Despite economic resilience, it is anything but business as usual at Ringier By Oliver Classen
What Ringier was pitied for just a few years ago is currently proving to be a blessing: its relative independence from the collapsed real estate and job advertising market. All the greater the surprise and uncertainty on Dufourstrasse at the ten percent savings order from the carpet floor. The collective question as to whether the publishing family will actually "jump" is also clearly perceptible, if not (yet) barely audible.
We have chosen a cold, wet and uncomfortable autumn morning for our tour d'horizon through the largest Swiss publishing house, which has apparently only been supposedly spared from the rampant flu in the industry. Jürg Ramspeck also looks slightly sniffy as he paces back and forth in front of the fully-closed Press House 1 with his coat collar turned up and an obligatory cigarette in the corner of his mouth, probably on a daily mind hunt for the material that will move readers' hearts tomorrow.
If the uncrowned king of columnists had a little more freedom and the courage to navel-gazing, his next topic would actually be right in front of him on the street. In the end, even the in-house kiosk lady reflexively asks the visitor for his assessment of the "Springier" speculation. Counter question: "Have Ringier employees been buying more Springer papers from you in the last few days?" The newspaper saleswoman answers in the negative, but adds mischievously that they had had enough time beforehand to get a "picture" of "what might be coming our way".
In the lobby, the eye wanders from an obtrusively flickering neon sign - "faster, better, bigger": at least the last part of this pious publisher's wish could soon be fulfilled - to a series of large-format, elegantly framed landscape photographs.
Two hearts beat in the publisher's chest
"If Michael Ringier's passion for journalism was as great as his passion for collecting art, he would probably be happy to take over the serpentine you," it flashes through our minds as Jürg Lehmann suddenly appears in the elevator doorway. During the ride up, the Blick editor-in-chief raves about yesterday's election thriller: "It was full steam ahead until one in the morning. It makes the job here really fun again."
He is noticeably less pleased at the prospect of having to tighten his purse strings even more with immediate effect. With the official savings target of ten percent and just under 100 full-time positions (including back office), ten editorial chairs would have to be vacated in 2003 at the flagship (and cash cow) alone.
After everything that has been thrown at them this year, his people are taking this announcement relatively calmly. In any case, he has not yet been contacted by any employees plagued by existential fears. But when in doubt, prevention is always better than cure, which is why Lehmann has not been replacing his departures for several months now. Behind closed doors, many colleagues refer to this as an "alarm signal", but no one wants to ring the alarm bell.
Damocles, "patron saint" of the Ringier editorial offices
The second sword of Damocles that has been hovering over the editors' heads for several weeks is also being kept discreetly silent in the otherwise always bubbling rumor mill these days. At the lunchtime conference chaired by the editor-in-chief, not a word is said about the media minister's warning published 100 meters away about a "culture shock" should Springer's long arm also pull the levers at Dufourstrasse one day.
However, things sound different in private, where various people are expressing the hope that "such a sell-off" cannot be carried out during the lifetime of publisher father Hans Ringier.
For his part, Lehmann, who has "taken note of Leuenberger's words with goodwill", mainly puts a big question mark behind the planned benchmarking of Ringier and Tamedia titles. Schweizer Familie and Schweizer Illustrierte or SonntagsZeitung and SonntagsBlick could at best still be compared, but "for Blick, the Tages-Anzeiger, which has far greater resources, is certainly no yardstick", says the Bernese tabloid professional.
In other words: If there are any fat eyes swimming in the alphabet soup, it's Werdstrasse. A coherent logic insofar as the idea for the comparison comes from the new Tamedia boss Martin Kall. After all, the former Ringier executive has already been using this management tool at Dufourstrasse for years, which is why SoBli, SI et al. are probably getting off more lightly than their direct competitors with this two-pronged cost-cutting exercise.
Drastic austerity program, diplomatic statements
26 house numbers away in the direction of Seefeld, the same is true. In addition to the advertising department, the Blick and SoBli publishing house also temporarily resides there in an Art Nouveau ambience. Its director, Ringier veteran Bruno Blaser, diplomatically describes the mood at home as "good under the circumstances". By this he means nothing other than that the latest decrees (reduction of overhead costs by a hefty 15 million francs) and assumptions ("Springier") are also causing growing unease among his team. According to Blaser, it remains to be seen which service or staff departments will fall victim to the red pencil of Martin Werfeli, the Group CEO coached by former McKinsey man Niels Lund.
One thing is certain since the corresponding squad information from
September 11 (!), however, that the exercise will not take place without redundancies. Nevertheless, the good-natured publishing director does not currently consider it appropriate to invite his staff to his office for a collective "chropflerete". He last resorted to this psycho-hygienic measure at the height of the Borer scandal, and with some success, as one person present at the time clearly but discreetly recalls.
Head of Advertising Mario Cecchin, based one floor below, also sees no need for internal communication or even action. In contrast to the unfortunate ambassador story, "hardly anyone really takes the Springer rumblings outside the market seriously anyway". Of course, this could have something to do with the fact that his sales team, which has remained unchanged for three years, has an average age of 47 - and therefore has a somewhat thicker skin than the new generation, which is particularly easy to unsettle in times of crisis. But if, contrary to expectations, a few ropes were to break, they would have to worry about the future. "We are all top salespeople and would be happy to work in other sectors at any time."
Magazines grudgingly help you save money
Dry feet into the heart of Seefeld: at Höschgasse, the temporary headquarters of Gesundheit Sprechstunde and Schweizer Illustrierte, the mood of the person we are talking to clears up. His name is Urs Heller (but he also goes by the name "Mister SI"), he is the publishing director and is bursting with
with self-confidence. In terms of advertising, the company is in a good position, thanks to the special editions even significantly better than in the previous year - and better than anyone else in the Group.
Heller even speaks of a "European record", which is why his title is undergoing the austerity program without any inner necessity. Is his recipe for success not transferable to struggling sister titles? "No, but Cash & Co. know best how to master the current crisis anyway."
The "thoroughbred journalist" (self-assessment), who clearly feels at home in his bare office full of moving boxes, sees synergy potential "most likely" with the Lausanne branch of Ringier.
This year, for example, the "Miss Switzerland" coverage was bundled in Zurich for the first time. In addition, the SI-Line extension Al Dente will also appear in French-speaking Switzerland from 2003. Heller dismisses the objection that this sounds more like colonization than cooperation with a broad smile: "Honestly, the exchange between Lake Geneva and Lake Zurich is better and more equal than ever before in my time at Ringier."
In his twelve years at SI, the former Blick editor describes the "seamless cooperation between the editorial team and the publisher, unhindered by any fear of contact" as the most important constant and guarantee of success. He adds: "It was easiest and most efficient when I was responsible for content and sales at the same time."
Ringier has a long tradition of managers working double duty. For example, Walter Bosch and Fridolin Luchsinger were both editor-in-chief of Blick and SoBli for many years. It is doubtful, however, that the decision-makers at Pressehaus 1 are thinking about reanimating this type of (top) salary saving. Instead, further departmental mergers are probably being considered, following the example of the sports sector. In other words, even at the "publisher of the little man", the ongoing press influenza is not claiming a king, but a whole series of pawn sacrifices.
Media series, part 2

