Column The range of newspapers says more about a restaurant than its menu. Every reasonably intelligent restaurateur knows that you can't not communicate - even if he thinks Paul Watzlawick is a Polish wrestler. And he should know that, in addition to the service culture and the hopefully non-existent fly in the ointment, newspapers are also part of the communication tools of good gastronomy.When, for example, the Herald Tribune is available in Zurich's Kaufleuten Bar, this is a statement of the internationality brought about by the banking district and at the same time a service for the sophisticated public. And the fact that the Bangkok Post can be found at Lily's Stomach Supply on Langstrasse communicates the cosmopolitan attitude of this upscale cookshop. Whether the Weltwoche, the Wochenzeitung, the Schweizer Familie or the Tierwelt is on display says a lot about the culture and zeitgeist affinity of a restaurant and therefore also about the clientele that frequents it. Newspapers reflect the identity of a bar, restaurant or cafeteria. As precarious as the financial situation in the
gastronomy today - a subscription to the Blick and the regional newspaper is enough for most restaurants.
But not in the Starbucks in Lucerne. There is only one free newspaper to read. It is called - oh wonder - 20 Minuten and is read in five. This is astonishing, especially as Starbucks defines its coffee houses as "third places", a term that goes back to the American sociologist Ray Oldenburg. Oldenburg uses the term to describe those third places (alongside home and work) where urban contemporaries spend their free time and seek the social closeness they miss in their single apartment.
In the USA, convivial places where you can read the newspaper in peace and quiet are something revolutionary, because the gastronomy there is programmed for high frequencies. In old Europe, however, and especially in Vienna, third places have been around for a long time. They are just called something else. Thomas Bernhard's "coffee house addiction" (self-diagnosis) was due to the fact that the Viennese coffee houses Bräunerhof, Eiles and Landtmann always had numerous international newspapers on display, including one of Helvetic origin. No wonder, the Austrian writer once wrote, that a man of the mind could not exist anywhere where there was no Neue Zürcher Zeitung. Newspapers connect the coffee drinker with current affairs. And signalize that they can linger without a waiter forcing them to order every quarter of an hour.
The founder of Starbucks,
Howard Schultz, once said that he doesn't sell coffee, but
15 minute break. Admittedly, a nice claim. But for it to be credible, the stores have to offer more than just the local edition of a free post. The question for guests is what to do with the remaining time once they have read the PR and agency messages. Stare into the empty coffee cup? Study the love lives of houseflies? Or shorten the break by ten minutes and leave this coffee house?
In view of the epidemic of cheap-is-cool nonsense, subscribing to quality newspapers signals that the host values his guests. This signal is all the more important as guests are being asked to pay 6.40 francs for a large caffe latte. But Starbucks probably considers its target group to be so intellectually underexposed that it should not be overburdened with Blick or the Neue Luzerner Zeitung - let alone an NZZ. We can only hope that this assessment does not correspond to reality.
Francis Müller also expects quality leaflets on caffeine brew in US coffee houses.

> Francis Müller is a freelance journalist and teaches at the Zurich University of Art and Design.

