Parents' magazine Fritz+Fränzi wins Q-Award

This has never happened before at the Q-Award: The prize, with which the Swiss Media Association (VSM) honors the best trade or special publication each year, was awarded for the second time on November 28 to the parents' magazine Fritz+Fränzi. In 2014, the editorial team had already received the honor for a successful rebranding.Laudator Andreas Häuptli explained in his speech how this novelty came about: "The jury discussed whether it was even possible for a publication to win the coveted award twice. But the opinion was quickly made: this must be possible!" The life cycle of a print publication has long since ceased to be linear, which is why it must also be possible to reward successful innovations.

The numbers speak for themselves

In fact, Fritz+Fränzi, which is supported by the Elternsein Foundation, has enjoyed growth that is both unusual and gratifying for Swiss print publications: In the past four years, the printed magazine has increased its readership by more than 20 percent; newsletter subscribers have even increased eightfold and average online users seventeenfold in the same period. This is also reflected in subscriber and advertising revenues.

Advertising market: Fritz+Fränzi stands for consistency

For advertisers, the Q-Award is always an interesting indication of which trade media offer themselves for advertisements through consistency and quality. In this context, Andreas Häuptli also mentioned Fritz+Fränzi's decision to have its readership surveyed in WEMF's MACH studies: "This is not something that can be taken for granted," said Häuptli. And further: "But the fact that this guarantees planning security for the advertising market and makes it possible for the publisher to track its own market performance is clever calculation."

Other nominees also of high quality

The co-nominees of the winning title also stood out for their high quality, according to the jury of this year's Q Award. Whereas in 2017 HR Today, a trade publication with a very clear target group, won the award, three special interest magazines now made it onto the shortlist: In addition to Fritz+Fränzi, these were Wandern.ch and the swinger newspaper Der Schlussgang.Even though it was only enough for one medium in the end, Andreas Häuptli attested to the co-nominees in his speech "impressive success in an interest growth market."

SFJ Awards for Nadine Kant, Coen Kaat and Rüdiger Sellin

The SFJ Awards, i.e. prizes for the best technical articles of the past year, went to Nadine Kant (3rd place for "Phönix Unikat #30: Heizkraftwerk Aubrugg, Zürich"), Coen Kaat (2nd place for "Mythos Künstliche Intelligenz - Warum KI komponieren, aber keine Bücher schreiben kann") and Rüdiger Sellin (1st place for "Quantum Leaps for Electricity Storage").