Following the Tamedia report three weeks ago (WW 32/02), we continue our series in this issue with a mood report from Ringier. This will be followed in loose succession by further inside views of more or less cyclical media companies until next spring. The next visit will be to Edipresse in Lausanne (oc).

Before the collective bargaining round, Guye Benker surprised everyone with an advertising campaign for the Tages-AnzeigerBy Simone Keller Getting your own portrait (for free) on a whole page in the Tagi - a dream or a nightmare? For eight senior employees of major advertising clients, this has become a reality over the last two weeks: At their expense, Guye Benker demonstrated how advertising in the Tages-Anzeiger works.
"No way!" Michael Brodbeck was annoyed on the morning of September 18 when an unknown caller pointed out his face on an entire Tagi page. But that was not all: his direct business telephone number was emblazoned in bold letters in the bottom left-hand corner of the picture. The Head of Product Management at Rivella AG became the first "victim" of an unusual advertising campaign by the Tages-Anzeiger. In this way, the daily newspaper portrayed people from the management levels of existing and potential Tages-Anzeiger advertisers in eight issues.
Participate yes, but not with your real phone number
The agency responsible for the unusual campaign is Guye Benker, which was asked to create a sales folder for the publication of the new advertising rates. The proposal to let the advertisers experience for themselves how advertising in the Tages-Anzeiger works fell on receptive ears with the client.
"We were all immediately enthusiastic about the spontaneous idea," enthuses Gabriela Wettstein, Head of Marketing Communications at Tamedia. "It's rare for a publisher to place advertisements in its own title. You get one-to-one feedback," she adds. Both sides were aware that without the necessary caution, such a campaign could achieve exactly the opposite. So what at first glance appears to be a daring spontaneous action is almost completely defused when Gabriela Wettstein and Christophe Guye assure us that appropriate preliminary clarifications had taken place.
Wettstein admits that not everyone who was approached wanted to make their face available for the Tagi. As most of those portrayed were informed in advance by the agency, they did not give their real direct contacts, but used a special number for this purpose. So anyone who wanted to reach Swisscom mobile man Mike Weber via the cell phone number published in the Tagi was forwarded directly to the Combox, which meant that "many did not dare" to say anything. The number printed next to Gabriela Hollenstein's portrait is also not really her direct dial number and only remains active for a few days, as the VZ marketing and media manager announces. Nevertheless, she answers calls on this line.
Arjen Pen was completely different: he left for a business trip to Moscow on day X and left the incoming calls and emails to his assistant. Michael Brodbeck really knew nothing about the whole story. He was very surprised, he says, expressing his initial feelings mildly, but over time he "took the whole thing with a good dose of humor". It was only later that he learned that the publication had been agreed with the Rivella management. He also redirected the telephone number immediately after the discovery.
To be continued: On the Tagi sales folder
However, all those involved consider the reactions to the advertisements to be very positive. The most frequent inquiry concerned the meaning and purpose of the advertisements. An astonishing number of advertising agencies enquired about the sender, and some acquaintances and relatives contacted them again because of the portraits. There were also compliments, for example about Mike Weber's "pleasant smile". Someone even wanted to meet Gabriela Hollenstein in person and turned up on the VZ.
Guye Benker and the Tages-Anzeiger are also satisfied with the initial feedback from the campaign. The plan now is to integrate the people portrayed and their experiences into the sales folder. One person, however, will still be amazed today, as he is dissolving the teaser campaign of the past few weeks without knowing it: Tagi sales manager Fridolin Holdener (see page 25).
Played (un)voluntarily guinea pigs: Michael Brodbeck, Head of Product Management, Rivella AG, Arjen Pen, Head of Sales and Marketing Swiss, Arno Gunsch, Marketing Manager Saab Automobile Schweiz AG, Mike Weber, Head of Marketing Communications Swisscom Mobile AG, Urs Schubiger, Management Schubiger Möbel, Gabriela Hollenstein, Marketing and Media VZ Vermögenszentrum, Marc Gläser, Marketing Director International Maurice Lacroix SA, and Stefan Planzer, Marketing Manager Heineken Switzerland.