Caroline Thoma thinks the SonntagsZeitung is a good product. Thanks to fresh ideas from the publishing house, it could become even stronger. "I've tried it, but so far I haven't been able to find any appeal in this adventure." Caroline Thoma had more fun than diving with whitefish and perch when she spent several weeks diving in the Maldives with her husband and friends in February. She celebrated her 40th birthday on an uninhabited island. "Exotic fish in crystal-clear water, living on a safari boat, the clear starry sky, catching your own fish on the barbecue ..." Actually, she could have lived out this paradisiacal vacation for a whole year. When it became apparent that Caroline Thomas' job as publishing director at Annabelle would be abolished as part of a new structure, she took action. "I'm not the kind of person who waits until the end. I want to be able to decide for myself what I want to do," said the power woman, who had previously spent more than a dozen years in the media with a steady upward trajectory. The impending reorganization was therefore exactly the right time to take a sabbatical of her own choosing. "But it was clear that I didn't want to take a year-long vacation."
The publisher found the ideal substitute for simultaneously recharging her batteries and advancing her career at the University of St.Gallen. The Executive Master of Business Administration in Media and Communication course with Professor Glotz was a full-time course and was held in English with only four participants from Switzerland. Caroline Thoma was also attracted by two modules abroad. She was able to study media in Singapore for three weeks. During further project work in San Francisco, she also visited the ranch of film producer Georg Lucas. "It was interesting to discuss things with him," enthuses Thoma. However, it was not from Hollywood but from Werdstrasse that the call came, bringing the well-traveled diver back to Lake Zurich.
"I left it to my gut feeling at first: How does it affect me when I walk back through the door at the same company where I left a year ago?"
The comeback whetted her appetite. The offer to become the new publishing director of SonntagsZeitung ultimately attracted Caroline Thoma more than various other offers, including an extremely interesting position abroad.
"The newspaper is a good brand, has substance and offers potential for innovation." With the arrival of NZZ am Sonntag, the market has changed and become more exciting. It is a good time to take another look at the product and look for fresh ideas.
Caroline Thoma likes the fact that she has "a broad spectrum" of tasks in a publishing house. "I want to see the whole picture." For this reason, she wanted to switch from the agency side to the client side back in 1991 and started at Cash, which had just been founded. In the era of Ingrid Deltenre, Thoma spent six years at Wirtschaftsblatt, progressing from advertising assistant to deputy publishing director.
Caroline Thoma then moved to the company Swisscard AECS. She was Head of Loyalty and Reward at this joint venture between American Express and Credit Suisse. At the time, Thoma set up the "Point up" bonus program for the newly launched credit card brands. She is proud of the fact that her new customer magazine was realized with a genuine editorial concept and did not simply publicize services for customers.
In 1998, Annabelle received a call to work as publishing director. Tamedia manager Kurt W. Zimmermann had just bought Orella, which was to become Annabelle Création. Together with editor-in-chief Christa Löpfe, Thoma also introduced Annabelle Wohnen and Annabelle Business as part of the line extension strategy pursued at the time.
New forms of sponsorship made the Prix de Beauté, the biggest event for the beauty industry in Switzerland, possible. "At Annabelle, we have understood how to find and introduce new forms of cooperation." The new ideas on how to approach things also led to the "Annabelle Business" events. Up to 500 women have gathered at Kaufleuten, for example for an evening on the topic of networking.
Caroline Thoma completed her diploma as an advertising assistant during her time at the agency, followed later by marketing planner and advertising manager. The fact that she now wanted to work towards an MBA is first and foremost due to her "great curiosity". However, the recent entrant to the world of 40-year-olds also wants to prevent "the increasingly better educated young people" from snatching away her dream job one day. "I always want to have the opportunity to choose. If something interests me, I want to be able to apply for it." She has already acted on this principle when, after her first apprenticeship as a decorator, she realized that an additional CT could soon open more interesting doors for her.
Caroline Thoma has been married to a self-employed software engineer for ten years. She lives in the country "in a kind of shared flat" with her brother-in-law and sister-in-law and their two children, cats and rabbits. A couple of cows also gaze over the fence when it's time for an open-air movie with a projector and a big screen in the garden. Aviation films are also occasionally shown there, as Caroline Thoma wants to get her pilot's license "one day" in addition to her diving certificate.
Comeback at Tamedia with an MBA in her backpack: Caroline Thoma, Publishing Director at SonntagsZeitung.
Andreas Panzeri

