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Press releases - Archives 2011
Farmers are also landscape architects
Press release of 1 September 2011 by the Swiss Farmers’ Union
Advertising posters with celebrities such as Michelle Hunziker, Michael Schumacher or Fabian Cancellara dressed in edelweiss shirts are out: nowadays, the farmers themselves explain which services they provide for the Swiss public. In four amusing TV spots by Bettina Oberli, farming families present the whole range of their special abilities, either as botanists, onomasticians or retailers. Three huge straw monoliths in St. Gallen, Lausanne and Bern symbolise their role as landscape architects and herald the commencement of a new stage of the Swiss agriculture’s image campaign.
You don’t have to be called Jean Nouvel to beautify the landscape with art. After all, farmers are also landscape architects. Swiss farming families have set up three monoliths made of straw in the cities of St. Gallen, Lausanne and Bern to begin their new communication with the population. The aim is to create sympathies for the farming families, to encourage the purchase of domestic products and to emphasise the importance of agriculture for our country.
Celebrities from the economic, sports and show business have been advertising the importance and achievements of Swiss farming families on posters since 2006. Michelle Hunziker, Michael Schumacher or Fabian Cancellara – to name only three – wearing the traditional edelweiss shirt and the joint slogan „Swiss farmers welcome you“ (Gut, gibt’s die Schweizer Bauern.) generated a large degree of attention and also appealed to the farming families. This made it all the more challenging to continue an appropriate image campaign for domestic farming, the farming families and for their high quality products.
In a competition of agencies, an idea by the experienced agency Jung von Matt from Zurich prevailed. They recommended putting the diversity of the services for the public and the skills required by the farming profession into the spotlight. A pleasant, fictive farming family shows in four humorous TV spots by Bettina Oberli and supplemental posters what else they are, apart from being farmers: botanists, retailers, hotel managers, wellness trainers, integration commissioners and also landscape artists. The farmer’s shirt as the characteristic defining feature and key visual will be retained. After a five year poster campaign, TV advertising is now the method of choice. The new spots can be viewed during the month of September in a first phase s well as on the web. The posters primarily serve to replace the abundant number of celebrity posters still hanging in barns and stables throughout the country. After all, farmers are also advertising specialists!
Further information:
Urs Schneider, Deputy Director/Head of Communication SFU
mobile 079 438 97 17
Sandra Helfenstein, Spokesperson SFU
phone. 056 462 52 21, mobile 079 826 89 75
Markus Rediger, Agricultural Information Center LID
phone 031 359 59 80, mobile 079 407 95 52
Martine Bailly, Agence d'information agricole romande
phone 021 613 11 31, mobile 079 679 72 09
