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The Swiss cow tram

July 16, 2014, 2 Comments

Cow tram calves

It’s a tram with cows on it and in it. It’s a cow tram! The latest marketing gimmick from Swiss Milk has been trundling through Bern for the past few months. Instead of the normal red tram, this one is all white with a cow painted on the side pulling all the calves behind her in a chain of little bike trailers.

That’s not all. Inside, every seat has a cow-hide effect on its back. Down the whole tram. That’s probably why they chose a black and white cow and not the typical Swiss brown one; then the seats would have just looked brown, whereas these one look startingly realistic.

Cow tram seats

The cow tram is the latest in a long line of Swiss Milk adverts, from billboards to videos. Most have become rather well-known in Switzerland, as has the slogan ‘Milch macht müde Männer munter’ or ‘milk makes tired men lively’. What it does for women is not made clear.

You might think that milk doesn’t really need advertising. Milk is milk, after all. Whether it’s fresh or UHT, full-fat or skimmed, or even what the Swiss call ‘Drink’ (semi-skimmed in other words), it is still simply the stuff cows produce. So why advertise?

Cow advert

It’s not as if there are many brands to choose from or the chance to buy imported milk over domestic (nearly all the milk sold in Switzerland is Swiss). And I’m sure there aren’t many people who see a milk ad and say ‘You know, I think I will have a glass of milk instead of a Coke or beer.’

Despite all that, Swiss Milk manages to come up with some great marketing ideas with cows as the stars. Our four-legged friends play football, ring bells, tap dance and climb mountains. Even a bovine Mission Impossible. You can see all the adverts on the Swiss Milk website – including the new one for 1 August.

As the slogan says, ‘echt stark’ or really strong!

2 Comments on "The Swiss cow tram"

  1. PostcardsfromSwitzerland Monday August 4th, 2014 at 10:10 PM · Reply

    I had not seen the inside of this tram!!! It is too cute!!!! (And I love Swiss milk BTW)

  2. Stella Sunday August 17th, 2014 at 06:47 PM · Reply

    Great! How ridiculous you must feel after a heavy climb and that cow from down below is already there.

    The first milk gimmick I saw, was the sticker Mil(CH).
    The milk-lobby brought us many great adverts and slogans.

    Alcohol intake aflicts women more than man. Isn’t it because of the higher fat contact? Well, that’s true for milk too. You get easier rid of the In water dissolving wastes in your body than of the fat dissolving wastes like PCBs, so they accumulate. Therefore we are warned to eat not more then once a forthnight the fat predater fishes (surely not twice a week).

    During one of my holidays in Swiss, I was told that the Swiss poultice and pudding receipts always were with half milk half water. That’s a very good idea, but the daily glasses of milk surely are not half milk half water? The best is unskimmed milk with water. Makes me think of the awkward UHT-milk. Dairies which don’t need a fridge after opening the packaging, won’t be healty.

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