Tourism Wirz Werbung is revisiting a tried-and-tested idea and making Kuoni customers forget everything again.whereas the previous campaign for Switzerland's largest travel provider made it clear that people forget everything after a Kuoni vacation, the current campaign from Wirz now makes people believe that this effect occurs not after, but during the vacation. Wirz is making Kuoni customers forget everything even earlier.those who still remember: the forgetting idea originally came to Advico Young & Rubicam. Because it was so well remembered, Kuoni has now made it a condition that Wirz Werbung should also adapt the basic messages in the new campaign. "So the ball was set very high for us. But we were also able to take it high," says CD Hanspeter Schweizer, convinced of his new variations.
The decisive differentiation: if everything is just right from A to Z for tourists with Kuoni during the best weeks of the year, forgetting doesn't just happen after the vacation - the relaxing switch-off of the mind begins on the first day of the vacation. The things that can be forgotten and the consequences of this are now causing a few surprises at Wirz, but also images that really make you long for a vacation. Also in contrast to the original campaign, the scenes in the extended variation are not set in the home country, but in a vacation environment.
In addition to two print subjects, the new image campaign is primarily based on two commercials. One of the new TV commercials from Wirz Werbung shows a woman on vacation floating through the vast Arizona landscape in a motorhome, so inspired that she forgets she is actually in a car. When her dog wants to go for a quick walk, she opens the door for him at full speed. But the spot is not so evil that the dog would forget all about the highway. The second film shows a man in a dreamy pose on a deck chair on the beach. He has forgotten that he has his own wife with him and caresses another in a half-dream.
Both commercials have been subtly staged by Spanish director Sebastien Grousset with enraptured images. They dramatize the degree of recovery "quite unusually, but very vividly", as Schweizer says.
Three years ago, Wirz Werbung already shot a commercial for Toyota with Grousset, which was shortlisted in Cannes. Grousset has also won Lions in Cannes for the newspaper Die Welt and a commercial for Mercedes.
Parallel to these moving images, the print campaign also makes notorious workaholics want to forget everything once again. A golfer has forgotten the small difference between a tennis ball and a golf ball. A woman no longer knows that the left beach shoe must also belong to the left foot. Unlike in the previous campaign, these subjects are no longer staged at home, but in a vacation landscape. The campaign starts this week.
The dog has to go for a walk - and is almost forgotten: Wirz hired Spanish director Sebastien Grousset for the TV commercials.
The flip-flops no longer fit properly and the golf ball has the jaundice - all because of Kuoni.
Andreas Panzeri

Oliver Classen on the Tages-Anzeiger's me-too local supplement Until yesterday, we thought that the Tagi's inferiority complex, which had been smouldering since the (National) de Weck era, was gradually becoming a thing of the past. After all, Tamedia boss Martin Kall emphasizes at every possible and impossible opportunity that Tamedia is just a publishing SME and proud of it, but we have just received an advertising letter from the same company, signed by the acting editor-in-chief himself, Peter Hartmeier. It states that with the launch of its regional edition for the left bank of Lake Zurich, the Tages-Anzeiger has "come a decisive step closer to its goal of becoming a complete newspaper".
However, you don't get this impression when leafing through the unstitched 20 pages. Even if Switzerland's largest subscription newspaper has not been fully-fledged to date, the local tabloid with its official gazette look does not make the journalistic roast from Werdstrasse any hotter. It offers too little nutritional value and surprises in terms of content and form. And the marginalized Tagi logo in the newspaper head borders on self-denial - with all due respect to the understatement of the urban invaders.
Compared to the bold appearance of the Aargau role model ten months ago, this supplement is at best an uninspired me-too product of the kind that appears dozens of times on the media market - and often soon disappears again. Therefore, anyone who takes such a big risk strategically and financially as Kall & Co. with their provincial daily should also be daring in terms of editorial and design. Or do we really have to conclude from the lack of innovation in publishing that there is a lack of self-confidence in Hartmeier's cheerful
Is this expressed in a misspelling? Anyway, there are already enough official gazettes in Switzerland.
> Oliver Classen, Editor

Posters In this year's tri-national poster design competition "100 Best Posters 04", the jury received 1100 individual posters from over 400 entrants, with around eight from Austria, around twelve from Switzerland and around 80 percent from Germany. With 22 award-winning works, Switzerland achieved a disproportionately high win rate in Berlin. The winners include Wirz, JvM, Studio Geissbühler, Sputnik and the Ruf Lanz agency with the "Teacup" motif for the Dolder Waldhaus. The tea brand, to which the motif was actually intended, felt that the handles looked too much like the face of a royal.

