Over 30,000 visitors flocked to the Ricola Experience Shop in its first year. CEO Thomas P. Meier is delighted: "The large number of guests exceeded our expectations. In December alone, we welcomed 3,700 visitors. The experience store has proved to be the latest highlight for the many Ricola fans. It brings them even closer to the world of herbs and at the same time contributes to the attractiveness of the place where we are rooted. It is the perfect combination of enjoyment, entertainment and tradition."

New taste experiences and special products

The Ricola Experience Shop not only offers the usual range, but also unique products that visitors will not find elsewhere. These include exclusive flavours that are normally only available abroad, as well as special gift packs that can be personalized on site. Particularly popular is the newly launched "Raspberry Melissa" flavor, which is currently available exclusively in the Ricola Experience Shop in Laufen and will also be available in Swiss retail stores later in 2024. In second place on the popularity scale is the "Echinacea Honey Lemon" variety, which has been available in stores since the end of 2022, followed by the "Mixed Berry" variety. In addition to the sweets, the store also offers merchandising products, including the popular "Ricola Buzzer", which plays the world-famous Riiicolaaa jingle at the touch of a button.

Interactive workshops and learning opportunities

The Ricola Experience Shop is not just a place to shop, but also a place to learn and have fun. Interactive workshops and guided tours allow visitors to experience the world of Ricola up close. The workshops offer a variety of activities, including building a bee hotel and making a 1-meter mock-up, which are particularly popular with visitors. The aim is to make the world of Ricola interactive and educational. The workshops and guided tours complement the visitor experience on the upper floor of the store, where visitors can learn in an interactive process how the herbs get into the sweets and even digitally create their own variety of sweets. The range is constantly being expanded and adapted to offer visitors a constantly changing experience.

Participants in the study who saw ads with a one-sided representation, be it exclusively with black or Asian models, rated them as less effective compared to ads with a diverse cast. These findings were consistent across all participant groups, regardless of their own ethnicity. Study leader Conor Henderson from the University of Oregon emphasized that non-white participants identify less with US society than white participants. However, they noted a stronger connection to society when they saw advertising with a diverse group of models.

Increased consumer identification leads to consumers engaging more with established brands and perceiving them more positively than small challenger brands. These conclusions were drawn during a research visit to France by Henderson together with Marc Mazodier from ESSEC Business School and Jamel Khenfer from Excelia Business School. The study included research in the USA, the UK and the United Arab Emirates.

Comprehensive data analysis

The researchers began by analyzing an extensive dataset of customer reviews of hundreds of US brands, taking into account ethnicity and zip codes. They found that the usual advantage leading brands gain from being well-known and popular was less pronounced among people of color. These groups were less interested in validating themselves by buying popular brands and therefore had less need for social conformity.

Effectiveness of various advertisements

The researchers emphasize that their findings mainly apply to large brands and are not necessarily transferable to small brands. They also found that the impact of leading brands was weakened among participants from ethnically diverse communities. In a further step, the researchers investigated whether ads featuring people of different ethnicities can help to strengthen feelings of connectedness with society.

The comparative analysis of real advertisements and artificially generated scenarios was used to examine the reactions to advertisements that showed either only models of a certain ethnicity or a mixed cast. It was found that ads without ethnic diversity were not rated positively by any of the participants. Ads with a diverse cast, on the other hand, received the best ratings. These results were published in the "Journal of the Academy of Marketing Sciences".

The film production company Mcqueen Films and Swiss International Air Lines (Swiss) are entering into a partnership for the next two years: Swiss is expanding its service this year to include direct flights between Zurich and Washington D.C., Seoul and Toronto, among others, in order to offer travelers an even greater choice of destinations. The collaboration kicks off with a film series that not only puts the spotlight on the new direct flight destinations, but also aims to create a deeper, emotional connection to these places.

