Alumna returned to Utah to become Salt Lake Magazine editor
After travelling the globe from Maryland to the Netherlands, Washington, D.C. and New York City, Marcie Young Cancio, a USU alumna, has made it back to Utah to take her dream job as editor in chief of Salt Lake Magazine.
“There aren’t many magazines in Utah that cover the area we cover,” Cancio said. “What we cover is far beyond Salt Lake. We are one of the bigger magazines in the state of Utah – we’re pretty broad.”
Before moving back to hometown Salt Lake City, Cancio covered features, trends and business for the global footwear industry at Condé Nast’s Footwear News (FN) as associate editor.
During the nearly three years spent at FN, she said she had the opportunity to travel to various locations for fashion events and develop friendships with elite shoe designers.
She also judged FN Shoe Star, an online reality competition to find the next big shoe designer. She worked with a variety of big names, including Toms founder, Blake Mycoskie, Grammy award winner Fergie and footwear business veteran Sam Edelman.
Though she loved the high-paced life in New York City, she said she enjoys the different scene at Salt Lake Magazine offers – a position Cancio said is ideal.
“This is the pinnacle of everything I’ve wanted to do. It’s a dream job,” she said. “I’m editor in chief in my hometown.”
Cancio graduated from USU in 2002 and said she made the most of her college experience by working in several editor positions at The Utah Statesman. She also traveled to the University of Maryland for a national exchange program as a press intern.
Later in her collegiate career, she said she traveled to the Netherlands for an international exchange program.
Cancio said she chose USU after applying to many schools, when her mom promised the trip to Logan would include Maddox chicken. While in Logan, she visited with journalism and communications department head Ted Pease to discuss her goals.
She lived in Cache Valley for two and half years and said her professors at USU encouraged her to explore options outside of Utah.
Cancio said she had “wonderful professors who were great mentors.” Aside from Pease, she said other professors, such as Nancy Williams, Mike Sweeney and her honors advisers, were instrumental throughout her college career.
“They were excited to teach and excited to have me as a person,” she said.
Because of her choice to attend USU, she said she was able to pay tuition and still travel. After she graduated with a bachelor’s degree, she moved to Columbia’s School of Journalism.
“It was such a wonderful experience,” she said. “My college experience was perfect for me. I was able to go to graduate school and get my master’s degree, instead of going to a more expensive school during my undergraduate.”
While at USU, Cancio worked as a press intern and web designer for U.S. Sen. Tim Johnson in Washington, D.C., a news intern for KUTV News and a news intern and freelance writer for the Logan Herald Journal.
After graduation in 2002, she said she continued to travel and expand her skills in the field. Cancio coordinated media feeds, statistics and breaking news during the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
In 2006, she moved to North Carolina and worked as a reporter for the Charlotte Observer and later freelanced at the New York Post.
Following the many years she worked around the world, Cancio said she returned to Salt Lake City and was initially managing editor of Salt Lake Magazine before her promotion to editor in chief. Cancio said she is grateful for these experiences.
“I think it is really good to have an outside perspective,” she said. “Now I get to cover a lot of things. I appreciate Salt Lake and Utah and the job.”
She said it was a good idea to step away from home to build a career beyond her comfort zone.
“You are able to see how other cultures live,” Cancio said.
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