Ad Rating

Tages-Anzeiger campaign
Ad raters don't like a nailed-up Swiss cross: good marks for the Publicis campaign. Next, please: the Tages-Anzeiger photo gallery? If you have already made up your mind, click on www. werbewoche.ch/adrating
Refugee aid campaign
Top: 53,79%
Flop: 46,21%
Praise and criticism of ad-raters summarized at www.werbewoche .ch/adrating/comments

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all? A question that takes us back to childhood and Grimm's "Snow White". As we all know, more or less traumatic childhood memories shape us for the rest of our lives and therefore also influence our everyday working lives. There is probably no other explanation for these two advertisements. Or is there another interpretation for why the female model is so preoccupied with her reflection? Hardly. What is certain is that the Snow White syndrome is rampant in the creative department. And has even made its way through to the customer side. Then I can only say: Mirror, mirror on the wall, take the sand out of your eyes ...
Chandra Kurt
[email protected]
Business lunch

Where Lämmle also likes to dine Of course you don't know Furtnau, and Lämmle even less. But in the old town of F., one pub follows the next. For example the "Angelis". A nice first-floor pub with a view of the old town of F. and plenty of space between the tables. Okay, the town is called St.Gallen, and Furtnau was invented by Giuseppe Gracia. You should definitely read his novel "Kippzustand" before you travel to the city of Gallus for dinner (platform 17, from Zurich main station). Gracia, a PR consultant by trade, has published a briskly written novel (Nagel & Kimche) that drags pretty much everyone through the fictional swampland that you later meet again in the Erststockbeiz, namely Lämmle, garage owner.
I like the sixties groove with wood paneling and leaded windows. I think it's funny when you fold napkins like a shirt. And I no longer get excited when the plate for the main course is square - of course, the "Angelis" belongs to the same restaurant that owns the "Engelis". Coincidences that only happen in Furtnau.
Oh, it was very nice, all of it. Lämmle didn't come to dinner (Gracia carved him up artfully), but Pascale did. She decided not to have an appetizer. So the cream of pumpkin soup disappeared into the author's gullet. Ordered with croutons, it was delivered with pumpkin seeds and a dash of pumpkin oil. Somewhere the capillaries discovered a little saffron. Oh, the soup was delicious. For the main course, lamb fillets, roasted pink, served with spaghetti in a tomato sauce and chopped green olives. It tasted good too. The pike-perch for Pascale was okay, the vegetables in the rice lacked flavor, the rice looked slightly overcooked even from a distance. A little tip for the kitchen: buy Migros budget rice (medium grain), add to boiling salted water, cook for no more than five minutes, remove from the heat immediately and then leave to swell in the pan. Keep it grainy, Furtnau chefs!
WerbeWoche readers will be familiar with the caramelized vanilla cream with ice cream from "Engelis". Three white wines, one rosé wine and four red wines are served by the glass. A good selection. There are no parking spaces in the narrow alleyways, but there are a few parking garages all around (Oberer Graben). And be sure to look out for Lämmle on your next visit. It's worth it - reading the book, of course!
Carlo Bernasconi
[email protected]
Angelis Bankgasse 12
9000 St.Gallen
Tel. 071 227 61 00
Fax 071 227 61 80
[email protected]
Column

Kunz evaluated by Thomas Lüber He had conscientiously studied all 83 agency documentations and used a sophisticated table to determine the
three piles of "Top", "Good" and "Out of the question". However, because the standard of the agencies he approached was so high, there were only four documentaries in the final pile. So Kunz set himself the unpleasant, but by no means delegable task of personally inspecting the remaining 79 agencies (the chemistry has to be right!), whereby he set the appointments at 11 a.m. as a matter of principle, firstly to save lunch checks, and secondly to test the agencies' understanding of service. Anyone who didn't invite him to lunch didn't have the necessary punch for Rausch Schrauben AG's CHF 1,500,000 budget. Nevertheless, there were still 24 candidates left, which Kunz had to translate into a communication strategy in a strategy presentation (No cardboard! Work economically!) by Prof. Dr. Wagenköttel from the HSG, whereby he took a close look at the labels of the enclosed bottles (in vino veritas!). After almost six months of intensive work, he was finally able to invite those four agencies to a pitch, who made themselves available for a free presentation and showed considerable creativity in the distribution of the screw, logo and headline in four-column advertisements, which were understood by the public, as the subsequent mafo established beyond doubt.
This is precisely why Kunz found the email from the Head of Marketing three weeks later slightly disconcerting: "After careful consideration, the management has decided to stay with the graphic design studio of the CEO's godson."
[email protected]
Thomas Lüber is Managing Director Creation at Lesch+Frei, Zurich.
Evaluation

