Germany: FAZ to adopt modern look

Posted by Jean Yves Chainon on September 26, 2007 at 11:17 AM

Starting on Oct. 5, the quality daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) is changing its design to include color pictures on its traditionally sober front page.

In its 58-year history, the paper printed a picture on its front page only 33 times.

Starting in October, the front page will consistently display a colored picture. The new layout is aimed to give the FAZ a modern look, with new fonts for headlines and a brighter, friendlier layout.

“The ‘FAZ’ loses the serious face of conservatism,” reports Der Spiegel.

While the FAZ’s conservative readership might not appreciate the change, the redesign is an attempt to regain a declining readership.

In the past nine years, the FAZ’s circulation decreased by about 40,000 copies, whereas the Süddeutsche Zeitung, its main competitor, gained about 19,000 readers.

Source: Der Spiegel, illustration of FAZ’s new design from Der Spiegel (link in German) – Publicitas