Xanterra Finds Easy Path to Digital Asset Management

30% time savings

by managing visuals directly in CMS

Simplified

storage of media files

Streamlined indexing, cataloging, and delivery

of visual assets

Xanterra Travel Collection is a diverse group of travel and hospitality companies on a mission to deliver unforgettable, environmentally-friendly experiences. The company prides itself in growing its sustainable travel practices and expanding its business through acquisitions. As more properties are added to its portfolio and more digital content is ingested, Xanterra needed a better way to quickly integrate visual assets inherited through its acquisitions. It also needed a better way to create and manage all its visual media, including new seasonal content for marketing and recruiting purposes.

ABOUT

Eco-friendly Accommodations Within America’s Greatest Getaways

Known for its “legendary hospitality with a softer footprint,” Xanterra Travel Collection provides “a world of unforgettable experiences” through its operations in national parks, including lodges, restaurants, tours, and activities, as well as through its ownership of resorts, a cruise line, a railway, and tour companies. With operations in Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Zion, Glacier, Rocky Mountain National Parks, Mount Rushmore National Memorial, as well as other resorts, Xanterra operates 14 websites for various national park lodging properties in addition to its own corporate site.

Industry Travel and Hospitality

Headquarters Colorado, United States

Employees 10,000+

“We needed a solution that would be flexible enough for our various properties now and into the future. To us, this meant the solution had to be lightweight and easy to use so no matter how much more content we must manage, we’ll be ready to serve our stakeholders.”

—Andrew Heltzel, Corporate Director of Marketing and CRM, Xanterra

THE CHALLENGE

Consolidating and Transforming With Digital Asset Management

While the landscapes of North America may be visually stunning, the journey from completing photo and video shoots to creating visual assets for marketing teams can be as treacherous as an off-trail hike. That’s why in 2019 Xanterra looked for an easier way to store and manage visual media. The team assembled a cross-organizational task force to better understand the landscape of current media management systems and identify a solution that satisfied as many stakeholders as possible. Twelve vendors were invited to respond to its RFP.

THE CLOUDINARY SOLUTION

Scalable and Future-Proof Digital Asset Management

Ultimately, the Cloudinary DAM solution won Xanterra over for its advanced capabilities in managing and delivering assets through automations, with the added bonus of the Cloudinary WordPress Plugin, which allowed for a seamless pathway to its existing CMS. Xanterra decision-makers were impressed with how easy it was to use and find features in Cloudinary compared to other solutions.

The initial phase of implementation included ingesting more than 7,000 assets into Cloudinary. This used to be a tedious, time-consuming process, requiring the Xanterra web team to log in to their DAM, download images, and use an editor to resize the images, remove backgrounds, or perform other repetitive tasks.

But ingesting over 7,000 assets with the Cloudinary DAM was a breeze. With the Cloudinary WordPress Plugin, the Xanterra web team can handle several aspects of image editing directly in WordPress without an image editor. The team also sees in real time what’s available in the DAM and approved for use. This simplifies workflows and saves the team time, allowing them to focus on other tasks instead.

“One of the reasons we chose Cloudinary is that it had a solution that would be flexible enough for the unknown. This meant to us that it was a future-proof solution as we grew how much content we must manage, both internally as well as through acquisitions.”

—Andrew Heltzel, Corporate Director of Marketing and CRM, Xanterra

THE RESULTS

Streamlined Workflows for More Dynamic Marketing

Cloudinary’s WordPress plugin has transformed digital asset management for Xanterra. By replacing manual work with automated workflows from Cloudinary directly in WordPress, the team is already saving time and money, with further savings expected as Cloudinary is eventually rolled out to all of Xanterra’s websites.

The decentralized asset repository that Xanterra now has with Cloudinary benefits employees on multiple teams and departments. Employees now know which assets are ready for use and can create their own collection of assets for future use.

Cloudinary has transformed visual media asset management for Xanterra. What was previously seen internally as a static repository of media files is now a powerful and dynamic system. Xanterra relies on Cloudinary to create engaging digital experiences that work to the company’s strategic advantage.