Background

For more than 25 years, Chocolate Sundaes has been a staple of the Hollywood comedy scene. Hosted every Sunday night at the Laugh Factory, the show has helped launch the careers of major comedians, including Kevin Hart and Ali Wong.

Behind the scenes, producer Lani Crooks has helped turn the local crowd-favorite show into an internet comedy destination. Leading both the on-stage and digital sides of the brand, she’s transformed hours of stand-up performances into popular viral clips across YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok.

Challenge: protecting and organizing decades of creative assets

Twenty-five years of performances don’t just organize themselves. From cataloging early recordings on physical tapes to uploading current shows from SD cards, the Chocolate Sundaes library was growing faster than their systems could keep up with.

Sharing large media files—securely and quickly—was another hurdle. As Chocolate Sundaes built an online audience and ramped up content, Crooks knew they needed a better way to store, manage, and share years of material.

Solution: one home for every video, image, and document

With Dropbox, Crooks found the answer the team needed. “Dropbox is the centerpiece for everything we do because we live off of the content we get from our live shows,” she recalls.

Every new performance is now uploaded directly to Dropbox and organized alongside archival photos and videos. With secure access controls that let the team decide exactly who sees what, they can quickly share footage with editors, social media managers, and partners—without worrying about file size or where it lives.

“I’ve never had a single technical issue with Dropbox. It works seamlessly,” says Crooks. “And the upload times are very quick for the size of files that we deal with.”

As the library grew, so did the challenge of finding the right piece of content fast. 

That’s where Dropbox Dash came in. It added an AI-powered layer to help the team find and organize their material, even across different apps.

“I’ve connected Slack, Google Sheets, and email. When I search for something, it comes up,” Crooks explains. “It saves me a couple hours a week for sure.” That time saved means Crooks and her team can spend more time creating content that drives audience growth.

To help streamline back-office organization, the team also adopted Dropbox Sign, an electronic signature tool that simplifies the collection of contracts, releases, and payment details.

“Dropbox gives us a hub for everything we do,” says Crooks. “Our videos, photos, and contracts all live there. It’s where our collaboration happens.”

Results: streamlined operations and accelerated growth

With Dropbox, Dash, and Sign working together, Chocolate Sundaes runs a smoother, more scalable operation:

• Centralized collaboration: Editors, creators, and producers work from the same shared files, wherever they are.
• Reliable, high-capacity storage: Decades of performances are safely stored with fast upload speeds and as much space as the team needs.
• Simplified admin workflows: Sign makes it easy to manage contracts and permissions securely.
• Faster access to creative assets: Dash connects all their material and apps, making it easy to find the right file or idea in seconds.

Chocolate Sundaes continues to turn you-had-to-be-there moments into comedy gold the internet can’t stop sharing. “Dropbox is the backbone of our creative process,” says Crooks. “They’ve made it possible for us to share our story, grow our brand, and keep people laughing everywhere.”