Food .......................3
Drinks ..................3
Operation ................2
Business factor ........4
5=top, 4=very good, 3=o.k., 2=naja, 1=flop

In addition, Stefan Gürtler has joined the cR Kommunikation agency group, which is based in Küsnacht, ZH, and Bern. Gürtler previously served as Head of Corporate Communications and Senior Vice President at the Internet provider Bluewin.
Claus Bornholt joined the executive board of Futurecom Interactive AG in early October and, as Head of Consulting, will lead the 18-member consulting team at the Zurich-based Internet service provider. He succeeds Martin Bosshardt, who is becoming CEO of Open Systems, a provider of IT security solutions.
Yves Baer began working as a consultant and PR editor at the Zurich-based publishing agency Toolbox in early October and will replace Werner Baur as a managing partner in January.
Patrick Wehrli, Head of Sales and Marketing at the Basler Zeitung, will also assume leadership of the local newspapers within the Basler Mediengruppe (BM) effective immediately. In this role, he will report directly to CEO Beat Meyer. To lighten his workload in his current position, the company is seeking a deputy. The previous head, Matthias Hugenschmidt, is set to take on a new role within the group.
Ursula Good-Widmer, the former managing director of Lokoop, a subsidiary of Mittelthurgaubahn, has been appointed head of corporate communications at BLS Lötschbergbahn. She succeeds Sonja Bietenhard.
Change in leadership at the advertising agency McCann-Erickson Switzerland: Effective early October, David Honegger (photo) took over as CEO from Edi Andrist. Andrist, who had led the agency since April 2001, is leaving by mutual agreement. Honegger co-founded the agency Honegger von Matt with Dominique von Matt in 1993. At the end of 2000, he sold his stake to the German agency Jung von Matt and has since been working as a freelance creative consultant.
After eight months in advertising sales at the Basler ProgrammZeitung, Annette Ungar is returning to the WoZ collective. The artist is joining the sales team at the WochenZeitung. In addition, the WoZ recently appointed Ester Elices as its new advertising director, following Denise Nick’s move to the executive board. Elices previously worked in the marketing department of the Zurich Schauspielhaus.

By Beat FritschA promotional star with the inscription "Now new", straight out of the direct marketing textbook, was emblazoned on the invitation card. This aroused curiosity, as the sender was the venerable Wirz advertising agency. However, the mailing was not intended to woo
The company was not only looking for new customers from the mail order sector, but also invited guests to the inauguration ceremony for the communications company's new buildings.
All of the Group's units can now be found at the same address: in the familiar Wirz high-rise and in the new Jean Nouvel-style glass cubes that were built next to it. In his speech on the agency's new architectural appearance, CEO Geri Aebi said briefly and succinctly: "The building appears clean, reduced and clear - and that's how our advertising should be too."
The agency's ADC cubes were artistically arranged in the atrium at the reception to take reduction and representation to the extreme and to give the whole thing a visual finishing touch. The new rooms met with a positive response from almost all visitors. However, among the "evil" envious people and those who like to make jokes - there are said to be plenty of them in the industry - one or two bon mots made the rounds: "Now people are happy to take a job at Wirz again" or "What, they've only won so few cubes in their long agency career?" were heard.
The Wirz creatives countered the latter by saying that the ADC cubes won so far were used as bricks for the new building and that the ones in the atrium were just the leftovers. The supposedly small number of ADC awards was finally clarified by Hansueli Schweizer, President of the Wirz Board of Directors. Of course there were more of them, but the white marble cubes, which were awarded by the creative association for a certain period of time, were not included in the all-black ambience for aesthetic reasons. Conclusion of the Wirz party - a visit to Uetlibergstrasse is not only worthwhile for contemporaries interested in architecture.
IP Multimedia also offered something new last week. "Good-bye Screen-up - hello Zap-in" was the motto on Thursday. Because Screen-up, the trade fair of the united Swiss TV advertising time providers, is not being continued this year, IPM organized its own event, Zap-in 03, without further ado. The screenings took place in the South Sea-style Yonex badminton hall near Hardbrücke, and IPM CEO Michi Frank welcomed his guests to the subsequent party in the neighboring In-Club UG.
Michael Seiler, Head of Advertising at the Berner Zeitung, on the other hand, opted for something tried and tested with the Bodega aperitif. The guests thanked him with a large attendance. Tapas, vino tinto and flamenco were the order of the day; the singing and dancing interludes by Rafael Segura's Iberian show troupe are just as legendary as the "Puff", the
in the backyard and wine cellar of the traditional pub when the BZ invites guests to the buffet. This was presented in its usual opulence and splendor. However, it seems that the Bernese are also saving money - some people waited in vain for the raffle of wellness weekends and other gifts, as has been the case in previous years. Well, maybe next time there will be something to win again,
because the BZ-Bodega-Apéro 2003 is definitely coming.
Beat Fritsch

moved to the new Wirz-Haus in Zurich-Giesshübel. But there were also celebrations in the
Bodega at the Berner Zeitung's traditional fall aperitif, and in the Westend, IP Multimedia launched Zap-in 03 on its own initiative as a replacement for Screen-up.
We find out who meets in the communications scene at drinks receptions and parties at a wide variety of industry events. Do you already have something exciting to report? Reach for the
Listener (01 296 97 98) or into the keyboard (info@werbewo che.ch). For event tips and further shortlist images: www.werbewoche.ch