Developed by Mcqueen directing duo Synkron (Yannis Petrone & Tim Holder) and Creative Director Martin Arnold, in close collaboration with Swiss' content marketing team, this series aims to tell authentic stories that share the spirit of Switzerland with the world. By focusing on real-life characters with a strong connection to Switzerland, this film series allows viewers to experience the cities from a unique perspective - one that goes beyond what is usually found in travel guides. This strategic initiative is designed not only to promote Swiss' new destinations, but also to build the bridges that connect cultures and expand the depth of the travel experience.

Emotional bridge between Washington D.C. and Switzerland

The first film in the series takes viewers to Washington D.C., where they explore the city through the eyes of Stephane Vogel, General Manager of the renowned "Hotel Washington". Just a stone's throw from the White House, Stephane offers us an insight into the heart of the American capital, interwoven with his unmistakable Swiss perspective. The journey to his home country, Switzerland, does not just begin when he arrives at the destination airport, but as soon as he boards the plane.

The films will be shown in the After Take-Off Videos on the aircraft in the Swiss fleet, every month. In addition to in-flight entertainment, the films will be published on social media channels and YouTube and will be shown on all Swiss Owned Channels, accompanied by editorial articles in the Swiss Magazine.

Client: Swiss International Air Lines. Content Marketing (Film): Oliver Lips. Head of Content Marketing: Dario Mastrogiovanni. Head of Marketing: Stefan Vasic. Film production: Mcqueen Films. Director & Cinematography: Synkron (Yannis Petrone & Tim Holder). Creative Director: Martin Arnold. Executive Producer: Philipp Petersson. Line Producer: Andrew Campbell. Sound & Ass. Cam: Kevin Prinz. Postproduction Supervsior: Ricardo da Silva. Editor: Oliver Don. Sound Design & Mix: Bardo Eichner.

It's done: the market and social research institute Link is now YouGov Switzerland. The name change goes hand in hand with a seamless continuation of the existing services of the former Link, while opening up new opportunities through YouGov's global presence. Link has been part of the YouGov family since December, and now the name change gives Swiss companies and brands access to even more products and services from the YouGov portfolio, as well as in-depth international market research expertise. It will also make it easier than ever for clients to access reliable research data from target markets around the world through a single source. YouGov has an extensive team of more than 3,000 employees worldwide with an industry-leading panel of 26 million registered members in 55 countries.

"The transition from Link to YouGov Switzerland represents not only a name change, but also a move towards the value we can create for Swiss businesses through accurate and insightful data. YouGov Switzerland combines local research excellence with global reach, insight and data to provide a unique offering to our clients in Switzerland and around the world," says Steve Hatch, CEO YouGov.

Werbewoche.ch spoke to four Link experts in an exclusive interview about what the change of name means for employees, the local business and customers.

Werbewoche.ch: After two years as part of the YouGov Group, Link is now YouGov Switzerland. How does that feel?

Julien Chevignon: It is very exciting that Link is now officially YouGov Switzerland. While the integration has been completed internally for some time, we are now also sending a strong signal to the outside world that the Swiss company is fully part of the Group. This step also visually marks the fact that, in addition to our usual regional expertise, comprehensive service and top quality, we offer our clients in the Swiss market top international know-how and all the services of the YouGov Group from a single source. The networking of the teams creates synergies from which clients in and outside Switzerland are already benefiting. For example, our high level of sector expertise in Switzerland, our pioneering role in the field of analytics and our public and qualitative offering complement each other very well with the other YouGov services and our syndicated products such as BrandIndex and Profiles. Added to this is the Group's experience in managing large international clients, from which we benefit locally.

Philipp Fessler: As a Linkian who has been with the company for 14 years, the joy is mixed with melancholy. Letting go of a brand is not a decision that is taken lightly. In the Swiss market, Link stands for the highest market research quality and innovative strength. Now the name is changing, but the core remains the same: the same employees are still here on site, putting their heart and soul into delivering top performance for our clients and helping to make us the number one in Swiss market research. We are now looking forward to bringing Link's values to the YouGov Group.

Marianne Altgeld: YouGov and Link share common values and YouGov is valued by clients worldwide for the quality of the data it provides, its expertise, methodological competence and reliability. These aspects make it easier for the team to identify with the brand. After two years of integration, this step is now important to ensure that Link is fully integrated into the Group and that we appear as a single entity on the market.

