Soft drinks market With his Mecca-Cola, the Franco-Tunisian Tawfik Mathlouthi is also calling on politically active people in Switzerland to "drink with commitment". His claim: "Ne buvez plus idiot. "The fight for a just world has never been easier: open a bottle of Coke. But not just any bottle. It has to be a bottle of Mecca-Cola. Its inventor, the Franco-Tunisian Tawfik Mathlouthi, calls it "committed drinking". Ten percent of the profits from his new beverage brand go to Palestinian aid organizations and ten percent to local aid organizations in the sales region. But it is not a me-too product like Pepsi, Vivi, Aproz or Afri-Cola. Mecca-Cola is an anti-Cola. The classic red is joined by the complementary color green, the color of the Koran. Red, white, green and (cola) black are also the colors on Palestine's flag. With the inscription "Please do not mix with alcohol", the drink also acknowledges the Koran, which forbids devout Muslims from drinking alcohol.
Not for idiots
"The anti-Cola strategy works because Coca-Cola itself has an ideological message in people's minds," analyzes Klaus Brandmeyer, Director of the Institute for Brand Technology in Geneva. "Namely the message of 'America', 'freedom' and all the positive things that go with it. With such a counter-product, this is initially demonized and branded with the slogan 'Ne buvez plus idiot'."
Mathlouthi quickly found a ready market among the Muslim population in France. Mecca-Cola is now also set to find buyers in Switzerland. The St.Gallen-based consulting firm Swinti NetMarketing is responsible for distribution. Its managing director, Mike Strahm, had read about Mecca-Cola in the newspaper. "I've always been interested in what's happening in the Middle East," says Strahm, explaining his motivation, "I have a strong sense of justice." That's why he immediately got in touch with Mathlouthi. For Strahm, the Swiss target audience is less Muslim immigrants than peace activists and no-globals who want to make a statement by buying Mecca-Cola.
Klaus Brandmeyer believes this marketing strategy has good prospects. After all, consuming a product always represents a social positioning, he says: "I am what I consume, and I want to be that too." In the current tense situation, where the start of the war against Iraq can be expected any day now, "something like this can really be a spark that ignites an area". Coke consumption as a peaceful demonstration against the American threat of war.
Coca-Cola is Coca-Cola is...
So should the Coca-Cola Company be worried about its brand? Brandmeyer doesn't think so. There has always been anti-Americanism and reservations about Coca-Cola throughout history. But not even scandals such as the Belgian affair with contaminated cans that sickened children have caused serious damage to this global brand. "Coca-Cola can always say: 'You know, we're not doing anything bad. We're not George W. Bush either. Coca-Cola is Coca-Cola,'" says Brandmeyer.
This puts the brand expert right in line with the soft drinks company's approach in Switzerland. "Coca-Cola spreads an attitude to life and is apolitical as a company," explains press spokesman Jürg Dinner. There have always been imitators, but Coca-Cola does not comment on competing products as a matter of principle. Coca-Cola has not yet taken any legal action for possible infringement of the trademark.
The anti-COLA initiative has apparently not been launched in Switzerland or internationally, even though Dinner's response on this point was evasive. Klaus Brandmeyer does not believe that other brands are threatened with a counter-product after the anti-Cola. "This is a very special resonance field that someone is making resonate here," says the brand expert. Here, a manufacturer is simply using a current political situation to generate ideological resonance and do business. "He could also have printed T-shirts!" With Coca-Cola, however, a brand that symbolizes America is being cleverly used to demonstrate against America.
It remains questionable whether Mecca-Cola will survive beyond the current crisis situation. For Brandmeyer, an ideological charge of the brand can also burden the consumer: "I actually only wanted to drink Mecca-Cola now, I didn't want to say I'm also a Palestinian," he outlines the thought process. As a parallel, he mentions the original positioning of Coca-Cola as a medicinal drink for headaches and discomfort. According to Brandmeyer, there were many people who drank the soft drink simply for the taste. But because they were always thought to be ill when they ordered Coke, they began to complain to the manufacturer. Eventually, the management repositioned Coca-Cola as a soft drink, says Brandmeyer.
Sold like hot cakes
The Iraq crisis is still a long way from a solution and Mecca-Cola is the thirst quencher for peace activists. At the peace demonstration in Bern on February 15, Swinti supplied the stand of the Swiss Palestine Society with Mecca-Cola. "Over a pallet went like hot cakes," says Strahm. To boost sales even more, the marketing strategy is currently being fine-tuned. It is to be implemented in an advertising concept in a few weeks' time. According to Strahm, Mecca-Cola is already in talks with several agencies.
The drink itself is apolitical, but according to the manufacturer, anyone who drinks Mecca-Cola is doing so for a good cause.
"We haven't found the right advertising idea yet "Swiss general importer Mike Strahm (24) is convinced: "Mecca-Cola has what it takes to become a trend drink." In this interview, he explains how he intends to achieve this.
WW Mike Strahm, you have been selling Mecca-Cola to retailers in Switzerland as general importer since February 10. How is the
Sale?
Mike Strahm: We can be satisfied. Things have been going very well, especially since Swiss television ran a report on Coke in mid-February.
How many liters of Coke have you sold so far?
Around ten thousand.
The time to make money with anti-American products is ideal. At some point, however, this anti-American sentiment will die down again. What will happen to Coke then?
We are convinced that we will be able to establish Coke as a trend label by then.
What gives you reason to believe this?
Because the Coke is special and because when you buy a Coke, you support Palestine and a local aid organization with ten percent of the sales price each.
Do you really believe that Coke consumers still care where the brown brew comes from and what happens to the sales price once the anti-American sentiment has died down?
Yes.
However, the chance that Mecca-Cola will remain a niche product that sells well, especially in stores where mainly Muslims shop, is ten times greater.
I disagree with that.
What are you doing to establish Coke as a trend label? Do you organize events? Do you sponsor young bands?
Not yet. However, we are looking into such possibilities and are looking for events that suit our product - but we haven't found anything yet.
Which advertising agency can help you with this?
We are currently looking at three larger and two smaller agencies and plan to work with one or two.
How big is your advertising budget?
Unfortunately, I can't say anything about that.
Interview: Annelies Friedli
Stefano Monachesi