In the reader battle with 20 Minuten, a new Swiss-German commuter newspaper is also an issue for TamediaBy Daniel Schifferle Now that 20 Minuten has signaled that it will not be bought, Tamedia is looking for other ways to create a commuter newspaper after all. The option of a new launch for the whole of German-speaking Switzerland - alone or together with other media companies - is also being examined.
When the new Tamedia CEO Martin Kall presented his offensive acquisition and cooperation policy in July, he said that all options would be kept open with regard to 20 Minuten (WW 27/02). But now that 20 Minuten has clearly stated in recent weeks that it is not for sale (see also page 5), Tamedia itself is going on the offensive. All possibilities for an entry into the commuter newspaper market will be examined. Marius Hagger, who was most recently responsible for the in-house efficiency program "Focus", has been commissioned with the project and the concept development.
The future viability of the industry is at stake
"We cannot accept another major newspaper title spreading into our core business and territory," says Tamedia spokesman Peter Hartmeier in a combative tone. They will now clarify how the business model of ZürichExpress (ZE) can be further developed. This is necessary to secure the future of the newspaper.
But it's not just coverage in the greater Zurich area that is up for debate. "One of the options we are looking at is a commuter newspaper for the whole of German-speaking Switzerland," says Hartmeier. Whether alone or together with other media companies remains to be seen at the moment, and he adds: "The future of the Swiss media landscape depends on whether the entrepreneurs among the publishers succeed in making our industry fit for the future."
It is clear that such a relaunch would also swallow up huge sums of money. The expected costs have not yet been calculated, says Hartmeier. "But in connection with the analysis that is now underway, we will also be talking in concrete terms about the budgets that would be necessary to launch a commuter newspaper for the whole of German-speaking Switzerland."
But wouldn't such an attempt at displacement come far too late - now that 20 Minuten is well established in the reader market and has a loyal readership? Hartmeier is nevertheless confident: "We have the journalistic potential for such a newspaper, and we have the necessary distribution systems throughout Switzerland."
Tamedia spokesman Peter Hartmeier leaves open the other possibility that Tamedia's main aim with the announced market analysis is to put pressure on 20 Minuten to give up its stubbornness regarding cooperation or acquisition after all. "That is a question of interpretation."
NZZ, which is a minority shareholder of ZE with a 40% stake, has not yet commented on Tamedia's advance. No statement was available by the editorial deadline. Hartmeier is reassuring. Of course, all decisions are discussed with NZZ. "But we are the majority shareholders and therefore have to work out the basis for decisions. When these are available, we will discuss them with NZZ." The analysis of the commuter newspaper market should be completed by the end of the year at the latest.

The cooperation between Publisuisse and TeleNewsCombi (TNC) has been finalized and the corresponding contracts have been signed by both sides these days, meaning that the Infopool, as the new advertising combination with SF 1 is called, can be booked from January 1, 2003. This step marks the successful conclusion of a long-running rapprochement between Publisuisse and the local TV stations.
The TNC has already been integrated into the Publisuisse booking and planning tools Publiplan and Mediaoptimizer. Handling, controlling, collection and distribution of the combined revenues are in the hands of Publisuisse. On SF 1, the combi will be placed daily in the advertising block before the "Tagesschau". The combined discount is 10 percent each on the TNC and SF 1 advertising blocks.
Publisuisse boss Ingrid Deltenre expressed her satisfaction that the advertising combination had come about. "This is exactly what we wanted." There was also no resistance at the TNC, says TNC Managing Director Marcel Geissbühler. "The cooperation agreement was approved without any dissenting votes."
However, the new collaboration comes with a downer for Radiotele, which previously marketed the TNC exclusively. It will have to hand over significant parts of its previous tasks to Publisuisse. But Radiotele boss Bruno Oetterli can live with that. "Provided, however, that the promised boost for the TNC actually materializes." An interim assessment will be made after 6 to 12 months.
The new TNC contract was signed at the same time as the Publisuisse cooperation agreement. As expected, Tele Südostschweiz, which did not agree to its share of the TNC advertising revenue, has left the company. However, this hardly means any losses for the TNC, says Geissbühler. "With Tele Südostschweiz, we are losing less than 0.5% of our viewers." (dse)

According to the evangelist Matthew, the disciples are said to have cried out in fear when they saw Jesus walking on the water. Last year, Publicis drew on the New Testament for the Zurich Transport Association (ZVV) and the city of Zwingli: In order to create a striking profile for the network fare, the agency sent Tram 3 across the waves of Lake Zurich and a ship along the region's country roads. In return, it received awards and the ZVV more loyal passengers. In order to remind Zurich's hard-boiled party people of the devotional streetcar, the creatives have now captured the miracle on celluloid. Film on page 14

