Lydia Harper found herself in a difficult position as the COVID-19 pandemic brought the world — and her job — to a standstill.
She worked as a freelance wedding and fashion photographer for about five years, but the pandemic wiped out her business. Her sister Alice worked in the fashion industry. While in lockdown, the pair watched old motorsport content and considered a career change.
“If we (could) travel again, we wanted to find a way to be in this world, to move with this crazy thing that goes to all these different countries,” Lydia said. “We looked at the motorsport world (in terms of how we could bring our skills in photography, creative direction and my sister’s fashion background to that world?”
Think of the founding of Parc Fermé, a creative agency the sisters launched in 2020 to document “the human stories and lifestyle of motorsport” in multiple formats. In addition to photography and interviews, the agency creates travel guides and merchandise. The Harpers have changed directions a number of times, from highlighting historic races they have not been able to attend in person to recently working with their first F1 client Alpine and its driver academy.
“We wanted to appeal to the people who found it in weird ways, not just ‘We love F1 and we want the facts and the news.'”
Netflix’s Formula 1: Drive to Survive is often credited with the recent F1 fandom boom, particularly in the United States. But the show was just one element in a perfect storm. As the pandemic began to shut down the world, the show’s next season fell, sticking to its usual preseason release time. At the same time, people in lockdown started creating content on social media. Creatives like the Harpers saw a gap in the market. They took the opportunity to join the burgeoning economy of motorsport content creators and grow their social media audience while maintaining F1’s fan base.
The creation and rise of parc fermé echo other pandemic success stories as the economies of content creators boomed across fandoms – including the world of Formula 1.
“Three years ago everything felt pretty old-fashioned,” Lydia said. “It felt like there were tons of opportunities to come in and just be different than anything that already exists.”
What is the Content Creator Economy?
“Content Creator” is a common term with no uniform formula. A number of platforms are available to them, including TikTok, Twitch, and YouTube. Forbes reported in 2022 that there are approximately 2 million professional creators worldwide – although many more are considered amateur creators – and the overall market is estimated at about $100 billion. According to Deloitte, 58% of creatives make less than $50,000 a year, and brand partnerships account for more than half of their revenue on average.
“Influencer” is another term that comes up when it comes to making money from social media. Despite the overlap, there is a difference between the two, as F1 content creators are quick to point out.
“In my experience, influencers tend to want brand partnerships with brands and products,” said Toni Cowan-Brown, commonly known as F1Toni and creator of The Beginner’s Guide to F1. “While the content creators appear to be building their own franchise and products.”
Lissie Mackintosh, a content creator, podcaster and F1 presenter with more than a quarter million followers on TikTok, said that F1 “content creators aim to enlighten” because they bridge the gap between the fans and the sport.
Currently, it is difficult to qualify as a content creator. It’s a recent development in the world of F1 and it seems they still dictate which box content creators are eligible for credentials and passports. “What are you if you’re not an influencer, and you’re not a freelancer, but you’re not a journalist?” asked Cowan-Brown.
A few pathways in the content creator economy: those who use them as stepping stones and those who see them as destinations, Cowan-Brown said. She falls into the latter category.
Mackintosh embodies the former. Her journey as a content creator began on TikTok in 2021 when she had “nothing to lose” as only her mom and friends watched her videos. Mackintosh said no one did anything like it back then, which “blew her mind.” Even though she got a message a few weeks late, she was probably the first to mention it on TikTok because nobody was taking that approach back then.
“Why isn’t anyone tackling this niche?” asked Mackintosh. “Now why isn’t anyone approaching this from such a personal angle? From a young perspective? Why doesn’t anyone just break it down into simple words?”
TikTok’s three-minute limit on videos (which has since increased to 10 minutes) forced creators to explain complex topics quickly while making the content fun and engaging. For example, Cowan-Brown broke down tire logistics for a Grand Prix weekend, and Mackintosh has an ongoing series called “What the F1 does that mean?”.
“I think the way you diversify an industry and get more people on board is to lower that barrier to entry, tell those stories, oversimplify things and make them easier to digest,” Cowan said -Brown. “Whether it’s tech or politics, you can look at the space from the outside and say, ‘This is discouraging, I feel like I don’t know enough,’ when in reality you just have to start having these conversations to lead.
“That was my big point of criticism in Formula 1.”
fill the void
Content creation is a 24-hour, 365-day occurrence.
Mikaela Kostaras runs SheLovesF1 with over 91,000 followers on TikTok. She keeps a list of content ideas in her Notes app, constantly saves trending sounds (e.g. viral music) and is always looking for ways to reconnect things with F1.
But analyzing their engagement data is their biggest focus. She said creators need to step away from their work and consider what their audience likes. Analyzing the data on what works and what doesn’t is how to develop and perfect a craft. For example, Kostaras creates SheLovesF1 isms like the “Pierre Effect”. If your audience runs by the “ism” or nickname, it will stay. It’s “a lot of trial and error,” she said.
It also has to be authentic. “If you’re trying to be something or try to copy something, I think Gen Z in particular will find that out,” Kostaras said.
Lydia Harper agreed. “If you do something differently in this area, you notice it and motorsport is quite intimidating from the outside. And it seems very difficult to get in. But I think if you’re doing something really different and for the right reasons, you’ll be easily noticed and picked up.”
Parc Fermé was the first to bring a specific style of photography to Formula 2 that Harper describes as “very human, very detail-oriented”. The drivers told them they had not been questioned in the same way as Parc Fermé last year.
These drivers may be athletes, but they are also brands. This balance makes her recent project with Williams’ Alex Albon and LPGA’s Lily Muni He unique as they provided an insight into the world of F1 drivers.
“Different photography serves different purposes,” Harper said. “I hope that one day the accreditation process will begin to recognize that different types of images and different types of content have different values. Fans want different things for different reasons.”
In a world where a fast pace is almost not fast enough to keep up, creators are slowing down, observing the market and finding ways to cater to growing audiences. You don’t come to one of these content creators to find out who won the race, but to see the sport in a different light and learn more about it. Content creators have shaped the space and served as a not-so-hidden force that has helped increase F1’s visibility in creative ways.
“(There is) a need for it and the sport; the fans, there are enough fans, and there are enough really passionate fans that have the extra bandwidth to see random people on the internet doing stuff,” Harper said. “And then for those people to become people who work in the sport is pretty crazy.”
(Top photo of Lydia and Alice Harper: Courtesy of Parc Fermé)
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