Suddeutsche Zeitung’s printing presses begin production at 6:00 p.m. and run through the night.
(photo by Alexa Blanchard)
Our final day in Munich could not have been better or more fulfilling. While it’s always difficult to get to this point in the trip, the tug of not wanting to leave yet is tempered by our appreciation for the wonderful insight we have gained into the German media and culture. And yes, we do have to go home sometime.
Thanks once again to the wonderful (and greatly missed on this trip!) Bob O’Gara, we had a great morning visit to Ketchum Pleon. The health care team members took us through their media strategy and digital media work for their clients. Their work confirmed what we learned before we traveled and what has been reinforced here again and again: Germans are readers and they love to write. So a great deal of work is through traditional media, although Facebook is the popular social medium. But their emphasis is that their media placements wouldn’t work at all without being able to tell a story. I emphasize this to students as the begin to learn to write as professional journalists and communicators, and many advertising and PR students always pooh-pooh the need to understand the format. I wish I had recorded them for future classes to hear.
I’ll let the student writing the story tell more about this, but we saw a hilarious animated video to sell a Procter and Gamble anti-flatulence OTC product. It defies description. You have to see it.
The students heard, once again, that Twitter is not catching on here. I also keep hearing that it’s on the wane in many places as more and more channels are created. Fast and furious changes, that’s for sure.
Alexa Blanchard and Johnie Freiwald check out a special advertisement in the pages of Munich’s Sueddeutsche Zeitung. (Helen Fallon photograph)
We spent the afternoon at Suddeutsche Zeitung, the newspaper and publishing company that stands as the No. 1 circulation broadsheet national paper and a huge printing company. It was the first paper to gain a license from the U.S. military to start printing in Bavaria on Oct. 6, 1945, and we were fortunate to receive a copy of that first paper and tomorrow’s edition at the end of our visit and printing plant tour.
We heard from a number of people of the various initiatives — printing and online — and how the paper has moved forward from some pretty dire financial circumstances in 2002 that nearly led it to file for bankruptcy. But its huge printing facility and specialized approach to serving a higher-income and educated Germany public has led it to a great niche and a solid status even in the face of declining print sales.
Two major thing: The newspaper has many innovative and creative approaches to advertising and working with their clients. We saw just beautiful ads and posters, and I so hope the photographs we took do them justice in the media reports the students will write. And the tour of the printing facility just completed the day. Those massive presses working with that famous German precision and efficiency (for example, all the plates are recycled and the color printing is just pristine) roaring away gave us such a close look into their operations. Fabulous!
Best of all, Mr. Stengl, the product manager of advertisements, just came to life when he showed us with great pride those beautiful ads. And his in-depth explanation of the printing process was incredible. He loves his job and the 20 years he has spent with this company, and he knows this newspaper inside and out, even with that firewall between editorial and advertising. And of course, I always love people who just love newspapers. I am just a homer when it comes to this.
As we ate our delicious last German meal tonight and celebrated Johnie’s birthday (complete with fireworks!), Jan and I marveled again and again how much time once again the people at Ketchum and Suddeutsche Zeitung spent today with our students, as with all of our visits here. And without fail, they look at our itinerary and are dumbstruck at what we do in just 12 days. We’re pretty amazed ourselves!
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