A funny year 2013

This is the most frequent comment that people have made to me when looking back on 2013. And there is no significant difference between professional and private issues. So it was a strange year, a year that brought us headaches as well as great joy and success. Our first year as a cinema advertising company in Switzerland has come to an end and the review is quite multifaceted.

We have learned that Switzerland has many more facets than we expected, not just the language and cultural regions (you can find out about these in advance), but also habits, likes, dislikes, idioms and their words. We experienced many careful, benevolently scrutinizing, precise and reliable, unconventional, innovative and humorous, special people. That alone makes the journey worthwhile. The distances are short (in kilometers) and the mental distance has also quickly decreased. Communication takes place in direct conversation, with time to spare and making use of one of Switzerland's strategic advantages: its excellent cuisine. However, this comes at a price. But the business for media marketers is always outside, i.e. with clients and agencies. This has already given us a very good overview of the overall gastronomic offering, especially in the metropolis of Zurich.

It was definitely worth it, not only because we experienced great places and dishes, we were also able to sell our medium very well in 2013. All the innovations we brought along and developed especially for Switzerland were received almost enthusiastically. In a few individual cases, however, we also learned that a Swiss "no" likes to hide behind very polite and authoritative words, shall we say. But as we all know, figures don't lie, and we more than exceeded our sales forecast in the first year.

We were also able to expand our cinema base, most recently even consolidating and extending our number one position in Switzerland's most important advertising region with the acquisition of the arthouse cinema chain in Zurich. Further steps will follow this year.

The previous top dog in cinema advertising doesn't find our commitment at all funny. This is understandable, but developments in the media always move forward, rarely or never backwards. Our colleagues there will experience this, and this is not only because competition is known to stimulate business, but also because the pressure from innovations is increasing. We have set ourselves very ambitious goals and the key points have long since been realized: hard box office data as the basis for billing per campaign, planning and implementation according to defined target groups, playout in cinemas at the highest technical quality level (also known as the DCI standard).

This motivates customers and agencies, but does not only make friends in competition. When the market then exerts pressure and demands these innovations from all providers, remedies and innovations are quickly promised. This is what happened in Switzerland in the fall of 2013. However, shortly after this announcement, I got carried away and made a bet that the technical renewal promised by the competitor for this February would not happen. There are only a few days to go and the chances of my prediction coming true are increasing. We will see. By the way, you can really see it in the movies - with a little practice.

Now you can guess what the winning bet will be? That's right: a good meal in Zurich - it's really easy to find. And 2014 will be a really good year. Want to place a bet?