The media agency group OMD Switzerland announces three new clients in the current year.OMD Zürich City is now looking after the Basel chemicals group Doetsch Grether as well as the SonntagsBlick reader and advertiser campaign. OMD Zürich See is working for Coop Bank. In view of the positive development, OMD Switzerland expects billing growth of over 15 percent in 2003. The workforce has been increased by four and a half positions compared to the first quarter of 2002, OMD writes in a press release.

Private TV The takeover of Germany's largest TV group ProSiebenSat 1 by the US billionaire Haim Saban is complete: After months of negotiations, Saban signed the purchase agreement on Monday. According to the KirchMedia management, the second part of the contract is to be signed within the next ten days. The contract for the film rights deal is said to be several thousand pages long. The lawyers on both sides did not finish proofreading in time. However, agreement has been reached on the general conditions of the sale. The purchase price is estimated at 500 million euros. Saban will acquire 36% of the shares and, according to Horizont.de, 72% of the voting rights in the TV group via a new subsidiary.

Free newspapers The Baslerstab has so far withstood all attacks from commuter newspapers. With a new campaign, it is positioning itself more confidently and independently.Baslerstab, the free newspaper published five times a week by the Basler Mediengruppe (BM), is doing well, relatively well. Admittedly, this title also suffered a drop in advertising last year - the city edition fell by 11.6 percent and the regional edition by 14.6 percent. This corresponds to a loss of around 1000 pages. However, with a total volume of around 6600 advertising pages last year, the Baslerstab alone accounts for a fifth of the total advertising volume of all the free titles listed in the VSW statistics. If one compares the number of advertising pages per issue, the Baslerstab is not at the top with 19 pages, but still very far ahead. For comparison: last year, ZürichExpress, with 2742 advertising pages, did not even reach half the volume of Baslerstab and only 11 advertising pages per issue, Berner Bär reached 1212 pages or 12 pages per issue, 20 Minuten Zürich reached 2874 pages or 11.5 pages per issue. In Basel, 20 Minuten, with only 765 pages, was no match for the Baslerstab. In the classified sections, where the free title suffered losses above all, 20 Minuten gained nothing.
Although 20 Minuten is also avidly read in Basel, the BM newspaper has not lost any readers as a result. Publishing director Daniel Weick assumes that the Basel staff can now certify 201518 copies (previous year 200727). Readership, last determined in the fall, was stable at 174,000 readers.
Often the nose in front
All of this strengthened the self-confidence of "Basel's largest free newspaper", which is also visualized in the new Baslerstab campaign that will be launched at the end of March. The new Basel agency Die Werft (see page 3) suggested a focus in terms of content and created the claim "What moves Basel and the region". This means that the Baslerstab no longer just wants to differentiate itself from 20 Minuten, but also from its sister paper Basler Zeitung, which is indeed the case time and again thanks to numerous major and minor primeurs. The nine subjects of the new campaign each form a contrast between headline and image, which is then resolved in the short text below the image.
Despite its increased self-confidence, the Baslerstab is facing new challenges. Should it form a combination with the new Express and other free titles - and switch to tabloid format - just to help Tamedia?
20 Minuten even better (see pages 1 and 15)? There is no doubt that the Basel staff is the least dependent on such an advertising combination and would rather lose than gain. "The combination is not ready to go," says Daniel Weick. That may well be true, but it is only a matter of time. In any case, the BM assumes that those who do not want to participate could feel the effects of Tamedia's aggression.
The bacon of a newspaper is good stories: advertisements for the Baslerstab from the new agency Die Werft.
Markus Knöpfli