Dr. Sabrina Pfister: All of us at Link had a strong emotional connection to the brand, which has accompanied us for a long time. Now we are part of an even bigger family, and that opens up new opportunities.

What is YouGov's business strategy in Switzerland and how does it affect the local business?

Julien Chevignon: The local business and Swiss team will remain in place and well-established processes will be retained. At the same time, the Swiss location will gain a lot under the YouGov umbrella: working with large international clients, more reach thanks to YouGov's own panels with 26 million panelists in the UK, America, Europe, the Middle East, India and the Asia-Pacific region, as well as access to YouGov products and solutions to expand our local offering.

Marianne Altgeld: As a full-service institute, we offer customized market and opinion research for private companies and public clients. We use the most relevant survey methods for both quantitative and qualitative research. In addition, with our data products such as the Swiss Brand Observer or YouGov's global counterpart, the BrandIndex, we continue to offer our clients an "always on" solution for measuring brand performance among consumers.

Philipp Fessler: This global network also allows us to put together an attractive offer for large international companies with headquarters in Switzerland.

With the rebranding, the Swiss company is now also visually part of the international organization. What impact does this have on customers?

Dr. Sabrina Pfister: The direct impact on our customers is minimal. The quality of our projects remains at the highest level and we are still there for them. What is changing is our website, which now has a new YouGov design.

Julien Chevignon: We have started to inform our existing and potential customers about the brand change and so far it seems that everyone is happy to hear this. To be fair, our clients in Switzerland have known the slogan "Link, a YouGov company" for some time, as the acquisition took place two years ago, so it's not a big surprise to them.

Philipp Fessler: The contact persons will remain the same and the panel quality will not change. This means that our clients can also expect the highest quality in consulting and project work from YouGov Switzerland. In addition, they now also have easy access to the many benefits of the YouGov world.

What are the plans for the Swiss panel?

Marianne Altgeld: There is a clear growth target for the Swiss panel, but without compromising our usual quality standards. For example, our panelists will continue to be actively recruited and verified.

Philipp Fessler: Thanks to active recruitment, our panel will continue to be representative - and free of bots, which are now becoming a major problem for less strictly recruited panels.

Julien Chevignon: Our Swiss panel is very strong and known for its outstanding quality. Therefore, we definitely want to maintain the same positioning and continue to recruit new panelists while maintaining our current base with the same very high standards. It is also in YouGov's DNA to focus on panel quality, as this has always been one of our USPs: most of our clients work with us because they can confirm that our panel is second to none in terms of quality.

Julien Chevignon is acting as Managing Director on an interim basis. What are the plans for the future?

Julien Chevignon: In fact, I am acting as Managing Director in an interim role. In the long term, we definitely want to find a local Managing Director who has a strong network, but who is also able to be on site every day and take optimum care of the team. Until we have found a suitable candidate, I will contribute my many years of experience in setting up and developing locations for YouGov in France and Italy, for example, as well as integrating acquired companies in the Asia-Pacific region. In my role, my networking within the Group also makes me a kind of bridge builder who can quickly bring the right people together and promote networking between colleagues beyond Switzerland.

At the beginning of the year, YouGov took over Consumer Panel Services GfK. What does this mean for the Swiss market?

Julien Chevignon: We welcome two new colleagues from CPS GfK to the Swiss team and more than 1,000 in total across Europe. Now that the acquisition is official, work has begun on the obvious synergies: stronger geographical coverage as we add many new countries where YouGov previously had no local team in place, but of course also a new combined offering for our clients. In summary, CPS GfK answers the "What?", "When?", and "How much?" with comprehensive data on household purchasing behavior, while YouGov provides answers to the "Who?" and "Why?" with up-to-the-minute consumer data on attitudes, opinions, media and brand consumption. In Switzerland, as in many other countries, this will make our offering much more holistic and expand our industry expertise. CPS GfK also essentially works with very large international clients, which is perfectly in line with our growth strategy in Switzerland.

