Yodel Customer Success Stories

Yodel Pass Powers Digital Transformation at the Belmont Stakes

The Belmont Stakes is the third and final leg of horse racing’s Triple Crown series, and is a signature event on the sports calendar annually.  In 2024, the event was held at Saratoga Race Course for the first time in history due to the ongoing construction of a new Belmont Park. After months of anticipation and wide-ranging national and international media coverage, NYRA welcomed more than 120,000 fans to Saratoga over the course of the four-day Festival.
 
Managing parking for this influx of vehicles, while ensuring a seamless experience for VIPs, employees, horsemen, and regular attendees, has long been a logistical challenge. To modernize and streamline these operations, NYRA partnered with Yodel Pass to create an efficient digital parking system.

The Challenge:
Handling Massive Volumes with Outdated Processes

Over the Belmont Stakes weekend, NYRA staff had to juggle multiple sources of parking passes: pre-purchased tickets, VIP parking passes, employee badges, and horseman passes. The traditional process required printing and distributing over 20,000 parking lanyards—a time-consuming and costly task.

Some of the main pain points included:

  • Distributing physical parking passes to VIPs, employees, and horsemen required days of coordination.
  • Customers purchasing admission tickets through Ticketmaster also bought parking passes, which needed to be validated and matched with the correct parking lot.
  • Employees had to carry both their ID badge and a parking hangtag, adding unnecessary complexity.
  • There was no integrated data system to track parking lot utilization or entrance activity, leaving staff without real-time insights into when and where vehicles were parking.
  • Devices used by staff were prone to malfunction, causing operational delays and errors.

The Solution:
A Digital Overhaul with Yodel Pass

Yodel Pass implemented a comprehensive digital transformation for NYRA, introducing solutions that enhanced both customer convenience and operational efficiency:

Digital Badges for Employees and Horsemen

Yodel Pass converted employee and horseman badges into digital passes. By bulk importing these into the system, employees could now use their ID badges to park, eliminating the need for a separate hangtag and simplifying parking management.

VIP Digital Passes

Yodel’s "Issue Pass" functionality allowed staff to send VIP and event staff passes directly to their mobile devices via SMS. Hundreds of passes could be issued in bulk within minutes, drastically cutting down on manual distribution.

Ticketmaster Integration

By integrating with Ticketmaster, Yodel Pass enabled staff to scan and validate pre-purchased parking tickets. This ensured that each customer parked in the correct lot and held a valid pass.

Clover Flex Devices

Staff used handheld Clover Flex devices, which worked seamlessly with Yodel Wallet technology. These all-in-one devices handled every parking scenario—day-of sales, pre-purchased passes, VIP entries, and employee badge scans—ensuring a smooth and consistent process.

Real-Time Dashboards

Yodel Pass provided real-time dashboards showing parking lot utilization by hour, including a breakdown of advanced sales vs. onsite purchases. Staff could monitor sales trends, parking activity, and lot availability in real time, improving operational awareness and decision-making.

Results:
Streamlined Operations and a Better Experience

Yodel Pass's digital transformation delivered significant improvements across the board:

Hundreds of Hours Saved

Digitizing 20,000 hangtags saved NYRA staff countless hours. Instead of manually distributing lanyards, staff issued digital passes directly to customers' mobile devices. VIPs and event staff received their passes in minutes, either in bulk or individually via SMS.

Reduced Printing Costs

Moving from physical hangtags to digital passes also cut down on printing costs, eliminating the need for 20,000 printed lanyards.

Simplified Employee Access

Employees could now park with just their digital ID badges, streamlining the process for both staff and management while making it easier to enforce parking rules.

Reliability and Efficiency

The Clover Flex devices integrated all sales, scans, and validations into one system, which operated flawlessly even under heavy usage. The Yodel solution proved 100% reliable, eliminating the system failures and hardware issues that had plagued previous years.

Real-Time Data Insights

The dashboards allowed staff to track real-time parking lot usage and sales data, giving them valuable insights into customer behavior. This information helped manage traffic flow, allocate resources, and maximize parking efficiency.

Seamless Customer Experience

For the first time, NYRA didn’t have to let vehicles in for free due to system issues. The Yodel Pass system ensured that every vehicle entering the parking lot was accounted for, delivering a reliable and hassle-free experience for attendees.

Conclusion

“Yodel Pass solution dramatically improved our fans experience and improved our internal efficiencies by issuing digital passes instead of hang tags”

Through its partnership with Yodel Pass, NYRA successfully digitized and streamlined parking operations for the Belmont Stakes. The transition to a digital-first system not only improved operational efficiency but also enhanced the customer and staff experience. With real-time data insights, reliable hardware, and seamless digital passes, Yodel Pass provided a scalable solution that transformed how NYRA manages its world-class events.

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