Virginia Commonwealth University’s first free, open-source marketing handbook for undergraduates began with an Affordable Course Content Award from VCU Libraries.

Created by a VCU School of Business faculty team and adopted across all sections of MKTG 301 (Marketing Principles), Marketing Principles from the River City replaced a costly ($90) Pearson textbook and saved 1,464 students more than $131,000 in course material costs during its early use. Marketing Principles (MKTG 301) is a required core course for business majors, marketing majors and minors. The course has few prerequisites, so it is often taken by undergraduate students all across campus. In any given full academic year, 1,500 students take the course.

Beyond the number of students who will use the resource, the textbook's impact extends beyond VCU and has received national attention. Pressbooks, VCU Libraries' platform for publishing open educational resources, selected the textbook as its May "Book of the Month," highlighting the project for a national audience of educators and publishers. The project was also a finalist in the Teaching Innovation Competition at the 2025 Society for Marketing Advances conference—a major professional organization for marketing faculty. 

Behind this successful creation, the Business School team was led by Jodie Ferguson, Ph.D., professor and director of the Customer Experience Laboratory, and César Zamudio, Ph.D., associate professor of marketing. They saw the opportunity to create an open textbook as an answer to their students’ complaints about high textbook costs. They merely had to write, illustrate, produce and post a new textbook, accessible online and free for all. And they could create a text rooted in reality, using Richmond as a learning laboratory.

For faculty authors, VCU Libraries provides grant funding and support for creating open resources. Support includes consulting on copyright, digital accessibility and textbook production. Participants in the Affordable Course Content program work closely with Abbey Childs, the open educational resources librarian, who guides them through the process from initial planning to publication.

 “This project is a perfect example of some of the many benefits of using and creating open educational resources,” said Childs, “It saves students money, which is fantastic, but beyond that, students get to learn with a resource that is tailor-made to the curriculum, the context in which they’re learning, and that is flexible enough to adapt as their needs change over time.”

Marketing Principles from the River City explores fundamental concepts from research and consumer behavior to pricing and promotion. The textbook is an introduction for students, a refresher resource for majors and a reference for professional marketing practitioners. The “River City” in the title is Richmond, Virginia, and that geographic grounding is more than a name. Throughout the book, local businesses, brands and examples bring concepts to life in ways that connect directly to students’ surroundings and everyday experiences.

While textbook development often takes years, the Business School team moved quickly.

“Bringing together seven contributors to put out this book in two years was pretty phenomenal, but everybody was all in on getting this done for our students,” Ferguson said.  

With each chapter written by the professor specializing in that area, Ferguson said, “it was a heavy lift to ask faculty on top of their normal activities.” 

Indeed, faculty members come to life in the book’s final section, “About the Authors.” Here, the contributors are identified not by the usual headshot, but by personalized photographs revealing clues as to their personality. Zamudio, for example, shows his favorite video game, while Ferguson holds a Gatorade bottle—a nod to her past agency work for the brand. 

To help bring the textbook to life, the authors partnered with two graduate students from the VCU Brandcenter, recognized as a leading graduate program in advertising, branding and creative communications. Drawing on their creative expertise and student perspective, the Brandcenter students helped shape the textbook's visual design, interactive elements and overall user experience, creating a resource that is both engaging and accessible for today's learners. 

Matching professors to identifying visuals is an aspect of the book fully fleshed out by two VCU Brandcenter student interns who worked on the project—copy editor Nathan Sisack (Copywriting, 2025) and art director Zofia Farley (Art Direction, 2026). “I love the idea that this book is not only free but also just a tap away on our phones. The text needs to come from experts, but it’s cool to have us translate that for our generation,” said Farley. 

“It doesn’t even feel like a textbook,” she added. “The interactive aspect makes it more like playing games.” The book includes drag-and-drop, matchup and other exercises designed to get instructional lessons across. To avoid copyright issues with visuals, Farley photographed Richmond scenes, landmarks and local products to illustrate concepts and tie the book to its roots. “It’s a picture-book-style guide to the words,” she explains—clearly emanating from River City.

“It’s all about putting students first — having them save and learn. It’s a unique project, but our marketing department is unique,” Zamundio said. 

While Ferguson describes herself as “more of the project manager,” Zamudio oversaw the book’s creative direction. He felt strongly that the textbook needed to have “a contemporary Gen Z feel,” with modern examples and scenarios. For instance, the term “modified rebuy” is exemplified by a bakery which suddenly needs to purchase a different kind of flour to add gluten-free bread to its menu. Photos of cellphones and coffee shops abound.

A survey completed after the textbook’s release suggests it was well received by students. And because it’s digital, it’s easy to add content, modify examples, refine AI-related sections and include new market segments as needed. Publishers issue new textbooks every few years, but the VCU book can be updated as often as necessary.

Zamudio calls it “a living document.” “The sky’s the limit,” he said. “Other institutions can adopt this book if they want to use it in their classroom. But in the end, the VCU marketing department hung together and worked to produce this book together. We like each other, and we really care about putting our students first. Always.”

A version of this article by freelancer Susie Burtch was first published by the VCU School of Business