Philipp Fessler: For the Swiss market, this primarily means that we can also provide our customers with the acquired services and, in particular, expertise. Our customers will therefore benefit from receiving even more from a single source. At the same time, we will be able to expand our knowledge through the exchange with our colleagues on the Consumer Panel, which in turn offers added value for our customers.

Marianne Altgeld: For our clients in the retail and FMCG sectors in particular, this acquisition means a broader portfolio of services. We can use broader perspectives and approaches to answer research questions and thus provide even deeper and more valid insights.

Don't you know it? Not so bad. The acronym stands for "Large Language Model". It is often used when someone wants to prove that they know more about artificial intelligence (AI) than their counterpart. AI is used quite excessively in small talk these days. In the topic ranking, right behind "How are you?" in second place, regardless of the person's school-leaving qualification or job. It is used to bluff, brag and bluff by talking about what AI would already be used for and what implications it would have for our everyday lives. It is then usually said: "Your industry will certainly be massively affected." And they always mean the other person's industry.

The impact on their own industry is skillfully downplayed because AI/AI has already been in use there for a long time. As our industry in particular is known for always sailing close to the wind of buzzwords, the abbreviation LLM is used to distinguish it from the AI/AI babble that has become commonplace. But what are LLMs?

Highly complex and yet child's play

LLMs are the basis of AI/AI. Large, so-called language models that have been trained on huge amounts of data. These are transformers that process entire sequences of queries in parallel. And with hundreds of billions of parameters. In everyday language: If this, then this. In educational language: If the hotplate is hot, don't put your hand on it. This process, also known as deep learning, uses interconnected nodes or neurons in a layered structure that resembles the human brain. Sounds mathematical and sophisticated. And it is.

Why is everyone talking about it anyway? Because nobody wants to be one of the diehards, the left behind or the losers whose jobs will fall victim to artificial intelligence. And because we tend to overestimate the impact of a technology in the short term and underestimate it in the long term. Those who constantly use the acronym are also overestimating. It would perhaps make more sense to talk about the learning progress of our own children and grandchildren in order to understand how learning works and how intelligence is created. Children learn to understand basic things such as grasping, crawling, walking, talking, languages and other things through self-learning and are able to practice unsupervised.

So here's a tip: behave like a child and ask the next person who uses the acronym LLM to explain it to you in detail. "What's that?" - you'll be amazed. Those who simply pontificate or parrot will stammer, and they themselves - as children are - will quickly turn their attention to something else because of their evasive answers. Those who have paid more attention in STEM subjects and are most likely to understand something about it will explain the underlying transformer to you in such detail, consisting of a series of neural networks made up of an encoder and a decoder with a self-observation function, that your mind will also be somewhere else. Just like when you read this sentence. So there is still a lot for us humans to learn.

* Benno Maggi is co-founder and CEO of Partner & Partner. He has been eavesdropping on the industry for over 30 years, discovering words and terms for us that can either be used for small talk, pomposity, excitement, playing Scrabble, or just because.

LEP is becoming increasingly important as a method for the structured and interdisciplinary documentation and evaluation of healthcare services, not only in German-speaking countries but also in Europe and beyond. LEP's range of services is constantly evolving. In order to do justice to the company's ambitious vision for the future and its expansion targets, Dachcom's entire brand identity has been realigned.

Based on a sound strategy process, Dachcom has supported LEP in positioning itself as a digital solution provider and as the "language of digitalization in healthcare". The new claim is intended to express LEP's claim to leadership and its importance for the entire healthcare sector. The same applies to the various concise core messages. LEP is the language of carers, the language of healthcare facilities, the language of data, the language of quality.

The conceptual idea was packaged in a concise visual appearance with a new brand logo, independent typography, striking color scheme, authentic images and a memorable tectonic speech bubble element that refers to the idea of language.

