Graphics industry: Viscom wants to merge the associations
With Viscom and VSD, the Swiss graphic arts industry has two associations with their own histories and different ranges of services. Viscom wants to merge these into a single association in order to make better use of synergies.
The Swiss graphic arts industry is facing enormous challenges, writes the Swiss Association for Visual Communication Viscom in a press release. Overcapacity, falling prices and a decline in overall demand for print products would characterize the industry situation. Aggressive competition from abroad - strengthened by a weak euro exchange rate - and intensified competition for market share between traditional print, online and mobile media are increasing the pressure on graphic arts companies in Switzerland to adapt. According to Viscom, the Swiss graphic arts industry today needs a single, powerful industry association whose central task is to support the ongoing process of change.
According to the association, Viscom and the Association of the Swiss Printing Industry VSD sometimes provide services that compete with each other and lead to an unfavorable use of resources. A merger of the associations is therefore the order of the day due to the existing synergy potential, better allocation of resources, similar member interests and the enormous structural challenges in the Swiss graphic arts industry.
At its meeting on August 26, 2011, the Central Board of Viscom unanimously decided to call on the VSD leadership to enter into talks with the aim of forming a single industry association. "It should be remembered that the VSD has already rejected a merger of the associations twice, in 1985 and 1994, on the initiative of Viscom. Viscom is of the opinion that the time is now riper than ever for a single association and that words must be followed by deeds," Viscom concludes the communiqué.
