Castling in the newsroom of the Blick Group
Ringier is reorganizing the Blick Group's newsroom: Going forward, it will be jointly led by DPA News Director Iris Mayer and Peter Röthlisberger. René Lüchinger, previously editor-in-chief of Blick, will become chief editorial writer.
In future, Mayer and Röthlisberger will be responsible for the Blick and Blick am Abend titles as well as the online offerings on Blick.ch and Blickamabend.ch. As of February 1, all offerings will be produced by a newly formed Blick desk, as Ringier announced on Wednesday. The new co-editor-in-chief Iris Mayer will also join Ringier on this date. The 40-year-old was foreign editor at the Associated Press in Frankfurt and editor at the news magazine Focus before becoming head of news and deputy editor-in-chief at Focus Online. Mayer has been Head of News at the German Press Agency DPA in Berlin for five years.
Reduction of "less than five positions"
The changes announced by Ringier were initiated by the new Managing Director of the Blick Group, Wolfgang Büchner. Together with the team of editors-in-chief, he has now worked out the further development and digitalization of the newsroom, according to the press release. The newly formed desk comprises the news, politics, business, people and lifestyle departments. As part of the reorganization, the company is cutting "fewer than five jobs". The future of Rüdi Steiner, the current editor-in-chief of Blick.ch, is still open. Talks are still being held with him about a new position of responsibility at Ringier.
Extended management of the Sonntagsblick
Fabian Zürcher, Thomas Benkö (Blick Digital), Andreas Dietrich (Blick) and Urs Helbling (Blick am Abend) will deputize for the two new Co-Editors-in-Chief. All four are already working in leading positions in the newsroom. The current Blick editor-in-chief René Lüchinger will take on a new role. He will become chief publicist of the Blick Group. In this role, he will also be a member of the Blick Group's Editor-in-Chief and the Editor-in-Chief of Sonntagsblick. Christine Maier and her deputy Philippe Pfister will continue to be responsible for Sonntagsblick. However, the management of the weekly newspaper will be strengthened in terms of personnel. Katia Murmann will join the editorial team on February 1.
Peter Hossli, current chief author and head of the pool of authors, and Sebastian Pfotenhauer, responsible for Video Ringier Publishing, will also be appointed members of the Blick Group's editorial board. Felix Bingesser will remain in charge of the Blick Group's sports reporting. (SDA)
Picture: DPA
