Delivery organization Now the head of Swiss Post is taking the AZO seriously In the past, Swiss Post had no interest in participating in the Alternative Delivery Organization for Magazines (AZO) despite several invitations. However, the fact that the publishing houses Ringier, Tamedia, NZZ and Südostschweiz as well as the retail giant Valora gave the project the green light on December 21 seems to have knocked Swiss Post off its feet. In any case, Swiss Post CEO Ulrich Gygi will meet with the heads of the four publishers this week. No wonder: the project, which is independent of the publishers' association, would take 180 million of the 700 million magazines distributed annually and a turnover of 150 million Swiss francs out of Swiss Post's hands.On January 11, the AZO committee also decided that potential major customers such as Schweizer Illustrierte, Touring, Migros Magazin and Coop Zeitung will now be approached and, if possible, integrated into the project. "We want to expand the committee considerably over the next few months," says Walter Lütolf, Head of Sales at Ringier and AZO spokesperson. It is also planned that project manager Wolfgang Schickli will continue in his role, although he will take over the Press & Book Switzerland division at Valora.
(mk)

Lettershops The St. Gallen PR agency Complecta has been commissioned by Künzler-Bachmann Direktmarketing with the communication surrounding the takeover of the lettershop Regor, which Künzler-Bachmann acquired from Tamedia at the beginning of the year. Complecta created a PR concept and is responsible for the realization of internal and external communication. This includes various media information and the creation of mailings to the stakeholders of Künzler-Bachmann and Regor.

Special Interest Ringier's Gesundheit Sprechstunde is seeking success in the advertising market with a new formula: Gesundheit Sprechstunde (GeS) will become "a package insert, an instruction manual for health", Samuel Stutz is convinced. Although the doctor and presenter of the "GeS" program on SF 2 is officially only a freelancer, as such he is the spiritus rector behind Ringier's GeS media network, and together with editorial director Theo Uhlir, Stutz has developed the magazine's new concept, which will be launched on January 14. The magazine will be brought closer to the TV program and will deal with the same topics in future. It will therefore focus on the areas of medicine, prevention and therapy. Softer topics such as wellness and beauty will only be covered if they are directly related to the topic of health.
"We bring health into people's everyday lives," says Stutz, outlining the aim: readers receive instructions on how to take responsibility for their own health. "We completely reverse the expert role: our readers become the experts for their own problems." Stutz believes this is in line with the trend: more and more people - including young people - are finding out about health themselves instead of turning to traditional authorities.
Zero issue rated positivelyA qualitative study based on the zero issue has already shown that the new formula has been well received. With more space for important topics, more infographics, better reader guidance and a larger format, the new magazine stood out from its predecessor in the respondents' assessment and, according to Stutz, scored particularly well in terms of authenticity and utility.
In the first year, the main aim is to consolidate circulation and "keep readers on board", says Martin Tamas, Commercial Director of the GeS media network. He believes that new readers can be gained primarily within the existing main target group: women over 35. "It's more difficult to reach younger people with the topic of health," says Tamas. According to Mach Basic 2004, only 22 percent of GeS readers are under 35 years old, 65 percent are women. "This has been the shape of the readership for five years," concludes Tamas.
Ringier is placing greater expectations on the advertising market. The magazine is to be brought out of the red through clearer positioning in the health sector and new forms of advertising. Individual sections of the magazine, such as a regularly published medical poster, can be sponsored. The editorial team also writes brochures or advertorials for customers, although these should be clearly marked as advertising.
From media network to service centerLast summer, Ringier spun off Gesundheit Sprechstunde (GeS) from the magazine division and created a "Health Business Unit" from the TV show, magazine and website. The aim is to achieve both editorial and commercial synergies. However, according to commercial director Martin Tamas, there will be no advertising combination of magazine and TV program. The rules at SRG and Press TV stand in the way of this. Ringier can only sell sponsorship appearances, while commercials have to be booked via Publisuisse.
For presenter Samuel Stutz, the "Health Unit" is about more than just selling advertising. "The old dream of a service center has come true," enthuses the TV doctor. In future, a wide range of health services are to be launched under the GeS label. Stutz wants to tailor "intelligent packages" for readers and viewers.
The first on the subject of weight loss will include a book from Gesundheit Sprechstunde, a preparation, a pedometer and a special measuring tape and will be launched together with the Galenica pharmacy chain. Further ideas are currently being examined. (sm)
Closer to the TV program: Gesundheit Sprechstunde.
Stefano Monachesi

