"You can never please everyone"

Mr. Akermann, there must be 100 large and small free newspapers and advertisers in Switzerland. Which ones do you represent in your association?
Thomas Akermann: Those that are published weekly, reach all households in the distribution area and meet certain quality criteria (see below). Many of them are also traditional titles that have a high number of exclusive readers, i.e. people who do not read a subscription daily newspaper.

The VSGZ has been dormant for a long time over the past 20 years. But in 2007, when the commuter newspapers News, .ch, Cash daily and Heute/Blick am Abend caused a sensation, you reactivated the association. What has happened since then?
Since then, the number of members has more than doubled, we have launched an advertising package on the market, and we have offered internal seminars for better online presences. We also introduced the following on the website Free newspapers.ch We also introduced a combined calculator that quickly provides the advertising market with an offer. We also carried out active generic marketing and were active in the area of littering.

Where do you see construction sites?
I am not yet completely satisfied with the combination. We have gained more volume and also a few national customers, but there are potential customers who are not yet advertising with us. We also want to support the expansion of our members' online presence, for example with games that are attractive to readers and ideally combine online and print.

It seems to me that the VSGZ fell asleep again after News, .ch and Cash daily disappeared from the market: The combined project made slow progress and is now smaller than it was a year ago. Even a founding member, Biel-Bienne, turned its back on you. What went wrong?
I personally regret the withdrawal of Biel-Bienne. But you can't say that anything went wrong. And it's certainly not a case of falling asleep. You can never please everyone. The important thing is that we are growing overall and that the majority are satisfied. A look at the list of members shows this: We are well positioned!

Arc Hébdo and the Courrier Neuchâtelois are also no longer involved. Are you meeting with reservations in French-speaking Switzerland?
No, because Jean-Marc Vellmann from GHI is our Vice President, we are well anchored there - and we have the big players from French-speaking Switzerland with us. But we welcome every new member. However, publishers differ in their assessment of how important a national connection is for individual titles. The fact is that we have more members today.

How many members are there? Last year you communicated a combination of 21 titles, in a communiqué from August 2011 there was talk of 18, on your homepage 19 are listed, but in a downloadable brochure only 14.
This shows that we still have some room for improvement when it comes to integrated communication (laughs). There are currently 20 members, if you count Zuger Presse, which is published in Baar as a Zugerbieter, as two individual titles. The differences have arisen because sometimes individual titles are counted and sometimes publishers. AZ Medien, for example, is a member with four titles, while Tamedia has a stake in three.

In a recent press release, you praised the fact that the reach of VSGZ members had remained "extremely stable" according to Mach-Basic 2011-2. However, you failed to mention that several VSGZ members no longer report their readership at all.
As an association, we support participation in the Wemf readership research. I also believe that this is important for the marketing of the station wagon. It is also a sign of seriousness that we can use to differentiate ourselves from other market players. However, I cannot dictate this to the publishing houses.

According to the VSGZ website, participation in Mach Basic is a prerequisite for association membership.
That is correct. Sometimes the publishers simply disagree. We don't immediately exclude a member because of this.

After all, a quarter of your members - the RhoneZeitung, the Rheinzeitung, the Baslerstab, the Anzeiger Luzern, the Bündner Anzeiger - have been doing without the reach survey for years in some cases.
I can only emphasize this: It is right and important to be there, and it is a mistake not to be. But as president of the association, I can't tell anyone what to do.

You recently emphasized that the majority of VSGZ members in German-speaking Switzerland had not suffered any major losses in readership compared to 2004, and that they were "a solid and sustainable advertising medium". This is partly true. However, according to Wemf, the language-assimilated population in German-speaking Switzerland has increased by around 350,000 people since 2004. The individual free newspapers should therefore have grown in line with this thanks to the spread of households. Why couldn't they keep up?
(thinks) This conclusion is only theoretically correct. Due to changes in positioning and concepts, the distribution areas were reduced in some cases. However, the VSGZ titles were able to defend their territory surprisingly well compared to other print categories. Many subscription titles lost readers significantly during this period.

There are also VSGZ titles, such as those in Basel, Berne, Zurich, Lucerne, Geneva and Lausanne, which have 20,000 to 40,000 fewer readers today than in 2004.
Some of these titles have undergone drastic concept changes: they adapted their publications to the market, sharpened their profiles, restricted their distribution areas and focused on cities. In this respect, their figures are not comparable.

"You can avoid the stop-advertising sticker via a free newspaper..." promises the VSGZ website to customers. Surely this is only true for titles that are also official publication organs?
Legally speaking, we are in a gray area. But it is true that we are getting past the stop stickers. This is interesting for brochure inserts, where we are seeing growth.

However, there are titles among the VSGZ members that do not serve letterboxes with stop stickers - the Baslerstab, for example.
I assume that these are exceptions at the special request of individuals. In principle, we can get past the stop stickers and are therefore a very interesting partner for advertising clients.

There are still gaps in the VSGZ network - in western Switzerland, Ticino, Solothurn, central Switzerland and around Lake Zurich. Why have you never been able to close them?
Firstly, there are not comparable concepts or titles in all areas, and secondly, not all candidates meet our requirements.

Does this still apply to the many titles of Zehnder AG in Wil SG?
Yes, they do not meet the criteria. We are not prepared to dilute our clearly defined image and positioning. Because we want to be a serious and reliable partner for the advertising industry.

The only thing is that you would have to pay even more attention to your own quality criteria - in terms of reach, stop stickers and circulation: three VSGZ members - GHI, Lausanne Cités and the RheinZeitung - do not have their circulation certified.
In principle, the criteria are valid and we uphold them. However, if the situation is unclear in an individual case, we do not react immediately, but first seek a discussion.

What goals have you set yourself for the next two or three years?
The main thing now is to drive the Kombi forward. We want to position it even more clearly and professionalize its marketing. Then we want to represent the free newspapers even more strongly to the outside world in terms of generic marketing. We are also currently holding talks with potential members so that we can eliminate the blank spots on our map as far as possible.

Four years ago, the VSGZ negotiated with the publishers' association - the aim was to become a member of the association and form a sub-group.
We are in regular and good contact with the publishers' association. At the moment, however, we are of the opinion that we can achieve more for our genre as an independent organization. That is why we are continuing on this path.

The VSGZ membership criteria

To become a VSGZ member, a free title must have its own editorial team, have been on the market for at least one year and be distributed at least once a week to all households in its distribution area. In addition, the editorial share should be at least 20 percent of the volume and PR texts must be identified as such. The title must also have its circulation and reach surveyed by Wemf, and it should have at least 0.75 readers per copy.

The current VSGZ members

Affoltern district gazette
Lucerne gazette
Anzeiger St. Gallen/Thurgau/Appenzell/Liechtenstein
Basler rod
Bernese bear
Bündner Anzeiger
Fridolin
GHI
Lausanne Cités
Lenzburger Anzeiger
Upper Lake News
RheinZeitung
Rhone newspaper
Schaffhauser Bock
City Gazette Olten
Tagblatt of the City of Zurich
Winterthur City Gazette
Weekly newspaper for the Emmental and Entlebuch
Zug press
Zugerbieter (Baar)