Outdoor advertising Affichage can be more than satisfied with 2004. Affichage currently generates around 10 percent of its total sales abroad and is aiming for a 25 percent share by 2008. If the biggest coup Affichage has planned for 2005 succeeds, it will already exceed its sales target abroad this year: it is preparing to take over the fourth-largest German out-of-home advertiser, Deutsche Eisenbahn-Reklame GmbH (DERG), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Deutsche Bahn (DB). DERG, which generated sales of 163 million euros in 2003 and markets DB's advertising media at 5,700 railroad stations, 19,000 railroad cars and locomotives as well as 7,000 bridges, is to be sold this year. According to reports from Germany, DB has instructed its profitable subsidiary to compile the documents required for the sale. "We expect these documents in March or April," said Affichage CEO Christian Kauter. He is certain that Affichage will submit an independent offer. However, Kauter, who is assuming a purchase price of 80 to 100 million euros, does not rule out the possibility that his company will look for a partner once the bid has been accepted.
In addition to Affichage, other internationally active out-of-home advertisers, such as the French Decaux Group, the American Viacom, the German market leader Ströer, the industry runner-up Freund and Berlin-based Wall AG, also want to bid for DERG. Others, such as Clear Channel, are also expected to bid.
Nevertheless, Kauter believes that Affichage has good prospects. Firstly, because the company has been active in station advertising in Switzerland for around 20 years, which means that "very good synergies" could be achieved. Furthermore, the out-of-home advertiser has a solid
equity ratio of 66 percent, which is why it would probably have no problem obtaining loans for the DERG deal. And thirdly, Affichage has virtually no presence in Germany, holding only a 25 percent stake in a small Stuttgart-based JCDecaux company. Other bidders would face competition law problems if they were awarded the contract. Incidentally, JCDecaux, which holds a 35 percent stake in Wall and a 30 percent stake in Affichage, is also on the board of directors of both companies. At Affichage, he will have to withdraw from the DERG business; it is unclear how he will handle this at Wall.
Even if Affichage does not succeed in making a major entry into Germany, the company's presence in Eastern Europe via Europlakat International (EPI), the joint venture with JCDecaux, is to be expanded in any case. Last year, sales there increased by 10.2 percent to 32.2 million Swiss francs, while the operating result even rose by 23.4 percent to 2.4 million Swiss francs. For 2005, EPI is expecting a further increase in sales of just under 10 percent.
After last year's contract for bus shelters in the Slovenian capital Ljubljana and the city contract for Budapest (Hungary), the focus this year is on Bulgaria and Romania. On the one hand, both markets are highly segmented, which is why EPI wants to buy companies and is negotiating with providers. In addition, a bus shelter contract is up for tender in the Bulgarian capital Sofia. "EPI will participate, we believe we have good chances there," says Kauter. He also mentions Ukraine and Belarus as other potential markets for EPI. "But we haven't put out any feelers yet," says the Affichage CEO. There is enough money available: Only half of the 120 million francs that JCDecaux and Affichage (60 million each) have earmarked for investments has been used up.
The third expansion step into Italy announced last year is also taking shape. Affichage wants to strengthen the difficult poster business in the small Ticino market by venturing beyond the national border into the Insubrica region just outside Milan. This region includes the cities of Como, Lecco and Varese, is closely linked to Ticino and, according to an Affichage analysis, forms a single unit in terms of commuter traffic, exchange of goods and communication.
Together with the population of Ticino, around one million people live there. Out-of-home advertising is largely unused. Negotiations are currently underway with a small company in Como for a takeover, and Affichage is also negotiating contracts with the municipal authorities. The aim is to build up a network in cities and along roads. It may also be possible to move southwards at a later date, says Kauter.
Affichage grew not only abroad, but also in Switzerland last year. Kauter was surprised that Media-Focus reported a gross decrease of 4 percent in poster advertising for 2005, as Affichage sales revenue in the domestic market grew by 2 percent to CHF 268.1 million. The operating result also improved by 3.5 percent to CHF 27.2 million, despite the trend towards higher taxes and commissions, as Kauter emphasized.
The Group as a whole closed the year 2.9 percent up on the previous year with sales revenue of CHF 300.3 million, while the result even increased by 5.1 percent to CHF 20.1 million.
New CI and an initial research sampleAffichage is working on a new Group image for the AGM in May. According to CEO Christian Kauter, the aim is to give the various subsidiaries such as E-Advertising, Paron and Bercher a more uniform appearance so that their affiliation to the Group can be better recognized via the logo. Much of the work had been developed internally, but a small Liechtenstein company had now been brought in to implement it.
A tool will also be available to download from www.affichage.ch in about a week's time, showing how the Swiss Poster Research (SPR) data is collected and weighted and how it can be used. However, sample data from the surveys in Winterthur and Zurich will be included first. According to Kauter, a tool with access to all existing SPR data will be available in 2006, when the city of Geneva will also have been surveyed. (mk)
Powerplay: Affichage wants to buy the Deutsche Bahn subsidiary DERG, which puts up posters at train stations.
Markus Knöpfli