As part of the rebranding, the website was also Lep.ch completely overhauled visually, structurally and in terms of content. An optimized user experience, a well thought-out information architecture and fresh corporate design elements should ensure a coherent overall picture. Services such as training, e-learning, seminars and knowledge videos are prominently bundled in a separate section. Thanks to Pimcore technology, content can be flexibly expanded in the future. The informative website is intended to make the language of digitalization in the healthcare sector tangible online and clearly set LEP apart from the market environment.

In addition, the new LEP brand identity will be used on trade fair and moving image elements, brochures, business stationery, social media content and online marketing measures.

Despite the growing interest in sustainable tourism, only around ten percent of travelers are willing to offset the greenhouse gas emissions of their flight and certified offers receive little attention. Fairunterwegs.org aims to provide environmentally conscious travelers with a comprehensive information platform so that they can close this gap between intention and action.

The website offers a wealth of information and advice on responsible travel that would normally have to be painstakingly sought from various sources. It is aimed at anyone who is committed to sustainable tourism and provides answers to questions about the most environmentally friendly travel options, fair business travel and sustainable transportation.

The responsive website runs with PHP and JavaScript without any frameworks. Only two JavaScript libraries were used. This approach ensures a fast loading time of the website and also enables the smooth functioning of the Country page with an interactive map of all countries. The concept and design were developed by Kargo, the technical implementation was carried out by Glunz. Both from Bern.

The new platform was successfully relaunched at the end of 2023 and is currently in a consolidation phase until mid-2025.

Responsible at Fairunterwegs: Jon Andrea Florin (overall project management), Sabrina Haase (PM). Responsible at Kargo Kommunikation: Christoph Balsiger (Creative Direction), Simon Aline Thurnheer (AD, Screen Design & PM), Nicole Balsiger-Gerber (Accounting). Responsible at Glunz: Dino Meyer, Christian Heiko Wüthrich (programming).

Mate is a traditional South American drink made from the leaves of the yerba maté plant. On the one hand, "Ámate" means "mate", but it is also a Spanish expression meaning "love yourself".

The iconic design of the bottle also stems from this idea: only those who love themselves can love others - the two red hearts are intended to reflect this duality.

The visuals and animations in the communication of "Ámate" also play with the graphic interpretation of love and self-love. This is particularly evident when more than one bottle comes together: If you string several "Ámate" bottles together, a chain of hearts is created: self-love grows into love for others, which is also passed on.

At the same time, this additional dimension should ensure maximum attention on the shelf at the POS and at the club bar. With full intent - because in order to conquer the Swiss market, "Ámate" should first establish itself in the club and bar scene. Ámate" is distributed by Zollywood.

Responsible at Ámate / Zollywood: Oliver Jordan, Marco Ammann. Responsible at Neu Creative Agency: Nicole Vizcardo, Finn van Grondel, Pian Gumpp, Maison Fitzgerald, Sandy Pfuhl, Nico Ammann. Photography Packshot: Oliver Nanzig. Photography Visuals: Gregor Brändli. Image retouching: Lorenz Wahl.

The scene is a warehouse somewhere in the world: robots scurry across the floor and pick up items, which they then hand over to human employees for packing and shipping. In many industries, from e-commerce to automotive production, warehouses with hundreds of robots are increasingly becoming part of the supply chain. The problem is that when 800 robots are on the move at the same time to efficiently deliver goods to their destinations, the risk of collisions increases. Even the best path-finding algorithms struggle to keep up with the fast pace of e-commerce or production. In a way, the robots are like cars that have to find their way in a crowded city center.

Intelligent traffic planning in the robot warehouse

A group of MIT researchers are already using AI to alleviate traffic congestion. They have adopted ideas from this field to tackle the problem of robot traffic in warehouses. To this end, they have developed a deep learning model that encodes important information about the warehouse. This includes information about robots, planned paths, tasks and obstacles. The model can be used to predict which areas of the warehouse should best be relieved to improve overall efficiency. The technique divides the warehouse robots into groups to unload them faster using traditional robot coordination algorithms. This allows the robots to be relieved almost four times faster than when using a strong random search method. Specifically, the new neural network architecture considers smaller groups of robots at the same time. In a warehouse with 800 robots, for example, the network could divide the warehouse into smaller groups of 40 robots each. It then predicts which group has the greatest potential to improve the overall solution when a search-based solver is used to coordinate the path to be traveled by the robots in that group. In an iterative process, the overall algorithm selects the most promising group of robots with the neural network, offloads the group with the search-based solver, then selects the next promising group with the neural network, and so on.

