Industry players are looking forward to a more Toronto-style daily newspaper market in Vancouver, thanks to the recent arrival of three commuter tabloids.

"This is the most excitement we've had in a long time," says Andeen Pitt, vice-president of media and business development with Wasserman and Partners Advertising, one of Vancouver's biggest ad agencies.

Pitt and other media buyers across Canada are anticipating discounts as Metro Vancouver, 24 Hours and Dose, which are all free to readers, aim to exploit national advertising contracts.

"It's clear that all these entries won't survive," says Pitt, echoing the sentiments of two other analysts interviewed by Business Edge. "That's my view. I don't think the market can absorb three papers."

Jimmy Pattison, left, and Pierre-Karl Péladeau savour the launch of their joint venture, 24 Hours.

For the first time since the 1970s, Vancouver has local dailies owned by more than one company. Although owners and company names have changed, a single company, now CanWest Global Communications Corp., has owned the Vancouver Sun and Province since 1957. Two other independent dailies folded in the 1970s and 1960s, respectively.

Pitt says 24 Hours, a joint venture between Vancouver billionaire Jimmy Pattison's group and Montreal-based Quebecor Inc., is the only real new competitor to CanWest.

The Winnipeg-based company owns Dose and has a one-third stake in Metro with Toronto-based Torstar Corp. and Metro International SSA of Sweden, which hatched the commuter paper phenomenon worldwide.

The CanWest-owned National Post and Toronto-based Bell Globemedia Publishing Inc.'s Globe and Mail, which are distributed across Canada, add to Vancouver's crowded playing field. Pitt says the freebies will need the support of local ads, and must initially offer significantly lower ad rates so that advertisers have a reason to use them. "They don't yet have proof that they have a market here," she says.

Pitt says she believes 24 Hours has a good chance of surviving because the Pattison-led publication won't "cannibalize" its other jointly owned publications by taking revenue away from them.

"The best news in all of this is not so much competition in the market for news and opinion, of which scant should be expected from the free sheets, but finally some competition for advertising," says Marc Edge, author of a book and doctoral thesis on the Sun and Province's monopoly.

Edge, a former Province reporter and assistant city editor who is now a visiting communications professor at the University of Texas at Arlington, calls the freebies "a welcome development.”

But he says the newcomers won't challenge the Sun-Province monopoly.

CanWest, he adds, has "hedged its bets" by investing in both Dose and Metro, giving the firm about 50 per cent of the freebie market, which the federal competition bureau might want to examine, says Edge.

But Pattison does not have a problem with CanWest owning more than one freebie paper.

"That's the free-enterprise system," he said, with a big smile, at a recent news conference where he and Quebecor president and CEO Pierre-Karl Péladeau unveiled the new publication.

The B.C. business legend's $3.3 billion in assets range from the Vancouver-based Save-On Foods grocery chain to Jim Pattison Lease in Calgary to Pattison Outdoor, an Oakville, Ont.-based advertising-signage company. He says he does not view 24 Hours as a direct competitor to the Sun and Province.

"I think they'll do fine," Pattison told reporters. "It's a different product ... (24 Hours) is looking for young people that don't have a lot of time to read."

Former B.C. NDP premier Glen Clark will serve as president of 24 Hours.

CanWest officials have downplayed their freebie's potential impact on the Sun and Province, contending their publications appeal to different demographic groups.

Pattison has pledged to continue advertising in other publications. He describes the Sun and Province as "good friends" but vows he and Péladeau will be "tough competitors."

Pattison, who does not own other newspapers, said 24 Hours will offer local ownership to a newspaper market that has been controlled by outsiders.

He and Péladeau also plan to introduce 24 Hours, already published in Toronto and Montreal under Quebecor's watch, into other markets.

Len Kubas, a Toronto-based newspaper consultant, says the journalistic quality of the freebies won't matter as much as a large readership.

"All of this is good for newspapers - believe it or not," says Kubas. "It really has made for a more vitalized newspaper-publishing scene."

In Toronto, as a result of the arrival of Metro and 24 Hours, he says, a lot of new advertisers are entering the market, base rates are lower, and there's a lot more wheeling and dealing in the newspaper industry as publishers try to meet their ad quotas.

However, Doug Checkeris, president of Toronto-based advertising buyer The Media Company, contends his hometown has not seen an influx of new advertisers. He does not anticipate an onslaught of new advertisers or a price war in Vancouver.

"I don't know if it's going to change advertising so much as it's going to change (market) share," says Checkeris. "The money has to come from somewhere."

But he notes the freebies are different in that Metro goes after a male audience, 24 Hours is skewed towards female readers and Dose appeals to readers in the 18 to 34 age range.

"You can presume Dose is going to be really competitive with something like Georgia Straight (an independent weekly arts and entertainment publication)," says Checkeris.

But the success of the freebies cannot be judged on one market alone, because they are trying to build major networks in several markets, he adds.

Dose launched simultaneously in Toronto, Ottawa, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver.

Checkeris expects CanWest to promote Metro and Dose on its TV stations, but he does not expect special newspaper-TV ad packages to be offered.

"I could see (TV-print ad packages) more in a market like Calgary-Edmonton where they want to take share from (Quebecor)," says Checkeris.

Michael Cowan, publisher of 24 Hours, said his publication may offer deals to companies that advertise on Pattison's signs - if that makes business sense.

Meanwhile, the Globe and Mail has beefed up its B.C. coverage with two more news pages and a Friday entertainment pull-out called 7.

Checkeris says the Globe wants to put pressure on the National Post. But Pitt says the Globe is finally waking up to complaints from advertisers and readers who dislike its "Toronto-centric" approach.

Pattison and Péladeau's publication had a bit of a rough start. Peter Judd, Vancouver's assistant city engineer, says 24 Hours "jumped the gun" by setting up its orange boxes at transit stops before obtaining the required $25 permit for each box.

But Judd says 24 Hours made amends by paying $6,000 for the removal of 500 boxes. Pattison's group also paid "double-time" for an inspector to scout locations with 24 Hours staff and grant on-the-spot temporary approval on Easter Monday.

He stresses the city is not giving 24 Hours preference and other publishers will have access to the same instant-approval service. The city is looking at increasing the box-permit fee to deal with more freebies, Judd adds.

(Monte Stewart can be reached at monte@businessedge.ca)