Media policy The preliminary consultation on the revised Radio and TV Act (RTVA) has been completed. The Transport and Telecommunications Committee of the Council of States has passed the bill unanimously, but due to the numerous differences, it is not expected that the Council of States will be able to finish discussing the RTVA in the coming March session, says Committee President Rolf Escher. Around two dozen minority motions are up for discussion.

The new cultural agenda for Bern will be published for the first time on January 13 and is backed by the city's cultural secretary and an association with a strong base in the cultural scene. It has a circulation of 60,000 copies, which are enclosed with the Berner Zeitung (BZ) and the Bund, among others, in their early delivery area. The budget of 705,000 francs is shared equally between the association, the city and the canton of Berne and is financed by advertising and sponsorship. Bernische Kraftwerke (BKW) has been secured as the main sponsor, and negotiations are underway with other potential sponsors. The volume of advertising is good, said Cultural Secretary Christoph Reichenau.

Education The Swiss Association of Construction Teachers (SVB) has been given a new name and a revised image, and the Bern-based agency Push 'n' Pull Communication has been commissioned to develop the new corporate design. In addition to the name, logo design and stationery, a new website will be developed in a second phase. The first results are expected to be seen in spring 2005.

With a special regulation in the new Alcohol and Tobacco Act, the government council of the canton of Baselland wants to secure the existence of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors tennis tournament.advertising bans The bill does contain a ban on advertising alcohol and tobacco on public property and in public buildings. However, "events whose names contain a reference to alcohol or tobacco products and which have been held for several years prior to the entry into force of this law" are exempt.

Radio Managing Director Günter Heuberger will in future hold a majority stake in Eastern Switzerland's local radio station Radio Top, and the Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications has cleared the way for a reorganization of the shareholder structure. Heuberger will initially take over 100 percent of Lokalradio Thurgau AG, which holds a quarter of Top shares. Subsequently, the three operating companies Lokalradio Thurgau, Radio Wil and Radio Eulach are to be merged in the first half of 2005. Once all transactions have been completed, Heuberger will hold 52.5 percent of the top shares. 8 percent are held by Thurgau entrepreneur Martin U. Model. A further 100 shareholders hold shares of less than 5 percent. Numerous small shareholders of Radio Eulach and Radio Wil will relinquish their shares.