Magazines Supersolo launches just in time for spring: the guide to happiness for singles Singles are an attractive target group. They need to keep up to date in terms of fashion, style and body care in order to keep their chances on the dating market. They are looking for entertainment and self-fulfilment in their free time. With this in mind, Mario Romano and Angelika Schnetzer launched Supersolo magazine for male and female singles aged 25 and over. It is designed as a "lifestyle magazine with class", says Romano. He has experience in this segment: together with Schnetzer, he has been publishing the zeitgeist magazine Massiv for five years. The glossy title has already caused quite a stir internationally (see box).
Supersolo is unlikely to be quite as prominent as its sister title. Although the print and format are similar to that of Massiv, utility value takes precedence over style (although this is not neglected). Supersolo is intended as a guide to topics such as partnership, love and eroticism, explains Romano. But topics such as modern thinking, sport, health and celebrities also have their place, as do tips for vacations, going out, books and music. Readers can also place paid contact ads.
The magazine doesn't just offer something for singles. Couples whose relationship needs new impetus should also be able to benefit from it. "The singles magazine is actually for everyone, because it's the magazine about love," write the publishers.
Romano and Schnetzer estimate the number of Swiss people without a partner at around one million. They are aiming lower with the initial print run: 30,000 copies will hit newsstands in German-speaking Switzerland on March 4 for 4 francs or will be distributed at selected locations. Five issues are planned for the current year. However, if the market reacts positively, Romano intends to increase the rhythm quickly. A website (www.supersolo.ch) will be added to the magazine in mid-March, and singles events are also planned.
Massive attention The St. Galler Schreibwerk publishing house
launched by Mario Romano and Angelika Schnetzer at the end of 1999, Massiv quickly made a name for itself with its lavish design and unconventional themes and photo series.
The Diesel jeans brand
voted Massiv 2000 one of the nine best international magazines in an in-house rating, alongside titles such as Vogue and i-D.
From the Paris media agency
In 2002, Zenith Optimedia included Massiv in the Top 40 of internationally pioneering magazines - the only Swiss title to do so.
Massive appears today
seven times a year with a print run of 25,000 copies. The magazine is sold by subscription and at newsstands.
distributed. (sm)
Supersolo - "a magazine about love" is what its editors call it.
Stefano Monachesi

