Milk and honey flow elsewhere

Edipresse The Lausanne-based media group earned its money abroad in 2002 Cost control is the secret recipe of the Lausanne-based Edipresse Group. The discontinuation of unprofitable products, restructuring, reduced expenditure and 10 percent lower paper prices enabled the publishing house to achieve a stable result in the 2002 financial year - despite the advertising slump. Sales fell by 1.2 percent to 706 million Swiss francs. The net result rose by 1.4 percent to 30.4 million Swiss francs, after falling by almost half in 2001. However, Edipresse also had to cut back on advertising income. Overall, 5.5 percent less flowed into the company's coffers, with the Swiss activities even falling by 9.4 percent. Retail sales, on the other hand, increased by 7.5 percent and the printing business by 1.67 percent.
Edipresse owes the increase in turnover to its international business. A decline of 6 percent in Switzerland contrasts with a balanced development in Spain (-0.3%) and significant growth in Poland (11.4%). The Spanish subsidiary contributed 21% to Group turnover last year. Income from Poland is around half as high. Switzerland's share fell from 67.1% to 63.9%.
In view of the volatile economic environment, Edipresse did not dare to issue a profit forecast for the current year. The takeover of the Corbaz publishing group and the online financial service Infotec as well as an increase in the shareholding in the Portuguese Edimpresa Group should result in an increase in turnover of CHF 100 million.
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