As anonymous, would-be bidders begin the process of signing non-disclosure agreements and investigating PNI financial records in anticipation of an auction later this year, one not-so-anonymous potential bidder has emerged: Stern Partners Inc., of Vancouver. In this Daily News piece, a delegation from Stern is revealed as having visited Philly last week to check out the scene, and very possibly having liked what they saw. Though no one could comment, founder Ronald N. Stern told the DN, “I enjoyed looking at your papers.” (Ooh, you saucy Canuck!) Though we all definitely need to do some digging to find out what kind of suitor Stern Partners would be, the home pages for two of their other newspapers, the Winnipeg Free Press and the Brandon Sun, suggest that they do know how to make a website for grownups, so they already have a leg up on Philly.com. Plus, if they did take over PNI, when the inevitable layoffs and trimming-of-union-fat began, we could all do something everyone loves: Blame Canada!

This entry was posted on Friday, January 29th, 2010 at 1:05 pm.