Advertising combination Wirz Werbung launches the new advertising combination Metropool with rotating ads. "The Swisspool is no longer a market-driven offer for national advertising", Tamedia spokeswoman Franziska Hügli told Werbewoche at the beginning of July 2004, explaining the termination of the Swisspool contract. Less than a month later, the Metropool was announced, which was officially launched at the beginning of January 2005. However, with Tages-Anzeiger (Tagi), Berner Zeitung (BZ) and Basler Zeitung (BaZ), only three of the original Swisspool partners are still represented in the new combination. As a result, the new metropolitan pool has a smaller circulation and fewer readers: Whereas the Swisspool still had a circulation of 966885, Metropool has 564741 copies. The number of readers reached has fallen from 2 to around 1.2 million.
Also for smaller budgetsIn contrast, the new ad combination offers advertisers a reduction of 13% instead of just 10% compared to individual bookings, making it affordable for smaller budgets. Those responsible hope that this will attract more attention in the advertising market than with Swisspool.
The launch campaign by Wirz Werbung is now intended to ensure broad publicity. The Zurich agency won the budget last fall in a competitive presentation. In the creative implementation, the Wirz team is relying on the advantages of the daily press
compared to the Sunday newspapers. "If you want to advertise when the stores are open and the trade is active, you can hardly do without the daily papers you subscribe to," CD Matthias Freuler is convinced. The creatives dramatize this advantage of the weekday in a playful way: by rotating the advertisement, readers can experience the difference between the weekday and Sunday for themselves. "Sunday is a day of rest," the ad headline comments on the reclining models and adds after a 90-degree turn: "There's Metropool on all other days."
The subjects, which had to work in both landscape and portrait format, were shot by Swedish top photographer Jimmy Henson. According to AD Chantal Heimo, they had to fight against gravity during the shoot, as the models were photographed lying down. However, using newspapers and wooden supports, it was possible to achieve a satisfactory result.
It makes sense: working days are days when stores are open and trade is active - days for advertisements.

Wirz Werbung has got the hang of it. In the blink of an eye, comfortable lounging becomes part of everyday working life. And on these working days, of course, you advertise in the Metropool >> page 9
Simone Keller

Telecom Luck again: I was recently annoyed by an advertising mailing from Swisscom Fixnet, because an address administrator had me and everyone else with the first name Luca undergo a sex change at the touch of a button. I almost threw the mailing unopened into the waste paper. But my natural curiosity prevailed over the bile acid in my stomach. I tore open the envelope. And there it was, the good news announcing the return of hundreds of thousands of people on the very day that a visibly moved Federal President Samuel Schmid claimed the opposite of a few hundred Swiss citizens. Flags flew at half-mast in all European countries on that day, because many there were also waiting in vain for returnees. This coincidence begs the question: were those responsible for the direct mailing able to laugh as calmly as the sitcom couple Beck? One thing is certain: a wave of enthusiasm is unlikely to have swept over them.
(la)

