Multiple Swiss musicians have been contacted by Ramona Bonbizin, a lifestyle influencer personality and founder of the online platform fashionpaper.ch.
The subject line of the email suggests that Ramona Bonbizin is interested in interviewing the musicians: „Let’s talk about your music. I’m interested in an interview!“
However, the pitch begins in the email itself, linking to a PDF explaining how the interview will actually occur: To receive the PR feature, a payment of 1400 Swiss Francs is needed.
This sort of payola-adjacent, quid-pro-quo publicity isn’t uncommon within the music industry. With the rising importance of playlists, offering placements for money has become a business model despite its violation of the streaming services’ policies.
However, Fashionpaper’s model adds an additional layer to the transaction. If an artist decides to spend the money, they also buy stock in the FASHIONPAPER (Schweiz) AG, which is registered in Cham, Canton of Zug. The Canton of Zug is a desired location for companies due to low taxes. According to Moneyhouse, 279 active companies are registered on the same address because there is a subscription service enabling to register the company at Sinserstrasse 67.
Next to the PR feature offer, there is a smaller community offer starting from 140 Swiss Francs and an exclusive investor offer for 40’000 Swiss Francs, which grants you a dinner, an AI keynote, and a booklet with AI prompts.
Negative White analysed the available documents, tried to assess the business model viability, and reached out for comment.
