If Torstar succeeds in buying Sun Media, advertisers will continue to benefit from competition, promises the vice-president of marketing for The Toronto Star.

Jeffrey Shearer says if the proposed takeover goes through, advertisers will continue to deal with separate sales reps for the tabloid and broadsheet divisions and, just as they do now, the papers will compete for the client’s business.

Rather than by merging sales departments, Shearer says efficiencies would come from other areas such as systems, production and distribution.

Hugh Dow, president of Initiative Media in Toronto, says that so long as the Sun and the Star remain distinct in Toronto the deal offers potential benefits for advertisers and agencies.

‘With everything I’ve seen in terms of the principles and announcements of what they intend to do with the paper, they [Torstar] certainly recognize the individuality and importance of that.’

Dow says if the deal goes through, major players such as Initiative Media would have an opportunity for one-stop shopping and the ability to make advertising and value-added arrangements that address a wider array of publications.

One area of the Sun’s holdings that is of particular interest to Torstar is its 60% interest in Canoe, Canadian Online Explorer, which it sees as a complement to its Toronto.com site.

Rocco Rossi, vice-president of strategic planning and new media at the Star, says the Sun purchase would mean that city-focused sites like toronto.com could be developed for other markets while Canoe.com could remain the national launching pad.

Rossi says that the greater scale would also allow new properties such as Internet classifieds, which need a larger base of papers to succeed, to be developed.

Sun Media publishes seven dailies including The Toronto Sun, eight daily community papers and 115 community and specialty publications in Canada and in Florida. Other media include Canoe and a 30% stake in CablePulse 23.

Torstar’s operations include the Star, Metroland Printing, Publishing & Distributing, which puts out 50 community newspapers, Harlequin Enterprises, and a 30% interest in ITI Education, a post-graduate information technology institution.