Newspapers Consolidation is also claiming victims in the USA: journalistic quality and traditional publishers.
The Pulitzer publishing family has weathered many a storm. One episode from 1986 is particularly memorable: Back then, the grandson of the legendary founder, who also went by the name of Joseph Pulitzer, resolutely fended off a takeover attempt: "I will never trade my heritage for a pot of gold," said the heir at the time.But that is exactly what the owners of the newspaper company now seem to be planning to do, led by the grandson's widow, Emily Rauh Pulitzer. They want to explore "strategic alternatives", the management recently said, meaning they are prepared to sell. "Like other publishing families before them, the Pulitzers have realized that newspapers currently have a value that they will probably never have again," suspects John Morton from the consulting firm Morton Research. The fact is that the company has made decent profits in recent years and is now valued by analysts at around 1.5 billion dollars.
Huge return thanks to monopolyThe most serious interested party is reportedly the newspaper conglomerate Gannett, which publishes 101 local and regional daily newspapers as well as USA Today, the largest US newspaper (circulation 2.3 million). Pulitzer, with its flagship The St. Louis Post-Dispatch in Missouri and 94 smaller newspapers, fits well into its portfolio. However, this would mean that another independent publisher would fall into the hands of the group. "Of the 1500 daily newspapers in the USA, just 275 are still under the control of one family, and the trend is falling rapidly," says Thomas Kunkel, professor of journalism at the University of Maryland and publisher of the American Journalism Review. And as we know, large publishing houses have one thing in mind above all else: profit.
American newspaper groups have made unprecedented profits in recent decades. For industry leader Gannett, for example, a 25 percent return on sales is nothing unusual. Despite the ongoing advertising crisis and growing Internet competition, the national average is still 20 percent - twice as much as the average Fortune 500 company. This has been made possible by the synergy effects of newspaper mergers, but also by the fact that local competitors have been and continue to be systematically bought up. "If you have no competitors," says Jim Naurekas from the New York-based organization Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, "you can raise advertising rates almost at will."
As a consequence, media critics like Naurekas are necessarily concerned about journalistic quality. "For those people who run news organizations in the US, the return on investment has long been more important than the question of what our reporting looks like." In his opinion, investors in media companies listed on the stock exchange are deliberately ensuring that the journalistic mission of providing information falls victim to Wall Street logic through "cost cutting" and cutbacks in foreign reporting, for example. "The probability that a publishing house will also take care of its social and democratic duties is much higher in family-run companies," says Kunkel.
The large US publishing houses that are still controlled by the founding families, such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Dow Jones/Wall Street Journal and the Seattle Times Company, are also the most credible and influential in the country in terms of publishing. Although they too have mostly floated their companies on the stock exchange under increasing pressure to make a profit, they protect themselves with a two-pronged ownership structure. Part of the shares - so-called A-shares - are issued to the public according to this model, which ensures a certain inflow of investment money. However, the majority of a second type of share, known as B shares, is held by the family, which secures the decisive voting rights. This has also been the case for the Pulitzers to date.
Arthur Sulzberger Jr., publisher of the New York Times, advises anyone who wants to enter the newspaper business as a family heir to think twice. Because the time and emotion involved is "simply cruel". "You have to have a strong passion for journalism," says Kunkel. "For younger generations, even in this industry, at some point it's just their grandfather's business. The likelihood that an entire family will still be willing to take on this challenge decreases as the years go by."
Father of the Nobel Prize in JournalismJoseph Pulitzer Senior emigrated from Hungary to the USA in 1864 and founded his newspaper company in 1876 in St. Louis, Missouri, where part of the German-speaking community was at home, which initially published the "Westliche Post". The St. Louis Post-Dispatch was added in the same year and the New York World in 1883. The latter became one of the first American Yellow Press organs at the end of the 19th century and competed with the Hearst publishing house.
legendary headline battles.
However, the scandal-ridden mother of all tabloids made its mark with investigative journalism during the lifetime of Pulitzer, who died in 1911. In his will, the newspaper pioneer left two million dollars for the founding of the now world-famous Columbia Journalism School in New York and awarded the Pulitzer Prize, which has long been considered a Nobel Prize for journalism, as a kind of reparation for his journalistic "sins of youth". Today, the company (2003 turnover: 423 million dollars; 2003 profit: 87 million dollars!) is in the hands of the Pulitzer heirs and comprises 12 daily newspapers and 82 weekly and niche publications. (oc)
Websites: http://www.pulitzerinc.com/
http://www.pulitzer.org
Selling out: More and more families are realizing that the value of their newspapers is currently at its peak and are drawing the consequences.
Gerti Schön

The Swiss Public Relations Institute (SPRI) is looking for a new director. Cyril Meier (photo) resigned at the end of 2004. The definitive successor is to be appointed in the first quarter of 2005....
Béatrice Wertli is leaving her post as Head of Communications at CVP Switzerland. At the beginning of April, she will take over as Head of Internal Communications at Swiss Post.
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Gabriella Zinke has been the new Head of Communications at the environmental protection organization WWF Switzerland since the beginning of December. She joins the Executive Board. Zinke most recently held the same position at Migros subsidiary Limmatdruck.
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Fisch Meier Direkt is strengthening its creative team with copywriter/concept developer Simone Paulzen and AD Michael Gallmann. Denise Vonlanthen, formerly of Grey Worldwide, and Christian Staub from Scotti have joined the consultancy team.
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In February, Rolf Kälin (photo) joins the Baden-based communications agency Mach AG as CD and member of the management board. Kälin was previously AD at Wirz Werbung. At the same time, AD and co-owner Roman Hofer is leaving Mach AG.
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After five and a half years in office, program director Peter Brun is leaving the Zurich local station Radio 24 due to differences of opinion about the strategic direction.