AZ Medien replaces free newspaper Woche with an ad
AZ Medien discontinues its free weekly title Woche at Christmas, but launches a new paper just one month later, called Stadt-Anzeiger or Bezirks-Anzeiger, depending on the region. Despite the existing Publicitas lease, it is also massively expanding the advertising team for the new Anzeiger.
AZ Medien discontinues its free weekly title Woche at Christmas, but launches a new paper just one month later, called Stadt-Anzeiger or Bezirks-Anzeiger, depending on the region. Despite the existing Publicitas lease, it is also massively expanding the advertising team for the new Anzeiger.
From February 5, 2009, three new newspapers will be published in the canton of Aargau and the Limmattal in Zurich: a city newspaper with split editions for the regions of Baden, Wettingen and Brugg, a second city newspaper for Aarau and Zofingen and a district newspaper in the Limmattal in Zurich. The total circulation is 112,355 copies. The free newspaper Woche with its six split editions is discontinued and is published for the last time on December 24.
The new Anzeiger, which like the Woche is published by AZ Wochenzeitungen AG, a subsidiary of AZ Medien, is distributed free of charge to households every Thursday: The editions for Baden, Wettingen and Brugg with a total of 42,747 copies, those for Aarau and Zofingen with 36,202 copies and the Bezirks-Anzeiger with 33,406 copies. In the advertising network with the Lenzburger Bezirksanzeiger (circulation 30,600 copies), this is the advertising combination with the highest circulation along the A1 highway.
The Anzeiger will be published in newspaper format in future. In terms of content, the focus will continue to be on local and regional stories, and the service character will remain in the foreground, although the editorial team under Editor-in-Chief Hubert Keller will be increased by three to six positions. "We want to bring the Anzeiger even closer to readers and advertising customers in future and anchor it even more firmly," says Eva Keller, spokesperson for AZ Medien, explaining the increase.
What is particularly striking, however, is that AZ Medien is also expanding advertising sales at the free newspaper, which is leased from Publicitas. And by four people. "Expansion" is therefore probably the wrong word; it looks more like "building up" an in-house advertising crew. Keller confirms: "The intention is to bring advertising sales for the new Anzeiger back closer to the publisher in the foreseeable future. However, we will continue to work very closely with P." In the same breath, however, she describes the advertising volume of the weekly this year as "unsatisfactory". Which expresses dissatisfaction with the work of the P. Keller says: "The P is aware of this and will do everything it can to improve the situation."
But anyone who consults the VSW advertising statistics will rub their eyes at the dissatisfaction. From January to October 2008, the Week had almost 50 percent more advertisements than in the same period last year. So did the P not do such a bad job? Caution: The statistics say nothing about how many advertisements came via the P. In fact, AZ Wochenzeitungen has also been acquiring ads for years - in parallel with P. And it has always accepted ads directly from other intermediaries. It is therefore possible that a large proportion of the weekly advertisements did not come via the P channel. In any case, this would be consistent with an earlier statement by AZ publisher Peter Wanner, according to which P was doing too little for AZ Medien titles in the local market. He said at the time that they therefore wanted to become active themselves. He also recently hinted that a termination of the P lease at the end of 2009 is not out of the question. Now the events at Die Woche even make a separation from P seem likely.
Markus Knöpfli
From February 5, 2009, three new newspapers will be published in the canton of Aargau and the Limmattal in Zurich: a city newspaper with split editions for the regions of Baden, Wettingen and Brugg, a second city newspaper for Aarau and Zofingen and a district newspaper in the Limmattal in Zurich. The total circulation is 112,355 copies. The free newspaper Woche with its six split editions is discontinued and is published for the last time on December 24.
The new Anzeiger, which like the Woche is published by AZ Wochenzeitungen AG, a subsidiary of AZ Medien, is distributed free of charge to households every Thursday: The editions for Baden, Wettingen and Brugg with a total of 42,747 copies, those for Aarau and Zofingen with 36,202 copies and the Bezirks-Anzeiger with 33,406 copies. In the advertising network with the Lenzburger Bezirksanzeiger (circulation 30,600 copies), this is the advertising combination with the highest circulation along the A1 highway.
The Anzeiger will be published in newspaper format in future. In terms of content, the focus will continue to be on local and regional stories, and the service character will remain in the foreground, although the editorial team under Editor-in-Chief Hubert Keller will be increased by three to six positions. "We want to bring the Anzeiger even closer to readers and advertising customers in future and anchor it even more firmly," says Eva Keller, spokesperson for AZ Medien, explaining the increase.
What is particularly striking, however, is that AZ Medien is also expanding advertising sales at the free newspaper, which is leased from Publicitas. And by four people. "Expansion" is therefore probably the wrong word; it looks more like "building up" an in-house advertising crew. Keller confirms: "The intention is to bring advertising sales for the new Anzeiger back closer to the publisher in the foreseeable future. However, we will continue to work very closely with P." In the same breath, however, she describes the advertising volume of the weekly this year as "unsatisfactory". Which expresses dissatisfaction with the work of the P. Keller says: "The P is aware of this and will do everything it can to improve the situation."
But anyone who consults the VSW advertising statistics will rub their eyes at the dissatisfaction. From January to October 2008, the Week had almost 50 percent more advertisements than in the same period last year. So did the P not do such a bad job? Caution: The statistics say nothing about how many advertisements came via the P. In fact, AZ Wochenzeitungen has also been acquiring ads for years - in parallel with P. And it has always accepted ads directly from other intermediaries. It is therefore possible that a large proportion of the weekly advertisements did not come via the P channel. In any case, this would be consistent with an earlier statement by AZ publisher Peter Wanner, according to which P was doing too little for AZ Medien titles in the local market. He said at the time that they therefore wanted to become active themselves. He also recently hinted that a termination of the P lease at the end of 2009 is not out of the question. Now the events at Die Woche even make a separation from P seem likely.
Markus Knöpfli
