“PhotoShelter is perfect for what we do. It’s your perfect one-stop shop to house all of your media. I honestly can’t think of anything that we wish it did that it doesn’t do now.”
Tadd Haislop, Manager of Digital Editorial, NASCAR
Stock car racing has a storied history. Since its founding in Daytona Beach in 1948, NASCAR has captivated and thrilled fans with fast cars, ruthless competition, and memorable personalities behind the wheel. Over the years, engaging photography of photo finishes and eccentric drivers has captured that excitement and attracted new fans to the sport. Now, with nearly a century of racing under its belt, the modern-day NASCAR organization is drawing on its rich history to share the moments that make people fall in love with racing.
The Challenge: Shifting Gears to a Real Asset Management Solution
As its library of images grew and the world went digital-first, NASCAR recognized the need to better organize and share its assets. From the editorial team at NASCAR.com to the organization’s marketing, communications, and sales teams — not to mention drivers and teams — countless stakeholders needed easy access to the images that complete their news stories and help promote the NASCAR brand. Plus, the digital content team wanted some control over which images were used, which was tough to accomplish when they weren’t all stored in one place.
“We get inquiries for all kinds of photographs all the time. With an archive of nearly 100 years, it became a big challenge to keep it all organized when photographs were stored in personal drives, Google Drive and other places. Having all archived images in one system, with the ability to give easy access to our stakeholders is very important and helpful to us.”
Tadd Haislop, Manager of Digital Editorial, NASCAR
The editorial and content teams at NASCAR Roots had some of the biggest challenges when it came to managing assets. Relying almost exclusively on freelance photographers for their regional races, NASCAR Roots had photos coming from many different sources week to week. It became clear that storing photos on disjointed file storage sites (or even employees’ phones and computers), sending huge files over email, and dealing with constant image requests from internal teams was not the answer. The Roots team needed an easy, reliable way to get images from hired photographers and access their massive archive of historical photos on a daily basis.
The Results: How PhotoShelter Keeps NASCAR Driving Forward
These days, PhotoShelter is a vital part of the NASCAR Roots workflow. Manager of Digital Editorial Tadd Haislop says that working with the platform has been seamless. For each event, the Roots team hires a photographer, who gets access to PhotoShelter to upload their files from the race. The Roots team organizes the images into folders and then uses those to build photo galleries on the website. At the same time, their social media manager grabs engaging shots from PhotoShelter to promote the upcoming weekend’s race.
“It’s super easy to go in [to PhotoShelter] and grab whatever we need. The search function is great… just having these images somewhere to keep archived is huge. Because you never know when someone is going to reach out and say, ‘Hey, do you guys happen to have a photo of this driver from 2012 at this track?’ And the way we have the folders organized, it’s pretty easy to go back in there and find whether we do.”
Tadd Haislop, Manager of Digital Editorial, NASCAR
Specifically, the NASCAR organization uses PhotoShelter’s keyword and metadata features to tag images and folders and make them more searchable. Tadd said he also uses the PhotoShelter mobile app to quickly and securely share photos with stakeholders on the go.
PhotoShelter doesn’t just save the NASCAR Roots team from frustration — it helps them do their jobs better. When it comes to news about drivers, teams, and races, time is of the essence. To get a story onto the website as quickly as possible, content producers need to be able to find relevant images quickly. “[With PhotoShelter], if there’s breaking news, within a minute, the person who needs the photo has the photo,” Tadd said.
Over the years that NASCAR has used PhotoShelter, the question occasionally comes up: Is it still meeting the team’s needs? Should they stick with it? According to Tadd: “Of course, the answer is ‘yes.’ We’ve had no issues. It’s easy to access; it’s easy to give access to others; it’s easy to send photos from. It’s the perfect one-stop shop to house all of your media.”
Key Stats
- 380,000+ assets stored on PhotoShelter
- Up to 180+ downloads of assets per day
