The winners within all four target groupsGold 58% Manta Reisen Zehen (content&form)Silver 57% Sölden Skipass (Lowe GGK)
Bronze 56% Mövenpick Schwarzwälder (La Povertà, Paris)

Magazines The first issue of the new magazine Saturne (WW 08/04), published in French-speaking Switzerland with an initial print run of 30,000 copies, sold out within hours. "We are surprised by its success," Saturne journalist Béatrice Schaad told the news agency SDA. Saturne is published twice a month and offers information, poetry and satire. The initiator is Ariane Dayer, the former editor-in-chief of L'Hebdo.

Guest commentary For Hans-Jürg Fehr, the revision of the RTVA is largely going according to plan. He sees a need for improvement in the areas of political advertising and the supervisory bodies. It is pleasing that the FDP and SVP motions for rejection were rejected. They had a single goal: to clip the wings of the SRG. And they did so more radically than the same circles later tried again with a series of (also unsuccessful) minority motions. These attacks, which arose from neoliberal ideology and old resentments, were aimed at the old enemy, the SRG. However, they also completely failed to recognize the interests of the Swiss advertising industry: a weakening of the SRG would not be to the advantage of private TV stations, but to that of foreign SRG competitors. Not only would the public service in the various language regions be massively damaged, but also the best electronic advertising platform.
The second important plus point is the legal anchoring of fee splitting. This will secure the existence of our finely structured local radio landscape. However, as fees will in future only be paid in connection with performance mandates, the splitting also means an expansion of the public service. In conjunction with a better endowed licence fee fund, it will also be possible to improve journalistic pay and working conditions in addition to the quality of private radio stations.
With the fee share limited to four percent (around CHF 45 million), the loss-making regional TVs can also be given a bigger helping hand. They will receive an additional boost from the asymmetrical advertising regulations in their favor: they allow private broadcasters to advertise beer and wine, political parties and religious communities, thus opening up markets that remain closed to SRG. However, it is doubtful whether these decisions will survive the deliberations in the Council of States.
Political advertising is problematic. This is permitted in the rest of Europe. But state funding of political parties is also common there. Without this, political TV advertising in particular would prove to be an extreme preference for financially strong parties, associations and individuals. That is undesirable. We want a direct democracy, not a venal one.
One of the negative points is the removal of the regional language public councils. The Council of States will have to make improvements here, as someone in the public service must check whether providers are adhering to their service mandates.
> Hans-Jürg Fehr is a member of the National Council of Schaffhausen, a member of the parliamentary media commission and the newly crowned SP President.

Dentalhygiene Exxtra's commercial for the new Candida Sensitive does not require the doctor's admonishing finger.oral hygiene is highly valued by the Swiss population. Sales in this product group are correspondingly impressive. This grew by 2.7 percent to over 163 million Swiss francs in 2002, although advertising spending has been in slight decline for three years. This development is due to the desire for gleaming white teeth, which is particularly pronounced among young people. Motivational research shows that dental care has been moving closer to the cosmetic sector for several years because beautiful teeth are essential for a good appearance. Manufacturers have responded gratefully to this trend with a large number of high-growth, high-margin whitening toothpastes. However, so-called sensitive pastes for sensitive teeth and exposed tooth necks have also been increasing in sales for some time.
With its best-selling Candida brand, Migros is playing a major role in this development - even after expanding its range with Gaba products last year.
All the benefits in one tubeThe competition on their own shelves seems to be a real challenge for the product developers at manufacturer Mibelle: The best results of Candida Sensitive in tests of abrasiveness and cleaning effect - including at the Clinic for Preventive Dentistry at the University of Zurich - prove to be the ideal prerequisite for a leader position. Apart from whitening toothpastes, benefit segmentation is anything but easy today, as all brands bring almost all benefits into one tube - from periodontal disease and caries prevention to a pleasant taste and an affordable price. Candida Sensitive is therefore to be given a more medicinal touch with an improved formula and now also without green stripes in packaging with an increased white content.
Pathetic paint treatment
The Zurich agency Exxtra is also tackling the communicative repositioning with fresh ideas: With a comparison that is unusual in the industry, the creatives are breaking the traditional mold of toothpaste advertising, in which the majority of the advertising is based on medical evidence. In their TV commercial, a snobbish guy washes his sports car with a cleaning agent that literally scrapes the paintwork - painfully audible. Instead of being startled and interrupting his circular movements, he calmly continues to look at his ruined gem with obvious satisfaction. The resolution: "Many people do exactly that twice a day" - "with their teeth", is the transition to the pack-shot.
Only philistines look after their sports car like this: Exxtra gives the Porsche a thrashing.
Luca Aloisi

According to market researcher Media Focus, the orange giant increased its advertising budget by 19.5 percent to CHF 221 million, while arch-rival Coop reduced it by 2 percent to CHF 210 million. Swisscom is in third place, although it reduced its budget by a full 36 percent and still invested 56 million francs. No other company made a bigger cut. With an increase of 65 percent, Credit Suisse made the biggest gains. The gross advertising expenditure of the twenty largest advertising clients amounted to a total of 956 million francs, one percent more than in 2002. In contrast, total expenditure on traditional advertising fell by 2.5 percent to 3.645 billion francs.

