The archive · Marketing & Growth · Marketing decision · 2025
Pressbyrån gives half its logo to press freedom — Eurobest 2025 Grand Prix
On World Press Freedom Day, Sweden's Pressbyrån cuts 'Press' from its logo and fills it with frontline photos of journalists — 202% newspaper sales lift.
Pressbyrån
What it had to solve
Pressbyrån, Sweden's largest convenience chain, had spent a century selling newspapers alongside snacks. As global press freedom hit historic lows, the brand wanted its nationwide presence to say something real on World Press Freedom Day — without a paid media campaign.
How it works
On World Press Freedom Day 2025, Sweden's largest convenience chain Pressbyrån did something to its own name: it removed the word 'PRESS' from the logo across thousands of storefronts and replaced it with frontline photographs of journalists at work. The change, created with Åkestam Holst /NoA and launched with Reporters Without Borders, turned the brand's nationwide footprint into a tribute to the people the name stood for.
The idea was a one-for-one trade. The logo had carried the word 'Press' for over a century because the chain sold newspapers; on that day it let the word be occupied by the journalists themselves. The campaign launched in parallel with the 2025 World Press Freedom Index, giving the gesture a date and a public reference point.
The response was measurable: 60% of those who saw the campaign bought a newspaper at Pressbyrån, a 202% increase in newspaper sales; 84% liked the campaign, 81% understood its message and 60% said it reminded them of the importance of press freedom. In December 2025 the work won the Eurobest Print & Publishing Grand Prix.
Why it lands
- It used the brand's own name as the canvas, so the message could not be separated from the brand making it.
- It traded one meaning of the word for another: 'Press' was literally replaced by the people who embody it.
- It turned a nationwide retail footprint into media — thousands of storefronts with no paid reach required.
- It tied the act to a date and an index people already knew, giving the gesture urgency and news value.
What it did
Among people who saw the campaign, 60% purchased a newspaper at Pressbyrån, driving a 202% rise in newspaper sales; 84% liked the campaign, 81% understood its message and 60% said it reminded them why press freedom matters. It won the Eurobest 2025 Print & Publishing Grand Prix.
What you can take
A logo is a promise: cutting the brand's own name to make room for the cause turned the chain's biggest real estate — thousands of storefronts — into the message itself.
Since then
The campaign ran on World Press Freedom Day 2025 and was honored with the Eurobest 2025 Print & Publishing Grand Prix in December. It became part of Pressbyrån's wider work with Reporters Without Borders and was covered across the advertising trade press as an example of a brand using its own identity for a civic statement.
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