Consideration of relationships

In addition, the neural network records the complex relationships between the individual robots. Even if one robot is initially far away from another, their paths can still cross while traveling through the robot warehouse. The technology also streamlines the calculation as the constraints only need to be coded once instead of repeating the process for each sub-problem. In a warehouse with 800 robots, 40 robots can be relieved by setting the other 760 as constraints. Other approaches require all 800 robots to be considered in each iteration per group. Instead, the 800 robots only need to be considered once across all groups in each iteration. This deep learning approach could be used not only for streamlining warehouse operations, but also for other complex planning tasks such as designing computer chips or laying pipelines in large buildings.

"We have developed a new neural network architecture suitable for real-time operations at the scale and complexity of these warehouses. It is able to encode hundreds of robots in terms of their trajectories, origins, destinations, and relationships to other robots in an efficient way that reuses computations across groups of robots," summarizes Cathy Wu, Gilbert W. Winslow Career Development Assistant Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) and a member of the Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems (LIDS) and the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society (IDSS). Cathy Wu is the lead author of an article on this technique, and is assisted by Zhongxia Yan, a PhD student in electrical and computer engineering.

Source: techexplore.com

This article originally appeared on m-q.ch - https://www.m-q.ch/de/ein-neues-ki-modell-koennte-ablaeufe-in-einem-roboterlager-rationalisieren/

With the redesign of its employer branding, the retailer wants to emphasize its commitment to inclusion and diversity and provide a convincing insight into the company's vibrant culture. The aim is for visitors to Coopjobs.ch get a real feel for Coop's culture and values.

This was achieved through the newly defined visual language. Models on the one hand and employees in their actual working environment on the other represent the different roles within the company and were available during eleven extensive shooting days. The resulting Captured authenticity is designed to make it easier for potential employees to connect with Coop on a personal level and develop a sense of belonging.

Contemporary graphic design

Designing a look and feel for Coop's employer branding involved not just a visual overhaul, but a strategic endeavor to authentically represent Coop's branding. The contemporary graphic design - also implemented by Suan - is intended to strike a balance between incorporating Coop's existing brand elements and differentiating the job portal as a unique point of contact for current and potential employees.

Managing diversity in the Coop Group

According to Suan, a comprehensive redesign is no easy task for a diverse company like Coop. Collaboration with in-house IT played a crucial role in the seamless integration of the new design into Coop's existing digital infrastructure. This collaboration extended beyond the online portal to templates for social media, graphics, icons, images and films. Close collaboration with photographers and filmmakers also ensured that every aspect of the redesign reflected Coop's commitment and design concept.

In various workshops with the client, Brandpulse developed an evolution of the positioning of Novis as a brand for "Swiss premium kitchen appliances, designed for a modern, natural and healthy lifestyle". The newly developed brand design based on this reflects the positioning with an energetic and colorful appearance that is brought to life by the contrast with white. The use of different colors is intended to express diversity, joy and health in all shades. This is also reflected in the colorful product collections and underlines the positioning as a lifestyle brand.

The communication concept developed by Brandpulse reflects the human-authentic attitude and value of Novis products with a cheeky, charming and direct approach to the target groups. The new branding was implemented at brand-relevant digital and physical touchpoints such as packaging, office equipment, newsletters, trade fair stands and much more.

Brandpulse's concept for the new trade fair appearance is based on the idea of an inspiring oasis that attracts customers and in which Novis products are presented in a refreshing and stimulating environment. Selected "Peak Moments" such as a vitamin bar are intended to invite the public to interact.

The new Novis branding was launched with a new exhibition stand at the Olma and Ambiente trade fairs. Novis testimonial and star chef Tanja Grandits was also there. Her statement in the Novis communication: "Novis, my first choice".