Othmar Fischlin Head of Media and Research at Publimedia Zurich on the problems and potential of SME titles.WW How has the market for SME titles changed in the last three years? Othmar Fischlin: Mediaprint.ch, the largest Swiss print media database, has a good dozen titles under the keyword SME that are aimed specifically at the small and medium-sized enterprise segment. It seems that publishers have discovered the backbone of the Swiss economy - SMEs - in recent years.
Many SME titles do not have a certified circulation or readership figures.
This is actually a point that can still be optimized. As many of these titles are new to the market in recent years, there are understandable deficits in terms of the planning basis. However, more transparency with regard to circulation and readership data as well as participation in advertising statistics would certainly make this press segment easier to plan and therefore more attractive in the advertising market.
How do you see the future of this market in general?
There is certainly still a lot of development potential to be expected for these titles. After all, the tasks of business management are becoming increasingly complex and the framework conditions are changing dramatically and rapidly. But the reader must be given real support so that they are prepared to invest time in using the title in the future.
Are there still undiscovered niches in this market segment?
That remains to be seen. In principle, a relatively large number of print products aimed at the management of SMEs are now being published - for the rather small Swiss market. It can be assumed that further expansion in this market will be at the expense of established trade journals. Alternatively, titles in the specialist and trade press will try to raise their profile in the SME sector, as the Schweizerische Gewerbezeitung is already doing with its supplement Der KMUnternehmer.
Markus Knöpfli

Banks Following an evaluation of three agencies, Graubündner Kantonalbank (GKB) has decided to work with Viva, a Zurich-based advertising agency that will be active in the areas of advertising, promotion, events and sponsorship. The account was previously managed by Jung von Matt/Limmat, which won a Bronze Effie and Silver at the New York Festivals for GKB last year. "We were always very satisfied with Jung von Matt's performance," emphasized Head of Marketing Daniel Michel. But there always comes a time when you have to reorient yourself. Michel did not want to give any details about the size of the budget. However, he pointed out that GKB has a strong internal advertising department. For example, the ice hockey sponsorship project, which recently won the German-language sponsorship award, was realized entirely in-house.

At the invitation of the Central Switzerland Advertising Club (WCZ), futurologist Georges T. Roos presents three scenarios from his study "Changing Values in Switzerland 2024", which is based on data from the Demoscope Institute and the Federal Statistical Office as well as a panel of experts. This will be followed by a discussion between Roos, Lucerne's head of culture Rosie Bitterli Mucha, advertiser Peter W. Ottiger (Ottiger & Partner) and Christian Tichelli from Demoscope. The event will take place on Monday, March 29, from 7 p.m. in Lucerne. It is free for members of the WCZ, other guests pay 75 francs. Register by March 24 at www.wcz.ch in the "Events" section.

Competition The European Association of Communication Agencies (EACA) is inviting entries for the Euro Effie 2004 efficiency award for advertising campaigns that can demonstrate success in two or more European markets. They must have been launched in 2003. The closing date for entries is April 30. The winners will be announced on September 30. Further information and entry forms can be found at www.euro-effie.com.

Newspapers The liberal Corriere del Ticino wants to help the crisis-ridden church newspaper Giornale del Popolo (GdP) - financially and technically.Il Caffè newspaper had reported that seven million francs would be needed to save the GdP over the next two years. Around a dozen jobs would be cut at the church newspaper, explained editor-in-chief Giancarlo Dillena. The GdP will remain an autonomous daily newspaper with its own editorial team and an independent line determined by the Catholic Church.

Prevention A cycling accident without a helmet can cause unwanted visions: This was impressively demonstrated by Ruf Lanz for Sport Factory Outlet on the living object (Uriella), and now the agency for Suva and the Federal Office for Accident Prevention is dramatizing the negative consequences of a head injury. The (almost) perfectly coiffed model presents herself to the photographer after an emergency doctor with no knowledge of hairdressing has touched her hair. The subject is intended to encourage cyclists to think about whether they might prefer to hide their lovingly styled mane under a helmet for a while.

The 13th Fumetto Comix Festival in Lucerne also includes a special exhibition on comics in advertising, presenting campaigns that were produced on behalf of Swiss companies or by Swiss agencies, designed by Swiss artists or at least shown in Switzerland. The Swiss Advertising Association (SW) is sponsoring this exhibition, which will be on display from May 1 to 9 in a room of the disused Hotel Union. The organizers of Fumetto are currently collecting exhibition material in the form of advertisements, commercials, POS material and merchandising articles. Anyone wishing to provide material can send it to the festival by March 31 (Fumetto, "Comic in der Werbung", P.O. Box 5163, 6000 Lucerne 5).