Christoph Bürge (pictured) is leaving Swiss Television DRS as program developer in the "Culture and Entertainment" department this early summer after around a year He has been appointed Chief Operating Officer of the Prima Group in Romania by SBS Broadcasting. The group consists of the broadcaster Prima TV and two national radio stations....
At the beginning of March 2005, Andreas Florek (photo) will be joining the Facts news magazine. In future, he will be responsible for the Mittelland region as Area Sales Manager. Florek has worked for various media agencies over the past twelve years, including as Managing Director of Media Planning Switzerland.
...
Managing Director Jane Borgström is leaving the media agency Carat Switzerland in the summer. She is moving to Germany for personal reasons. The new Managing Director will be Christophe Waeber (photo), currently Deputy Publishing Director and Head of Sales at the Jean Frey magazines Bilanz and Weltwoche.
...
Sandro Prezzi (photo) is the new Managing Director of Mediaedge CIA Zurich. He joins at the beginning of June from Optimedia, where he has been a member of the management team responsible for strategic consulting and head of a key account unit since 2001.
...
Maria Müller replaces Karin Hug as art director at the Haltestelle content design agency in Bern. Hug moved to SF DRS at the beginning of March. Müller previously worked at TeleBasel, New Identity and Ruweba Klein Kommunikation.
...
Florian Birkner (pictured) has been copywriting for Advico Young & Rubicam since the beginning of March. He previously worked at Scholz & Friends in Berlin for three years. Nicolas Vontobel (previously Lesch + Frei) will join the agency as the new Art Director at the beginning of May.
...
Silvan Wyser is the new Head of Marketing at GIA GraphaInformatik in Oftringen AG. Prior to his move, he was Head of Marketing & Communications at Swisscom IT Services.

Advertising bans Don't worry. Although the World Health Organization's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control comes into force on Sunday, Switzerland has not ratified the treaty because various amendments to the law are still required. These include restrictions on advertising, the ban on selling cigarettes to minors and the protection of non-smokers in public places. Switzerland will not be able to ratify the convention for another five to seven years, said Philippe Vallat, head of the national tobacco prevention program, when asked by SDA.

Body care The Küsnacht-based communications agency Unikat has received a new commission from Doetsch Grether, which has entrusted it with the naming and product design of a new Fenjal line from the Basel-based chemical company. The new body care product will be launched in Switzerland and Germany in spring 2005.

Agencies J. Walter Thompson swears by new creative ideas. WW Worldwide CEO Bob Jeffreys has declared February 28, 2005 to be the "day of birth" of JWT. The oldest agency in the world wants to get rid of its service image and has committed itself to creativity. Is JWT+H+F also undergoing a creative reorientation? Remy Fabrikant We are happy that the network is finally realizing what we have been doing for years.
Andy Hostettler Remy and I actually have this way of thinking in our genes. We've been pursuing this concept since we had our own agency, and even before that at Weber Hodel Schmid.
More creative advertising equals more attention equals more sales and success, you write in a press release. Isn't this equation a little too
simple?
Hostettler We're not the first to say that. Three or four years ago, Y&R conducted a study based on the Brand Asset Valuator and compared it with Nielsen data from various clients. This proved that creative advertising sells better than average advertising. Take a look at what Procter & Gamble is doing: the company that stood for stupid advertising for around 30 years has been demanding that its agencies include their campaigns in the Gunn Report for two years now. They have realized that creative advertising can get you out of the swamp of mass communication and get people more involved.
Fabrikant One reason for the repositioning is that large network customers complained that the old advertising strategies were no longer working. There is a cultural difference between the USA and Switzerland. A large part of the advertising volume in America goes to television. In Switzerland, there is a diversity of media and countless channels from which advertising is pushed at consumers. Despite these inverse signs, our common basis is to discuss creative standards and develop them further, in whatever medium or with whatever mix. You have to be able to stand out from the mud. If you can do that, you have won the consumer's attention. Only then will you be in a position to convey a message.
All JWT agencies are now committed to the JWT Success Standard, which measures their success in ten levels from "detrimental" to "world-beating". Isn't this standard a bit simplistic?
Hostettler We absolutely stand behind these standards. They were not invented overnight, but were developed a long time ago.
Fabrikant Actually, that's not even JWT's idea. These are the so-called "Seven Pluses" invented by Michael Conrad from Leo Burnett. They are designed to help us make creation assessable, especially in discussions with customers.
Hostettler That's the most important point. We keep finding that everyone wants a creative campaign, but everyone understands it differently. That's why in future we want to incorporate the standards as soon as we receive the briefing: Can this brief enable a top creative campaign or not? We will use the standards as a yardstick and also encourage the client to measure us against them.
The German JWT has already drawn the consequences of the realignment and outsourced the controlling department to the network in order to be able to hire more creative people. Are you thinking of similar measures?
Hostettler In Germany, people go so far as to say that there are only creatives and producers at JWT. Producers are desktoppers, producers, accountants and so on. The creatives now also include consultants and strategists. We don't need to take this step: At JWT+H+F, everyone has been sitting at the same table for five years: strategists, creatives and consultants.
After 140 years, the agency has reduced its name to the initials of its founder. Will you miss J. Walter Thompson?
Hostettler Not at all. We already adopted it years ago. The only thing that has changed for us is the implementation of the logo.
Ideas for peopleFrom a service-oriented organization to a creative organism: this is CEO Bob Jeffrey's vision for JWT.
This is how Jeffrey defines the new agency point of view: "We need to ensure that more people spend more time with our clients' brands. We need to create ideas that people want to spend more time with. The better the idea is, the more time people will spend with it."
The new Success Standard (see image) and a quantitative-qualitative evaluation tool, which for the first time measures performance not only from a financial point of view, serve as aids. (sm)
The JWT Success Standard: the benchmark for creative quality.
Interview: Stefano Monachesi

