Magazines division, will be outsourced with the launch of Cash daily and taken over by Markus Graber. After studying Italian, business informatics and German literature in Zurich and Bologna, 42-year-old Rüdi Steiner worked for HandelsZeitung for five years. Since September 1, 2004, he has been head of the business section of the Blick editorial team.
Ringier plans to launch the multimedia business platform Cash daily this year, the publishing house announced. Cash daily is expected to reach 1 million people interested in business every week within a year via various channels. The project includes audio and video applications on the Internet and on mobile platforms, as well as a modern daily newspaper. The project manager is Hans Ott.