An add-on appearance by Lowe's renews the soft drink's healthy imageBy Ernst Weber Rivella's appearance - "What color is your thirst?" - does not fully convey the brand's core values. That's why an added-value campaign designed by Lowe, Zurich, is now to communicate the product attributes of the healthy thirst quencher. It is used as a flanking measure.
Rivella is gaining momentum. According to Mike Brodbeck, head of product marketing at Rivella, Rothrist, the brand's market share rose by one percent to 14 percent last year in a sweet beverage market that is tending to decline. Around 80 million liters of the popular drink are now consumed in Switzerland each year (52% drinks red, 30% drinks blue, 18% drinks green).
In Rothrist, the company is convinced that "the reason for success clearly lies in the separate structure of the three product worlds. Since the launch of Rivella green in the summer of 1999, Rivella advertising designed by Lowe, Zurich, has tried to teach consumers that thirst is not just thirst, but comes in the colors red, blue and green.
Naturally, the colors correspond to the advertising identity colors of the Rivella varieties. The psychologically cleverly operating appearance has prevailed because the color sensations coincide with the mood of the worlds of experience in which the products are located.
It is well known that Rivella red is intended to quench thirst caused by athletic performance, Rivella blue to quench thirst felt during leisure and social activities, and Rivella green to quench thirst caused by concentrated mental work. According to Constance psychologist Ingrid Riedel, the red ray symbolizes vitality, the blue ray the mind, and the green ray the resilience of the will.
Nevertheless, the color appearance has a weak point. It neglects the core value of the brand. A shortcoming that Lowe now wants to make up for with an additional appearance. Rivella is to be more clearly differentiated, particularly in relation to the still-growing iced tea submarket. "Sharpening the brand value is tantamount to strengthening the brand," says Brodbeck.
The visuals of the added-value campaign each show the product against a corresponding color background. Headlines such as "For everyone who wants to give up sugar but not calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, and potassium" remind us that the milk serum-based drink is a natural and healthy thirst quencher. In each case, the headlines refer to the editorial environment in which the special-format ads appear. "For us, the campaign is an opportunity to once again cultivate our strength in copywriting," says Lowe CD Mark Stahel.

at BAzThe Basler Zeitung, parent company of the Basler Mediengruppe (BM), improved its operating result in the financial year ending June.News Improved balance sheet at BAzThe Basler Zeitung, parent company of the Basler Mediengruppe (BM), improved its operating result in the financial year ending June. Profit rose from CHF 1.1 million in the previous year to CHF 2.4 million. The result is remarkable because BM had to record a reduction in turnover in the 2001/2002 financial year due to the sale of Jean Frey AG. This amounted to only 311.9 million francs compared to 512.2 million francs in the previous year.
New magazine for gay community Gay.ch will also be available on paper in future. The monthly magazine, named Quickmag, will be published for the first time on December 6 and is aimed at "people from the scene". It is being launched by the company Alcontex in Baar, which already runs Gay.ch.

By Heart creates a romantic natural brand world for butterBy Luca Aloisi Despite the agricultural reform, butter sales are still stagnating. Consumer behavior or cholesterol hysteria: With top model Sarina Arnold as the new butter woman, By Heart wants to melt the butter mountain for the Swiss Milk Producers (SMP).
Nothing is in butter anymore. Although ACNielsen has noted a slight increase in sales in the Swiss retail trade over the past twelve months, only a fraction is sold through this channel. The Butter Industry Organization (BOB) paints a less favorable picture. According to this organization, the Swiss consumed just under 4,500 tons of butter in processed or natural form in 2001. That is 4.8 percent less than in the previous year.
While Heinrich Geissbühler, treasurer of BOB, stated in Schweizer Bauer that "a butter mountain is not to be expected at the moment", BOB Managing Director Peter Ryser came to the opposite conclusion in Facts: "If we cannot significantly increase milk fat sales, we will have a butter mountain at the end of the year." Ryser expects the surplus to grow to around 8,000 tons by the end of the milk year (April 2003) and cost a good CHF 80 million. Does liberalized agriculture not function according to the laws of the free market economy after all?
Margarine just melts a little faster than butter
The only thing that is certain is that the reduction in milk quotas envisaged by the SMP has no legal basis and is therefore dependent on the goodwill of the farmers. And that the thirst is too small to drink away the milk produced. The problem is exacerbated by the trend towards low-fat dairy products.
Because producers pay 0.52 centimes per kilo of milk delivered and the federal government pays a maximum of the same amount for marketing measures, the advertising budget has remained constant at best in recent years. This is in stark contrast to the broad impact of the advertising campaigns of various margarine brands and private labels, not to mention the cumulative advertising pressure.
They benefited from the debate about animal versus vegetable fats and exploited this position in their favor. Margarine advertising consistently conveys the image of the vital consumer, whose outward appearance suggests a conscious diet and enviable health, as the testimonial appearances from Lätta to Becel or the family idyll of Rama would have us believe. The fact that margarine has been able to position itself as a healthy food despite preservatives, stabilizers, emulsifiers and flavour enhancers is partly thanks to its successful marketing strategy.
As margarine also owes its success to the price factor and is well able to defend the myth of the healthier fat, butter has only one USP to beat the competition: the added value of the natural product. No margarine can dispute this product characteristic. This is why naturalness should also be the linchpin of a new campaign.
By Heart's concept already does justice to this positioning with its new claim: instead of using the phrase "everything in butter" as before, it profiles butter as "a natural talent". This is just the beginning of the rediscovered desire for natural products.
By Heart CD Hans Siegwart and his team asked themselves whether the popular Butterfrau could be continued at all, and if so, in what way. They characterized the previous butterwoman as a young, modern and somewhat edgy user. Although she had emancipated herself from the original farmer's wife to agent to quizmaster's wife, she remained the only focal point of the campaign.
Stabilize butter sales with Arnold and Rousseau?
For the new campaign, the creatives and strategists envisioned a brand world that translates naturalness in multiple dimensions and appeals to the viewer's desires: pristine surroundings captured photographically by artist Katrin Freisager in natural colors and freshness. The butter woman is no longer just a user. She becomes a symbolic figure for naturalness par excellence.
This symbolic figure can also be replaced by other people, Siegwart continues. "We didn't come up with Sarina Arnold because she is the most famous model in Switzerland. Rather, we asked ourselves the question: who could play Änneli in a new Gotthelf adaptation?" The charisma of the Uri native, her connection to her homeland and her dialect met expectations in the casting.
SMP wants to effectively counter the competition with the original brand world of the four TV commercials and three advertisements. The positioning of naturalness is followed by a gleeful comparison in the second spot, in which the butter woman drives grazing cows into flight by reading the margarine additives. The third and fourth commercials refer to Christmas and later Easter specialties, which taste more natural and therefore better with butter.
"Although we have developed very natural designs, we have moved away from the smell of cowsheds and are presenting a fashionable butter woman that also appeals to the young target group, where true values such as naturalness are back in fashion," Siegwart is convinced.
For the premium butter Floralp, By Heart chose a reduced brand world consisting of the product and trademark Enzian. The spots dramatize the genuine beauty and taste of a butter sandwich with honey or dried meat.
In addition to the striking, culinary visual opulence, which borrows from the grand hotel world, and the playful "food ballet" to a classical soundtrack, the new claim "Grand Beurre Suisse" underlines the claim to the highest quality. This high quality is rounded off in the advertisement subjects with ironic lists of places such as St. Moritz, Crans Montana, Gstaad, Davos and Rümlang.