Automobile In a teaser campaign for Daihatsu, FCBLK called on people to kiss the green frog.Daihatsu has created a great past for itself with small cars. As space is becoming scarcer and more expensive in urban areas, the Toyota Group brand wants to continue to clearly differentiate itself from the competition with compact cars. Daihatsu's compact models are designed to offer more space and comfort in their own way, which is familiar from higher classes, and at the same time have less impact on the environment. Hence the brand claim: Bigger is dumb. Ascar, responsible for importing Daihatsu in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein, opted for Lime Green Metallic as a unique color for the Swiss market launch of the new Daihatsu Sirion - also as a nod to Daihatsu's environmentally friendly model range.
The almost 100-year-old Toyota subsidiary, which has been sold in Switzerland for over 20 years, set the course early and consistently with its guiding principle "we make it compact". Compact vehicles consume fewer resources and less fuel, take up less road and parking space and reduce the disposal and recycling problem.
This clear brand orientation is also reflected in the marketing communication, which aims to strike a balance between the ecological concept and comfortable private transportation for Daihatsu vehicles. For the launch campaign, the revised Sirion model inspired FCB Leutenegger Krüll to call on the whole of Switzerland to kiss a green frog. After the teaser phase, the frog was transformed into the new Sirion.
With further accompanying measures, FCB Leutenegger Krüll wants to ensure that younger target groups will also be interested in the new Daihatsu model and that the brand's level of awareness can be further expanded. The environmental friendliness of the brand is carried through to the BtL area of the campaign. Completely off the beaten advertising track, Daihatsu has taken on animal sponsorships of well-known and lesser-known frogs in various Swiss zoos. It remains to be seen whether this PR campaign will meet with a positive response from the rather critical target group.
The riddle is solved: the frog, if kissed, mutates into a small car.

35000 Opels ready for testingDespite a refreshed model range, Opel sales are stagnating (Switzerland 2004: minus 7.2% compared to 2003). Alain Visser, Head of Marketing Europe since June 2004, is presenting a new type of campaign at the Geneva Motor Show: after the current Opel models have repeatedly emerged as winners in comparative tests by specialist magazines, this quality is now to be experienced by potential customers - in the largest Opel test drive campaign of all time. Around 35,000 cars will be tested in around 40 European countries. The special thing about the campaign is not just the number of vehicles, but the duration of the test drive itself: the vehicles will be made available to interested parties for three days. Fancy a shopping trip to Milan? (la)
Luca Aloisi