About The Vancouver Sun

The Vancouver Sun

The Vancouver Sun is a daily broadsheet newspaper published in Vancouver, British Columbia, and — alongside its tabloid sister paper, The Province — one of British Columbia's two major newspapers. Published by Pacific Newspaper Group, a division of Postmedia Network, the Sun is the province's paper of record: a comprehensive broadsheet with the largest newsroom of any newspaper in Western Canada, covering metropolitan Vancouver, the provincial legislature, national and international affairs, business, sports and the arts. It published its first edition on 12 February 1912, has appeared daily (except Sundays and holidays) for more than a century, and operates its digital news service at vancouversun.com. It is not related to the tabloid Sun newspapers also owned by Postmedia.

Overview

The Vancouver Sun is the establishment daily of Canada's Pacific metropolis — the paper read in Victoria's legislature press gallery, in Vancouver's boardrooms and law firms, and in the suburbs of the Lower Mainland. Its journalism is comprehensive rather than populist: deep city-hall and legislature coverage, investigative reporting, national and foreign bureaus through Postmedia's network, a full business section attuned to the Pacific Rim economy, extensive Canucks, Lions and Whitecaps sports coverage, and arts pages serving one of Canada's most culturally active cities.

The Sun's broadsheet identity distinguishes it sharply from its tabloid sister, The Province. Both papers are produced by Pacific Newspaper Group from shared resources, but the Sun maintains its own editor, masthead and editorial voice — sober, authoritative and comprehensive where the Province is punchy and populist. Together they give Vancouver a two-paper daily market that is increasingly rare in North America.

History

The Vancouver Sun published its first edition on 12 February 1912 from offices at 125 West Pender Street, just around the corner from its rival, the Vancouver Daily Province. It was launched by John Pollock McConnell and Richard Samuel Ford, publishers of the weekly B.C. Saturday Sunset, as a Liberal-backed competitor to the Province, the News-Advertiser and the World. The paper struggled in its early years, sliding into receivership under a subsequent ownership group.

Its destiny changed in 1917, when Robert James Cromie — a railway-construction entrepreneur with, as the Dictionary of Canadian Biography puts it, a natural genius for the newspaper business — took charge of the bankrupt paper. Cromie bought out the Daily News-Advertiser (founded 1886) on 1 September 1917 with borrowed money, absorbed its circulation and appropriated its history, claiming the takeover made the Sun Vancouver's oldest newspaper. Readership leapt from 10,000 to 17,000, and within a year the Sunday edition was selling more than 25,000 copies. In 1924 Cromie acquired The Evening World (established 1888) for $475,000, converting it into the Vancouver Evening Sun and consolidating the Sun as one of the city's two leading dailies. He remained publisher until his death in 1936.

The paper's physical history is a tour of twentieth-century Vancouver: a 1937 fire destroyed its business and editorial offices (the only death was the janitor), and the Sun moved across the street into the World Building, renamed the Sun Tower, which housed its offices from 1937 to 1965. The Sun emerged as the city's leading newspaper after the Province endured a lengthy labour dispute from 1946 to 1949. In 1958 the Sun and the Province joined to create Pacific Press in response to rising production costs — first merging their mechanical and financial departments, then moving together into the Pacific Press Building on December 27, 1965.

Ownership evolved through the great Canadian newspaper dynasties: in 1963 the Cromie family's majority holdings were sold to FP Publications, which sold to Southam in 1980; Conrad Black's Hollinger took over in 1992; Canwest followed; and in 2010 the paper became part of Postmedia Network after Canwest's collapse. Along the way the Sun notched a technological milestone: following the 1994 release of the Kodak DCS 400 series, its photography department became the first in the world to switch fully to digital photography. The paper's offices later moved to Granville Square (1997–2015), and its printing to the Kennedy Heights facility opened in 1997.

Content and Sections

The modern Vancouver Sun is a full-service metropolitan broadsheet. Its news report leads with Vancouver and the Lower Mainland — city hall, the region's municipalities, the courts, education and health — and extends to the provincial legislature in Victoria, where the Sun's bureau covers the government, the opposition and the policies shaping British Columbia. National and international coverage comes through Postmedia's network and wire services, giving the paper a comprehensive world report.

Business coverage is a particular strength, reflecting Vancouver's role as Canada's Pacific gateway: real estate, forestry, mining, technology, trade with Asia and the port economy all receive sustained attention. Sports coverage centres on the NHL's Canucks, the CFL's Lions, the Whitecaps of MLS and the WHL's Giants, with columnists who rank among the most prominent in Western Canadian sports media. The arts and entertainment pages cover the city's film industry, theatre, music and dining scenes; opinion pages carry editorials, staff and syndicated columnists, and letters; and feature sections address homes, health, travel and lifestyle.

Coverage and Audience

The Sun serves metropolitan Vancouver and the Lower Mainland — a market of more than 2.5 million people — with secondary reach across British Columbia and among the province's diaspora through its digital edition. Its audience is the region's professional and civic establishment: policymakers, business leaders, academics, lawyers and engaged citizens who want comprehensive coverage rather than the tabloid treatment.

The paper's influence extends well beyond its circulation: Sun investigations and legislature reporting regularly set the provincial news agenda, and its archives — more than a century of daily editions documenting the Paris Peace Conference, Prohibition, the Komagata Maru incident, Expo 86, the 2010 Olympics and the transformation of a resource town into a Pacific metropolis — are among the most important historical records in Western Canada.

Ownership

The Vancouver Sun is published by Pacific Newspaper Group, a division of Postmedia Network Inc., Canada's largest newspaper chain. Postmedia acquired the paper in 2010 from the collapsed Canwest empire; the corporate lineage runs through Hollinger, Southam, FP Publications and the Cromie family. Within Postmedia, the Sun shares newsroom resources, national content, digital platforms and corporate services with its sister paper, The Province, while maintaining its own broadsheet identity and editorial leadership.

Postmedia itself is publicly traded and majority-owned by the U.S. investment firm Chatham Asset Management, with additional stakes held by investors including Leon Cooperman and Allianz. Like its sister papers, the Sun has experienced successive rounds of cost reduction, newsroom consolidation and operational change as the chain has managed the economics of the digital transition — even as it has retained its position as the largest newsroom in Western Canada.

Digital Presence

The Sun's website, vancouversun.com, is a continuously updated news operation: breaking news, legislature and city-hall coverage, business and sports, opinion, photo galleries and video, optimized for desktop and mobile readers. The site runs on Postmedia's shared digital infrastructure, offering digital subscriptions, e-edition replicas of the print paper, newsletters and single sign-on access across the company's titles.

On social media the Sun distributes breaking news and enterprise journalism to a large British Columbia following, and its newsletters serve the province's professional readership. As of 2026, The Vancouver Sun continues to publish daily — in print and online — more than 114 years after McConnell and Ford launched it on West Pender Street, still the broadsheet of record for Canada's Pacific province.