Digital strategy and trade events help Weigl open doors and drive exports
Transcript — Digital strategy and trade events help Weigl open doors and drive exports
Video length: 00:03:10
[Upbeat jazz music. Scenes of downtown Calgary streets, showing everyday life, busy streets, skyscrapers and the flags of Canada, Alberta and the United Kingdom flapping in the wind.]
Woman: 90% of our sales are now in the export market.
[A woman and man seated in an office with bookshelves in the background.]
Woman: We actually are in 52 countries and we publish in 17 languages.
[Aerial views of downtown Calgary’s skyline and turquoise river. On-screen text: “Creative Export Strategy”, then “Weigl Educational Publishing”.]
[On-screen text: Linda Weigl, Founder and publisher]
Woman: I'm Linda Weigl, I'm the founder and publisher of Weigl Educational Publishing, an Alberta-based company. We originally started in 1984, and we have since broadened that library to digital products.
[Linda is pictured on trade missions, then in an office with a man, with large bookshelves of Weigl publications in the background. Transitions to footage from around the office, including a close-up of a Weigl publication about Alberta.]
[On-screen text: Lee Helton, Vice President of Digital Products]
Man: My name is Lee Helton. I'm the VP of Digital Products. I've been with the company for a little over 30 years. And our mission is to allow students to really engage with the content. We made it come alive, so then it made it much easier for the teachers to also engage the student.
[Lee speaking to the camera. Transitions to Linda and Lee in front of a large screen showing their publications, followed by footage of them in their office, then seated at a boardroom table having a discussion.]
Linda: We realized that we didn't have a large enough market in Canada, and what we really needed to do was to move internationally. So it became really important to have an export marketing strategy, and we have to find the resources as a small company to put that into motion.
[Lively music resumes. An aerial view of downtown Calgary with a large Canadian flag in the foreground, then a street view showing a mix of heritage and modern buildings.]
Lee: We need to start to do things like digital marketing. And so that's where our application to the Creative Export Strategy funding came from. It enabled us to acquire tools like a digital CRM, to build a direct sales force and to bring in someone that knew how to do digital marketing.
[Lee and Linda in the office interspersed with footage of Weigl’s online platform, showing its colourful publications on the natural world.]
Linda: The funding from the Creative Export Strategy enabled us to test new markets. For example, we went to a book fair in Abu Dhabi, and we made a big deal. And we've now produced materials in Arabic. Just something we’d never thought of before.
[Close-up of a book on rainbows with English and Arabic on the right page. Transitions to footage of the Calgary skyline.]
Lee: It doesn't happen overnight, but we're now getting a foothold because of the funding in places like Japan, Vietnam and Turkey, which would help us be able to have regular sales.
[Night scenes of a busy Tokyo street, then a Japanese temple. Linda and Lee in the office, interspersed with Lee working at his computer and footage of Weigl’s bookshelves and its online platform showing pages from its Lightbox The Universe publication.]
Lee: We went from basically zero digital sales, but then our export sales increased substantially, like to the point where we're trying to get parity almost now with our print book sales.
[Linda attending business-to-business meetings and visiting sites during a trade mission in Japan. Linda and Lee in the office and seated at a boardroom table, with a large screen showing images from Weigl’s online platform.]
Linda: So one of the benefits of this program, I went on a trade mission in Japan, and we had tremendous success with some very large companies. And they do things very differently. And we have to think about how could we fit into that.
[Images from around the offices of Weigl’s publishing awards and certificates. Linda and Lee in the office.]
Lee: If you don't have someone like the government making those types of introductions, I think it's much harder to get in the door. Once you're in the door, then it's our job. But getting us in the door, that's a huge benefit for us. And I think it is nice to be able to have that diversification, because you never know how things will change in the future.
Linda: For us, where we are right now as a country, even, it gives us more impetus to go and export our product.
[Lively guitar music underscores an aerial view of a large Canadian flag flapping in the wind. Linda and Lee in the office, followed by aerial views of Calgary’s skyline. On-screen text: Canada.ca/creative-export-strategy. Transitions to the Government of Canada logo.]
Sector: Educational publishing
Location: Calgary, Alberta
Creative Export Strategy support: Creative Export Canada funding, trade missions and events
About the company
Weigl Educational Publishers is a Calgary-based company dedicated to creating innovative educational resources for kindergarten to Grade 12. The company’s mandate is to engage young learners through multimedia-rich content that supports visual, auditory, and multilingual learning – something that sets it apart from its competitors.
Weigl’s award-winning platforms feature videos, activities, quizzes and even Google map integrations, and are used in over 65 countries. Its print publications are available in 52 countries and 17 languages.
The export challenge
From its early days, Weigl has relied on export to survive and thrive in the small but competitive field of educational publishing. An early adopter of digital publishing, the company was ready to pivot to online sales when the pandemic hit, but its print wholesalers and distributors struggled to make the shift.
With a burgeoning digital collection, Weigl realized the key to growth would be to sell directly to school boards and libraries. The company turned to the Creative Export Strategy for support.
The export project
Weigl received funding from the Creative Export Canada (CEC) program over fiscal years 2021-2022 and 2022-2023 to carry out an export marketing project. This involved creating a direct sales and marketing force, adopting new technology to improve operations, and carrying out digital marketing through targeted emails and social media campaigns.
Beyond the export project, the company was looking to explore new markets and close deals with partners and distributors in Asia. To that end, Weigl representatives participated in two government trade missions (Japan in 2023 and East Asia in 2025), and were also part of the Canadian delegation at the Seoul International Book Fair in 2023.
Outcomes
With CEC funding, Weigl was able to leverage digital marketing, new sales channels and technology to improve sales effectiveness, customer engagement, and overall efficiency, increasing its exports to the U.S. and global markets. Specifically, the CEC funding enabled Weigl to:
- double its export revenues
- create 12 jobs
- speed up order processing by 30% and content distribution by 60%
- close sales 20% faster and make 15% more sales
- increase customer interest by over 400%
- gain international exposure for nearly 5,500 titles
Weigl’s participation in government trade missions and events in Asia led to partnerships in the region. The company eventually clinched a deal to provide catalogue subscriptions to Singapore’s nearly 100 public libraries and signed an agreement with a Japanese publishing company.
Weigl also received CEC funding in 2025-2026 for a project aimed at exporting their digital educational content to more markets, including in the Middle East, Asia, Europe, Latin America, the U.S. and the UK. The project will focus on marketing and hiring activities, such as international book fair attendance and staffing sales roles.
Advice for potential importers
“We began to export in the late 90s and we're still at it. With some countries, it happens quickly. With other countries, it's going to take a long partnership. So, you have to believe in yourself and know what you want to do. And then, when you have the opportunity to get the funding, make the most of it.”