No Air Time for German Anti-TV Spot

International Herald Tribune – September 5, 2005

Eric Pfanner

Germany is one of the most sluggish advertising markets in the world, with spending expected to grow by less than 1 percent this year, according to a media-buying agency, Zenith Optimedia.

One might think that television channels, which are hungry for revenue, would accept any old ad that came along.

But when Der Stern, the German newsmagazine, tried to promote its Aug. 25 issue with a 12-second TV spot, the leading Germany television stations responded with a firm "nein, danke."

The reason was that Stern's cover featured a headline telling readers, "Turn It Off: Why Television Has Gotten So Boring," using the slightly derogatory slang term Glotze, which means tube or box.

Inside the magazine, an article featured German families who have decided to do away with their televisions entirely.

While businesses have been known to pull advertising out of newspapers or off the airwaves after news coverage critical of their operations, it is unusual for media owners to turn down advertising unless it runs against guidelines on taste or decency, or promotes illegal activity, for example.

In this case, however, the leading German networks, including channels owned by RTL and ProSiebenSat.1, as well as the state broadcaster ARD, decided not to run the spot for other reasons.

"We just asked ourselves, 'Why should we?"' said Christian Körner, a spokesman for RTL. "No newspaper would publish an ad saying, 'Don't read it, throw it away.'"

The ad for Stern, which frequently uses television spots, was simple, showing the magazine's cover, with a voice-over announcing, "The first time that you can change something by looking away."

A spokesman for Stern, Frank Plümer, defended the magazine's coverage, maintaining that "a high percentage of Germans find what they see in the evening very boring." Further, he said, Stern would reject an ad only if it were "politically or morally extreme."

Plümer acknowledged that the rejection of the ad, conveniently revealed to a German newspaper, Süddeutsche Zeitung, might have given Stern a public relations boost, free advertising, as it were.

But he said the magazine would have preferred to have placed the ad as intended.

RTL, like Stern, is owned by Bertelsmann, the media conglomerate. The decision to run a news article criticizing a medium in which the parent company has a significant interest demonstrates Stern's "independence," Plümer said.

Not to be outdone, Körner also claimed a measure of autonomy for RTL under the Bertelsmann umbrella.

"They are independent, and we are independent, and that is how we act," he said.

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