Time budget studies are booming and dissect media consumption down to the minuteBy Wolfgang Koschnick Time budget studies sometimes document the media consumption of test subjects down to the minute. However, the knowledge gained from these studies rarely justifies the effort involved. During the day, people listen to the radio and leaf through newspapers a lot, but from 6 p.m. onwards, consumers' attention is focused on television.
Recently, one time budget study has followed the next: first the Munich-based TV marketer SevenOne Media, which is also active in Switzerland, published its long-term study "TimeBudget 1999-2001", followed by the RTL marketer IP Deutschland with "Medien im Tagesablauf 2002". But what exactly is time budget research and what benefits does it provide?
Time budget studies are empirical studies that determine what the people observed do during a specified period of time. How they spend a day or a week. The aim is to find out how much time
they typically spend on certain activities.
In essence, the time-budget method is a tool for reconstructing the daily routine of test subjects - and is therefore pretty old hat. This is because it was already used as an instrument by the Austrian-American social researcher Paul F. Lazarsfeld at the end of the 1930s. The decisive advantage of this method lies in the necessity for the interviewer and the interviewee to go through the entire daily routine chronologically from morning to evening without being overwhelmed by the systematic approach. In the listener research, the instrument also had the additional advantage that the interviewees did not even suspect that it was about commercial radio when they were thinking about what they had been doing yesterday afternoon at around 3.00 pm.
Media ascetics are the most avid TV viewers
In media research, the media use of the previous day is usually surveyed using a more or less finely structured time grid. Respondents are usually unable to reliably recall longer than this. And since the use of the Radiocontrol clock and other technical measuring devices, it is actually pretty certain that they can't even do that.
But that doesn't explain why this wave of time budget studies has emerged. But are they so productive that media planners need a new one every year? In principle, the findings are always the same: People spend quite a lot of time with media.
The "basic study" by IP Deutschland, "MiT 2002", found that people in Germany spend an average of 260 minutes a day using media. The rest is spent working and sleeping. At weekends, Germans spend around 25 minutes more on media than on weekdays. Of the five media types surveyed (TV, radio, magazines, daily newspapers and the Internet), television is by far the number one with 150 minutes per day. Only 86 minutes are spent listening to the radio.
Significantly lower values were measured for print media: At 19 minutes, the daily newspaper is still ahead of magazines (11 minutes). And due to its relatively low penetration among the German population (37% of the population aged 14 and over use the medium at least occasionally), the internet brings up the rear with six minutes of daily use per person.
"MiT 2002" shows that television can be used to quickly build up a high reach. Whether executives, people with a particularly high household income or with a higher level of education: In every target group, TV accounts for over 50% of total media usage. And television also reaches people with below-average media usage. The "media ascetics", the quarter of the population with the lowest media consumption, even have the highest TV share of all target groups at 64%. This means that those with little time prefer to reach for the TV remote control for information and entertainment.
The study design of "MiT 2002" also makes it possible to record the parallel use of several media. The contact quality of a medium depends largely on how exclusive this contact is. 98% of TV use takes place without the simultaneous use of other media - the best value of all the mass media recorded. Radio follows with 91%. The Internet also achieves high exclusivity values: 81% of surfers do not use any other medium at the same time. Print media follow at a considerable distance with 67% of exclusive use (magazine) and 64% (daily newspaper).
With great scientific fanfare, "MiT 2002" found out that television is a great medium. Is it even necessary to mention that the client of this fabulous study is a TV marketing company?
Other studies produce completely different results in some cases. Time budget studies commissioned by print media publishers inevitably find that people spend more time with print media and that this is the best time of the day. This indicates a certain arbitrariness in the results.
One year before "MiT 2002", TV marketer SevenOne Media published the first results of the long-term study "TimeBudget 1999- 2001". Every summer since 1999, the market research institute Forsa has surveyed a representative group of Germans aged between 14 and 49 (a total of 2,487 people) about their media use.
According to the initial results, every German spent around 7.5 hours a day using media in 2001, i.e. several times the amount of time recorded by IP Deutschland. In 1999, the figure was 6.5 hours. The lion's share of "TimeBudget" is accounted for by the accompanying medium of radio (169 minutes) and television (153 minutes). This is followed by books
(32 minutes) and the internet (30 minutes). According to this study, the average person spends 24 minutes on newspapers and 15 minutes on magazines.
According to "TimeBudget", television and radio are the media with the highest reach. 97% of all 14- to 49-year-olds in Germany can be reached via television, while the figure for 14- to 29-year-olds is just under 100%. Radio achieves similar figures with 93% (14 to 49-year-olds). Print media have lost reach. Whereas in 1999, 92% still stated that they at least rarely read a newspaper, in 2001 this figure was only 88%. In the same period, magazines fell from 73% to 65%.