Affinity of the ads among supporters in the "bourgeois corner "Gold (167) Rivella Green - Let yourself... (Lowe)
Silver (161) Range Rover Luxury Sedan (Lowe Direct)
Bronze (156) Audi A8 (Bürgi & Partner)

The spirits group Bacardi-Martini Suisse has entrusted McCann-Erickson Switzerland with the advertising budget for Bacardi Breezer. McCann won the pitch against four competitors. "The budget is so large that we are happy to toast it with a Breezer," said McCann COO Curdin Janett. As mixed drinks are the area with the greatest growth, Bacardi Breezer also accounts for by far the largest share of Bacardi-Martini's total budget. The new campaign (cinema, poster and print) is to be seen from April. Universal McCann is responsible for media planning and purchasing.

The Zurich-based online marketing agency Planetactive has been strengthened by Philippe Uhlmann. ...
The merger of the Swiss media agencies The Media Edge (TME) and CIA to form Mediaedge CIA has been completed with two new managers. Former TME Managing Director Urs Renner takes over the management of the Media Service Organization (MSO) in Bern and remains active for various clients of Mediaedge CIA Zurich. With Saverio Progano, the Lausanne branch will have a new Managing Director. He was already working there as Client Service Director and is taking over from Bernd Leckebusch, who is concentrating on his role as CEO of Mediaedge CIA.
...
McCann-Erickson Switzerland has added advertising assistant Mayoo van Wissen-Verwey from Amsterdam to the support team for the insurance company XL Capital.
...
Kristian Widmer will take over as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Condor Communications at the beginning of April. He will succeed Roger Zbinden, who is leaving the company. Widmer will also continue to oversee the Entertainment department and the branch in Berlin. The new Chairman of the Board of Directors will be Martin A. Fueter.
...
After five years in office, Hans-Ulrich Herrmann is handing over the directorship of the Bern and Biel School of Design at the end of July. The school commission has elected Anna-Marie Kappeler as his successor. Kappeler, currently Head of Media Relations and a member of the management team at "Winterthur" Insurance, will take up the post on August 1.

Magazines The magazine Musiq is being discontinued for the time being. The publisher, Focus Publishing, had to make this decision despite the fact that the editorial team "managed to position the magazine in the highly competitive youth market and make a lasting impression within just eight months", as publishing director René Götz explains. Although the volume of advertisements has increased continuously, the decision was made to "put Musiq on hold and wait and see how it develops" in the current economic situation. The number of permanent employees at Focus will remain unchanged. The discontinuation affects 16 freelancers. (pan)

Agencies A new advertising agency with the rather unusual name Die Werft has dropped anchor in Basel. Dieter F. Wullschleger and Beat Scherb worked together once before, 13 years ago, but then went their separate ways. Since the beginning of the year, they have been sharing account and work in the newly founded Basel agency Die Werft. The name of the company with the subtitle "AG für Kommunikation ASW" says what they want: They see their own company as a ship, a small tugboat on its way to others, equipped with navigation instruments, a foghorn and searchlights. They adhere to a dictum by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, according to which anyone who wants to promote shipping should not teach the people shipbuilding, but should awaken in them a longing for the sea.
Wullschleger and Scherb took the metaphor of the communications agency as a boat so seriously that they wanted to move their offices into a houseboat in Basel's Rhine harbor. But the authorities thought this was a sailor's yarn. So the two of them set up shop in the St. Alban Valley, barely 100 steps from the Rhine. In the summer, Markus Spielmann, until recently Head of Marketing at Tally Weijl, is also due to join the shipyard - although he will not be dropping anchor on the Rhine, but opening a shipyard branch on the Aare in Olten. The team of an ADC award-winning graphic designer (Scherb) and two communication managers (Wullschleger and Spielmann) would then be complete.
Werft sees itself as a general contractor that is well networked and can call in selected freelancers. Some companies, such as the free newspaper Basler-stab (see page 17) and Basel's largest retailer association, Pro Innerstadt, are already having the Werft workers, who are all trained in integrated communication, give them a new look.
(mk)

Newspapers From next week, the Zuger Presse will appear in a new layout, which is intended to provide a better overview and reader-friendliness without losing the characteristics of the previous appearance, according to a press release. It also allows the increased use of color advertisements. In addition to the modernized design by producer Marcel Nusskern, a second volume will also be introduced. According to a statement from the publisher Zuger Media AG, the Forum newspaper has recorded growth rates of over 10 percent in the advertising and subscription markets in recent months.

