Suzan Kenawy, Marketing Manager at the American University in Cairo Press, reports on visiting University of Toronto Press
Rationale for visit
I was honored to be selected for the 2025 AUPresses Week in Residence Program, and I purposefully selected the University of Toronto Press (UTP) to learn from one of North America’s leading university presses. UTP’s integrated model with their publishing, distribution, and retail divisions offered a comprehensive view into areas highly relevant to my role at the American University in Cairo (AUC) Press. I’m deeply grateful to everyone at UTP for their warm welcome and generous willingness to share their knowledge. My sincere thanks go to Jennifer DiDomenico, Editorial Director, for thoughtfully organizing an outstanding program of meetings and visits throughout my stay, and to Jessica Mosher, Publisher and CEO, and Antonia Pop, VP Publishing Division, and Vesna Micic, Marketing Director, for making this invaluable experience possible.
AUC Press is a unique university press—publishing both academic and trade books in English while being based in Egypt, at the heart of the Arabic-speaking Middle East. We are one of the very few university presses in the region, and the only one in Egypt. Without opportunities for exchange and connection with peers at other university presses, it can be easy to feel isolated and disconnected from the shared best practices that guide our field. This residency program provided an invaluable opportunity to learn firsthand from some of the most experienced and innovative teams in publishing.
Summary of experience
Over the course of one week, I attended more than 15 meetings (in person and virtual) with members of the marketing, editorial, production, and business development teams, in addition to in-depth visits to the UTP Distribution Center and the flagship University of Toronto (U of T) Bookstore. I also had the opportunity to join the weekly marketing meeting, gaining valuable insights into their workflow and recent campaign strategies. A highlight of the visit was attending a book launch event for a newly released title, which offered a firsthand look at UTP’s approach to author engagement and public programming. These engagements sparked thoughtful conversations and revealed both shared challenges and mutual successes across our organizations.
Marketing operations, team structure, and digital strategy
At the weekly marketing meeting led by Vesna Micic, I was introduced to UTP’s 12-person marketing team. These meetings serve as collaborative sessions for brainstorming and planning, with agendas that include digital campaigns, social media, and event recaps.
Vesna also highlighted UTP’s shift toward in-person events, with 47 hosted this year alone, and explained that virtual events are now rarer. UTP’s publicity model focuses on targeted outreach rather than unsolicited review copies, and their social media strategy emphasizes trade titles, with content creation shared across the team. This collaborative approach—supported by clear guidelines—allows for creativity and workload balance. They’ve also transitioned their website blog to LinkedIn for greater reach. A notable takeaway was their monthly marketing report shared across departments, which enhances internal visibility and alignment—an idea worth replicating at AUC Press.
Digital Marketing Manager, Kayla Kiteley, oversees all online promotions, social media, advertising, and Amazon A+ content. She emphasized UTP’s results-driven ad strategy, with boosted Instagram Reels being the most effective. UTP marketing team uses tools like Canva, Adobe Express, and Photoshop for visual assets similar to AUC Press. Kayla tracks email campaign performance—achieving impressive open rates compared to industry benchmarks—and attributes part of this success to using AI for subject line optimization and A/B subject line and campaign testing. UTP tracks all campaign efforts using shared Google Sheets and Trello, with quarterly meetings to evaluate outcomes—a model of transparency and continuous improvement.
Retail division
The University of Toronto Bookstore operates five physical locations alongside a global online store, and during the visit, several shared operational challenges were discussed. These included plans to update store signage, the reduction of general book sections to prioritize academic materials and branded merchandise, and the growing shift away from physical textbooks with the adoption of the Inclusive Access model—where students access digital course materials through institutional platforms. This shift has transformed the traditional bookstore model, prompting adjustments in inventory, layout, and student engagement strategies.
Distribution
During the visit to the University of Toronto Press Distribution Center, I met with Jason Farrell, Vice President of Distribution and Retail, who provided insights into the center’s extensive operations. The facility spans over 70,000 square feet and manages distribution not only for UTP titles but also for more than 260 publishers worldwide. This scale allows UTP to offer competitive shipping rates by consolidating orders across publishers and handling fulfillment through various channels, including Amazon listings, Pubnet, and email. They also enhance Amazon visibility by creating and managing A+ Content for client publishers.
Additionally, the distribution center supports inventory for the U of T Bookstores’ retail division, underscoring the integrated nature of UTP’s operations.
Business development, sales, and inclusive access
Lily Burgh, Director of Business Development, and Lori Will, Business Development Manager, provided an in-depth look at UTP’s comprehensive sales operations—from course adoptions and international trade to partnerships and agents. UTP is actively involved in Inclusive Access (IA), a growing digital course content model in higher education where content is embedded in LMS platforms and billed as part of student fees. This approach offers reduced prices and immediate access for students, and predictable sales for publishers. With vendors like VitalSource and RedShelf, IA already represents 25% of higher-ed sales. UTP President Jessica Mosher also noted this model’s potential application in the University of Toronto Bookstores.
International rights management
At UTP, rights management is primarily handled through a global network of agents who operate under non-exclusive agreements and receive a commission for any rights deals they secure. Lisa Jemison, UTP’s Rights Manager, favors this approach, as it recognizes the agents’ expertise in navigating the financial and logistical complexities of rights transactions.
When it comes to rights sales involving third-party content, UTP requires acquisition editors to complete a detailed permissions sheet at the transmittal stage, listing all image permissions and highlighting any that may require further clearance. This sheet is included in the rights package shared with potential acquiring publishers. UTP also licenses audiobook rights, an area still untapped by AUC Press, but increasingly important in the evolving publishing landscape.
Editorial and acquisitions strategy
Throughout the meetings with UTP’s acquisitions team—including Lohit Jagwani (health & medicine), Rebecca Duce (political science), and Carli Hansen (anthropology and graphic books)—a shared emphasis on strategic subject area development emerged. We explored a number of potential collaborations, including “India-only” editions, Middle East politics content, and ethnographic graphic books.
Final reflections
This residency was an incredibly rich and rewarding experience. The generosity, transparency, and openness with which the UTP team shared their knowledge truly exemplify the uniquely collegial spirit of the university press community. It was a powerful reminder that, while each press may operate differently, we are united by a shared mission—and that collaboration and mutual support are central to the impact we strive to make. It also reaffirmed for me and my team that we are on the right track, aligned with the practices of some of the leading university presses, and that many of the challenges we face are not unique but shared across the industry.
As many previous grant recipients have shared, I returned home with a head full of ideas, a wealth of new connections, and one resonating thought: we are, at once, remarkably similar and distinctly unique.