About Bild+Funk

Bild+Funk

Bild+Funk is a German weekly programme guide with a removable radio programme, published by the Gong Verlag GmbH of Ismaning — part of the Funke Mediengruppe. Appearing since 1951 — first in the Burda publishing house, since 1996 at the Gong Verlag — it is the sister title of Gong: except for the cover and the imprint, the two magazines are identical. German-language Wikipedia lists bildundfunk.de as its website; the address could not be independently load-verified for this profile, so no website is asserted here.

Overview

Bild+Funk is a weekly classic Programmzeitschrift with a removable radio programme section — a survival of the radio age in the television-guide format. The editor-in-chief is Christian Hellmann (since August 2014; from 2002 to 2014 Carsten Pfefferkorn). The ZDB identifier is 127371-1. The cover price is €2.30 (as of April 2023).

History

Bild+Funk appeared from 1951, first in the Burda publishing house — the Offenburg-based house of Franz Burda, built around Bunte and the fashion magazines. For forty-five years it was Burda's programme guide: the weekly that carried the Burda name into Germany's living rooms alongside the television set itself. The title — Bild (picture) + Funk (radio) — captured the media transition of the 1950s: the picture joining the radio, television joining broadcasting.

In 1996 Bild+Funk was given to the Gong Verlag in exchange for shares in Super TV. The swap was part of the Burda-Gong rearrangement around the 1990-founded Super TV: Burda and Gong had jointly conceived Super TV for eastern Germany in 1990; in 1996 Burda took over all of Gong's shares in Super TV, and Gong received Burda's long-standing programme guide Bild+Funk in return. Since then the magazine has appeared as the sister title of Gong and of the later re-acquired Super TV (which Burda sold back to the Gong Verlag in 2005).

Except for the cover and the imprint, Gong and Bild+Funk are identical — the same programme section, the same editorial mantle, the same documentary planner, under two different mastheads. The arrangement is one of the German programme-guide market's long-standing peculiarities: two brands, one magazine. The economics are those of the subscription weekly: one editorial operation, two newsstand identities, and a combined subscriber base that keeps the classic weekly viable in the age of the fortnightly.

A curiosity of the Burda years, documented by Star Trek fans: from issue 1/1973 to 11/1973, Bild+Funk serialised eight (abridged) adventures from the Williams-Verlag's novel adaptations of the Star Trek television series — "Welterfolg im Fernsehen: ENTERPRISE — jetzt nur noch in Bild+Funk" ("World success on television: ENTERPRISE — now only in Bild+Funk"). In 1979 a few issues carried comic strips on the original series by the artist Ludwig Fischer. The programme guide as a science-fiction serial — a reminder of the era when the TV magazine was also a family entertainment paper.

Content

As the sister title of Gong, Bild+Funk shares its content — and that content is the classic weekly programme guide at its most comprehensive. With almost 55 broadcasters and twelve pages per programme day, the guide offers one of the most extensive programme sections of all weekly programme guides. The seven largest German broadcasters (from Das Erste to VOX) are presented on two double pages per day: the reader finds the day's programme on one complete double page and the entire evening programme on another. Niche and regional broadcasters, all the "Dritten" programmes, and children's and youth broadcasters are also presented; since 2013 further pay broadcasters alongside Sky have been included in the listing.

The daily documentary planner (Doku-Planer) informs readers, in its own section, about the day's best knowledge, travel, and nature programmes in the editors' opinion — the guide for viewers who watch documentaries with the same attention others give feature films. In the Unsere Zeit ("Our Time") section, the magazine bundles useful contributions from health, travel, kitchen, and psychology/family. All broadcast films are rated and tested for family suitability.

In the middle of the magazine sits a removable radio newspaper with a detailed overview of the daily radio programme — the Funk in Bild+Funk, a survival of the radio age in the television-guide format, and the title's distinguishing feature. The large puzzle section completes the weekly ritual: the programme guide as the week's companion, not just its listings grid. (The sister title Gong reached a print run of 1,204,800 copies in 1979 — the programme guide at the height of the three-channel era, when the week's television could still be surveyed in a single magazine. The removable radio newspaper, the Doku-Planer, and the Unsere Zeit section carry that comprehensive ambition into the multichannel age: almost 55 broadcasters where once there were three.)

The editorial focus outside the programme — in the front and back sections — lies on knowledge, travel, media, cinema, health, and consumer topics, addressing viewers who, alongside feature films and series, have a strong interest in documentaries, reportages, and useful magazine programmes. It is the weekly for the curious viewer: the programme as the occasion, knowledge as the substance.

Coverage & Audience

Bild+Funk appears weekly. The weekly circulation was 157,777 copies sold (IVW 3/2011), with 142,960 by subscription — a subscription-heavy title even then, with over 90 percent of buyers as subscribers. The audience is the classic weekly programme-guide readership: loyal, older, subscription-based — readers who have taken the same guide for decades, whether under the Gong or the Bild+Funk masthead. The subscription share is the title's economic backbone: in the age of the €1.69 fortnightly, the weekly subscriber base keeps the classic guide viable — readers who pay €2.30 a week for the programme, the radio newspaper, and the puzzles, year after year. It is the economics of loyalty against the economics of price.

Ownership

Bild+Funk is published by the Gong Verlag GmbH of Ismaning, a subsidiary of the Funke Mediengruppe. The magazine came to the Gong Verlag in 1996 in the Super TV share swap with Burda; since August 2014 Christian Hellmann has held editorial responsibility (from 2002 to 2014 Carsten Pfefferkorn was editor-in-chief).

The Gong Verlag's own history mirrors the German magazine market's consolidation. Founded in 1948 as a subsidiary of the Nuremberg Sebaldus Verlag — in which the Catholic Church held 24 percent — it passed through the Schlott AG takeover to the WAZ media group (now Funke), which bought 75 percent in October 2000 and the remaining 25 percent in December 2001. The Verlag's digital operations — klack.de (the online programme guide, since 2010), lifeline.de (the health portal, since 2012), werstreamt.es (the video-on-demand search engine, since 2017) — extend the programme-guide publisher beyond print, serving the Bild+Funk readership's digital needs alongside the weekly. In 2006 the Verlag founded the Deutscher Rätselverlag subsidiary, in which some 50 puzzle magazines appear — the puzzle section's industrial base.

The Funke programme-guide portfolio, organised in the Gong Verlag and the Funke Women Group (both in Ismaning), reaches a total circulation of nearly 5 million copies weekly across its titles — Gong, Bild+Funk, Hörzu, Bild der Frau, TVdirekt, TV für mich among them. Bild+Funk is the portfolio's classic subscription weekly: the title for readers who have taken the same guide for decades.

Digital Presence

German-language Wikipedia lists bildundfunk.de as the magazine's website; the address could not be independently load-verified for this profile. From the Burda programme guide of 1951 through the 1996 Super TV swap to the Funke-era sister title of Gong, Bild+Funk has remained the weekly that carries radio in its name: the removable radio newspaper in the middle of the television guide, every week — Bild plus Funk, the picture and the radio, since 1951.