The various media are used differently throughout the day. Depending on the time of day, a different medium takes center stage. Two out of five Germans read the newspaper at breakfast or on the way to work to find out about the events of the previous day. After nine o'clock, the daily newspaper loses a lot of its reach and is hardly read after 10 pm. Radio, on the other hand, remains the most used medium during the day until 6 pm. Whether on the road in the car or at work in the office - for many, the radio is a constant companion in the background throughout the day.
Respondents were asked to indicate the preferred information medium for their respective area of interest. The result: Television is the medium of choice for almost all of the topics examined. Only for business information and news from the region did the daily newspaper come out on top, and radio for traffic information and music. The top competencies of television are diverse. It is almost unrivaled when it comes to documentaries, eroticism and entertainment, and respondents also see few alternatives to television for current information in the areas of news, sport and weather.
The daily newspaper has its core competencies in the area of current information. When it comes to local news, business, politics, sport and news, the daily newspaper is at the forefront. Radio is almost unrivaled when it comes to traffic information. Radio is also still the first choice for music - although the internet is already in third place here thanks to the mp3 boom. According to the respondents, teletext is particularly strong in terms of content when it comes to sports news, weather and travel, but also traffic information and business news - in other words, where concise and quickly available information is required.
Spaniards don't care about the media at the weekend Different media are used by different population groups. While television and radio are media for the entire population, the other media have a clear focus in the socio-demographic groups. The Internet still has a user structure in which a disproportionate number of men, young people, high earners and a large number of university graduates are represented. However, these proportions have already decreased in recent years, and with the further spread of the Internet, user structures will also become even more similar to the structure of the population as a whole.
Of the more recent studies, "Media in Mind", which was first conducted in 1998 on behalf of Universal Media, London, is the most worthy of mention. It bears the subtitle "Consumption and lifestyle habits in Europe" and examined
media usage behavior in ten European countries. The study is conducted annually in May or June and, in addition to the whole of Europe (including Switzerland), now covers numerous other countries in North and South America, Asia, Australia and New Zealand.
The aim of "Media in Mind" is to obtain internationally comparable results on the qualitative aspects of media use. The central question of the survey was: "Which media and advertising media are consumed where, with whom and how during the course of the day in the various countries?"
The location of the activity is also taken into account (e.g. at home). Qualitative categories also supplement the time- and location-specific analysis of media consumption. These include the level of attention of the consumer, the environmental situation (alone or with friends) and the mood during media consumption (relaxed or depressed).
The media covered are television and radio (both broken down into private and public broadcasters) as well as newspapers and magazines. Video, cinema visits and the Internet are also surveyed, but without taking the attention factor into account.
With "Media in Mind", Universal Media is able to recognize regularities in the daily mood of target groups and thus use them to optimize the quality of media plans.
In order to ensure that the people concerned perform their task conscientiously, some countries rely on willing respondents whose addresses are collected in Infratest Burke's Access Panel. In Germany, for example, 100,000 addresses are available from which a random sample is drawn. In other countries that do not have an access panel, the addresses are generated by random sampling. Respondents are sent a questionnaire and a diary.
The study revealed considerable differences between the countries. Take newspaper reading, for example: Compared to other European countries, Germans read newspapers the most and most intensively. The newspaper has the highest proportion of attentive users in Germany for almost the entire day. More than a third of respondents stated that they read their newspaper very attentively in the morning.
Only a small proportion of German radio listeners say they listen attentively to the program. Magazines are also flicked through rather than studied attentively for most of the day. On Sundays, Germans devote more time to the media than any other nation. They pay the most attention to newspapers and television. Spaniards and Italians, on the other hand, spend a lot of time away from home at the weekend.
The results from "Media in Mind" confirm what was already known from other studies: television is still predominantly used in the evening. The usage curve rises slowly from around 5 p.m. and reaches its highest level at 8 p.m. during the "Tagesschau" time slot; after 10 p.m. it quickly flattens out.
The British, on the other hand, are out more often in the evenings than Germans. As a result, TV usage in prime time is lower than in Germany. However, this begins earlier in England: from 4 p.m. onwards, there is a continuous increase in TV usage. The use of breakfast TV is significantly higher than in Germany, but still at a very low level. More TV is also watched in the afternoon in the UK than in Germany.
Another peculiarity of the British is the relatively high use of television outside the home. Almost all major football matches on the island are broadcast exclusively on pay-TV channels, which many English people can only watch with friends or in pubs. As in Germany, the level of attention paid to radio is very low.