"We entertain with lightness, not with noise" - Interview with Marketing Director Victoria Rispy on the relaunch of 20 Minuten

m&k: Victoria Rispy, you only started at 20 Minuten in January 2025. Just nine months later, 20 Minuten has a new visual identity, a revamped digital product and a new advertising campaign. Can you work magic?

Victoria Rispy: When I joined 20 Minuten, it was already clear that my marketing team and I were in for an intensive but extremely exciting time. The step into the digital future had already become apparent, even though it was not yet clear when the print version of 20 Minuten would be discontinued. Together with the international agency Prophet, we started to work intensively on the positioning of 20 Minuten and the next steps followed on this basis: a new visual identity and a new campaign. At the same time, the product team and the editorial team worked flat out on the new app and website for 20 Minuten and 20 Minutes, while the advertising market worked on new formats and environments for the advertising market. All the gears had to mesh perfectly in order to achieve such a comprehensive relaunch in just a few months. Sometimes magic really would have helped!

You mention the new positioning. How is 20 Minuten repositioning itself? What is changing?

We position ourselves as a separate category in the media landscape and combine the best aspects of traditional media, popular media and social media. This allows us to offer readers a perfect content mix of news, entertainment and inspiration. We entertain with ease, not with noise. Our journalism remains compact, easy to understand and neutral, so that people can form their own opinions. The new app and layout now provide the perfect stage for our journalism, which we have continuously developed and sharpened.

What's behind the new look? Why is it coming just now?

We believe that the end of our print edition is the right time to give the digital edition of 20 Minuten an upgrade. With the print edition, we are losing a piece of tradition, but also visibility. We have an excellent leading position in the digital user market and have been able to further differentiate ourselves from our competitors in terms of traffic in recent years. Nevertheless, in our purely digital future, we want to offer our users an app that is even easier to use, new options and, last but not least, a clean, contemporary and attractive design. Our new logo is also a step into the digital future without denying our heritage.

What was special about Design Refresh?

When developing the design system, we paid close attention to our unique brand heritage and at the same time to the greatest possible flexibility. We are at the beginning of the new digital era of 20 minutes and have to anticipate this new future in our design. It was important for our design to be highly recognizable, from the smallest icon in the app to the XXL mega poster in marketing communication. To this end, we developed our signature shape "The 20 Tile" - a key element that is derived from the logo and can be used on a wide variety of levels: as a visual grid, as a container for content or as a striking graphic accent. The result is a consistent yet dynamic design language that makes 20 minutes clearly identifiable and offers sufficient scope for future developments.

How did you go about it?

It was crucial for us to first find out how far we wanted to go with modernization. We quickly realized that, as one of the best-known brands in the country, we wanted to start the new era with as much brand equity as possible. We therefore proceeded very cautiously and started by identifying the central core brand assets.

Another game changer was the broad handover phase: together with the design team from the Prophet agency in London and our own design and product team in Zurich, we developed the assets "made to measure" - in other words, adapted them so that they fit the needs of 20 Minuten exactly. In this way, we were able to ensure that the new appearance is not only visually strong, but also functions smoothly in day-to-day implementation.

Why did you do it all at once?

We wanted to surprise our users and advertising customers with a "big bang", in which a new product, logo, offers for the advertising market and a new advertising campaign are launched simultaneously and cause a stir. A new era doesn't start every day, and we wanted to herald it in a way that would attract attention.

You worked with star advertisers Thomas Wildberger and Thomas Schöb to realize the campaign. How did this come about?

ADC President Thomas Wildberger and 20-Minuten CEO Bernhard Brechbühl have worked together in the past and have therefore been in sporadic contact over the years. Thomas Wildberger and Thomas Schöb pitched the campaign idea spontaneously, but the time was not yet ripe. With the decision to do away with paper in future and venture into a purely digital era, 20 Minuten was looking for a campaign that was fresh, surprising and different. That's where the two came in. The Prophet agency, under whose umbrella they both work, was the perfect partner for the development of our new positioning, the new brand identity and the campaign.

The campaign stands out. Is the new claim deliberately provocative? What is behind it?

A good campaign that generates attention needs to be bold and a little outrageous. Traditionally, advertising campaigns talk about the product or the company itself and praise its added value. We were convinced by the completely different approach: we deliberately placed our users at the center and made them the heroes of everyday life. What happens to them when they read? They become aware and appear more attractive or sexy thanks to the knowledge they acquire. The campaign is basically generic advertising for reading in general.

Isn't the claim "Reading makes you sexy" a bit too narrow? After all, 20 Minuten doesn't just contain written articles, but also videos, games, etc.?

It's not just written articles that are popular with our readership. Contemporary video storytelling also relies heavily on a mix of text, graphics and moving images - a lot is still read in moving form. That's what we wanted to focus on here.

You hired the well-known film director Simon Verhoeven for the commercial. The photos were taken by Anoush Abrar, a star photographer from western Switzerland. How did this collaboration go?

The collaboration was extremely inspiring! Even if the spots are very short, the images, visual language, models and settings are all carefully selected. Every detail counts. We wanted to capture the transformation of a person that happens while reading with perfect aesthetics. Anoush Abrar and Simon Verhoeven understood this immediately and realized it perfectly.

How should we imagine the filming/photoshootings? Where were they taken? What particularly impressed you?

We filmed in Zurich's Kreis 5 district - coincidentally in the very neighborhood where I live. What was particularly nice was that I discovered completely new sides to my neighborhood. The team impressed me enormously: everyone went the proverbial extra mile, tried out countless variations and produced an incredible amount of strong material. This professionalism combined with the palpable joy on set was something special. And it was precisely in this atmosphere that we were able to experience live how something changes when reading - how people suddenly seem more open, more present and develop a special charisma. Capturing this moment so authentically was a real highlight for me.

What other marketing news can we expect from 20 Minuten in the near future?

With the brand refresh and the new image campaign, we have laid a strong foundation. Now we can delve deeper into tactical marketing communication. We want to continue to take bold paths, deepen the dialog with our community and inspire our advertising customers with surprising ideas. We want to create moments for our users that bring our brand to life and anchor 20 Minuten even more firmly in the hearts of the Swiss.