Marketing offensive
Baden-Württemberg is now “The Länd” – Twitter users think it’s funny
Baden-Württemberg’s Prime Minister Winfried Kretschmann introduces the new slogan
© Bernd Weißbrod / Picture Alliance
Baden-Württemberg has a new advertising slogan: The Ländle becomes “The Länd”. On Twitter, however, the state’s campaign is rather ridiculed.
In Baden-Württemberg they can – if you believe the advertising slogan – everything except standard German. But now the state speaks English for it: Baden-Württemberg is from now on “The Länd”. On Friday, Prime Minister Winfried Kretschmann (Greens) presented the corresponding advertising campaign. In addition, the state presented a 90-second image film based on the advertising slogan created by the Jung von Matt agency.
With the slogan “Welcome to The Länd”, the state government wants to attract skilled workers from all over the world. Nursing and nursing staff, software developers and programmers are particularly in demand. If the country did nothing, labor market experts estimate that the aging of society alone would create a gap of 90,000 skilled workers by 2040.
Baden-Württemberg wants to attack internationally
We’ll have to wait and see whether that succeeds. However, the new slogan initially caused amusement on the Internet. Not least because of Prime Minister Kretschmann, whose English pronunciation reminded some of the legendary English of his predecessor Günther Oettinger. Baden-Württemberg wants to be cosmopolitan, but some users have doubts whether this will work. “Also a really good idea to want to take off internationally with an umlaut”, commented a user on Twitter ironically on the slogan. Another user immediately expanded the previous slogan: “We can do everything. Except standard German. And English.”
The SPD parliamentary group in the state parliament also responded with humorous tweets to the marketing campaign of the green-black government.
The campaign costs 21 million euros
Others felt reminded of song titles by the slogan – for example “Mein Land” by Rammstein or the passage “The land of the free and the home of the brave” from the US national anthem. A well-known Goethe poem was also rewritten: “Do you know # TheLÄND, where the zibeben bloom, the Maultaschen brew in the dark foliage …” And the grocery retail chain Kaufland announced jokingly that its branches in Baden-Württemberg are now in “Kaufländ” want to rename.
The state plans to spend 21 million euros on the umbrella brand campaign. “You can put a lot of money into technology, but everything depends on the right people, with their vigor, inventiveness and inventive talent. This shows the history of our country more than clearly,” emphasized Prime Minister Kretschmann in a press release.
Sources: Twitter / Press release