Magazines For the third time in a row, Schweizer Illustrierte is dramatizing its good relationships with Swiss celebrities with a campaign designed by Wirz.
Paparazzi: a painful topic for celebrities, but the basis of scandal stories for many a people magazine. But not for Schweizer Illustrierte (SI), which has positioned itself as "the only Swiss people magazine" (self-declaration) on the market for around ten years.
The use of such images is not an issue for the Ringier weekly magazine. SI doesn't even need them - at least that's what the campaign claim "Closer to the stars" introduced two years ago by the Wirz agency claims. Because SI photographers don't need a super telephoto lens - much to the frustration of the paparazzi. When launching the claim in 2001, the Wirz creatives visually exploited the paparazzi's displeasure at the lack of proximity to "their" stars by showing an SI reporter next to celebrities in blurred snapshots.
While this concept worked very well on advertisements, as Wirz CD Matthias Freuler explains, the public lacked a reference for the posters. A new visual language was therefore agreed for last year's campaign: The star lets the SI reporter take part in his activities. This concept should also support the magazine this year in order to "retain its approximately one million readers and continuously increase circulation", as publishing director Urs Heller comments.
Good contacts used
After ex-Miss Switzerland Mahara McKay and goalie Martin Zuberbühler, this year Gold-Simi (Amman) is competing with the SI reporter on the ski jump and Melanie Winiger is splashing around in the bath with the photographer. "When we started with this creative strategy, it wasn't imperative for us to depict 'real' celebrities," explains Matthias Freuler. Nevertheless, those responsible on the customer side were of the opinion that the existing good contacts should be used for the appearance. Freuler: "It's great to work with stars, especially professionals like Melanie Winiger, but the campaign also works without famous faces."
This was already proven last year: The subjects "Yoga" and "Ballet" lived solely from the respective synchronicity of the models - but were no less popular as poster motifs than McKay or Zuberbühler, Freuler is pleased to report. This year too, a (still) unknown South African mermaid shows off her water-skiing skills next to the obligatory SI reporter, while another SI employee has his head cut off in order to be "inconspicuously" close to the Hamlet actor.
Freuler makes sure that the reporters are seen as companions and not as friends of the "stars". The outfit should make this clear: While the person portrayed is dressed appropriately for the respective activity, the SI man always presents himself in a reporter's outfit - even on water skis or in the bathtub. The impression that the two people are connected should be avoided at all costs, emphasizes the Wirz creative.
Freuler attributes the success of the two-year campaign strategy - the appearances won national and international awards - to the easy-to-understand visual language. This communication with few words also pleases the publishing director: "Even on the advertisement there are only four words and these are the same words that the editor-in-chief says to his editorial team.
Even in close proximity to celebrities, the SI reporter keeps his classic outfit.
Simone Keller

Samuel Helbling on the structural crisis in the advertising industryCrisis. Recession. Budget cuts. When the economy falters, the advertising industry is hit to the core: Fewer jobs, nothing to laugh about and clients who are increasingly brazen in exploiting their market power by making agencies bleed more and more in pitches. There is no question that the advertising industry has had a miserable year. The decline in turnover at BSW agencies doubled from 5.6 percent in 2001 to over 11 percent last year. A fifth of the staff has now been laid off. Price pressure and margin erosion continue. In 2002, advertising expenditure fell more dramatically than ever before, by around 110 million francs. The stock market hype and overinvestment have now been reduced, but the industry's shrinking process continues. The culprits are the service providers who, in contrast to the consumer goods industry, have drastically reduced their advertising investments. Banks and insurance companies alone have reduced their budgets by over 70 million francs.
Another problem is likely to keep some advertisers awake: the share of traditional commercial communication is constantly shrinking in favor of below-the-line measures. While the dialogue and specialist agencies organized in the BSW are confidently expecting an increase in turnover of over 6 percent in 2003, the full-service agencies are only hoping that the decline will slow down (-2.2 %).
However, this structural change is likely to fundamentally alter the communications landscape. In the crisis, fewer and fewer clients believe in the effectiveness of traditional image campaigns. Sales-promoting means are the order of the day, in which marketing departments want to escape the pressure of controllers. Those who do not want to get involved in efficiency discussions are choosing forms of communication whose success is easier to measure. Under the prevailing conditions, coupon tinkerers have a clear advantage.
> Samuel Helbling, Editor-in-Chief