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Camelot Records Highest Ever H1 UK National Lottery Sales
By Jeff Osienya Nov 26, 2021 IndustryThe UK National Lottery wins its highest-ever first-half revenue from sales of lottery tickets. Between April and September 2021, Camelot, UK’s National Lottery operator, sold nearly £4 billion worth of tickets.Camelot, the UK National Lottery operator, has published its results for the first half of the 2021/22 financial year, and they are super impressive. According to Camelot’s report, the UK National Lottery enjoyed record-breaking sales at a whopping £3.961 billion ($5.28 billion) for the first six months of the 2021/22 financial year starting April 1st, ending September 25th. This is a £104.146 million ($138.85 million), or 2.7% increase compared to the same period over the last financial year, and the best H1 performance of the UK National Lottery yet.
This record-smashing figure was driven by a strong performance for draw-based games, especially for the Lotto, and steady post-pandemic recovery for the retail businesses. Moreover, this is the third consecutive year of growth for the Lotto games of the UK National Lottery. The Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games were also a booster for the National Lottery, soaring its numbers to the new record high.
Retail Continues to be the Largest Sales Channel
The total in-store sales for Camelot in H1 jumped to £2.336 million ($3.12 million), which is 4.5% or £102.7 million ($136.96 million) compared to the first half of the preceding financial year. From the said sales volume, retailer commission jumped by 5.1% or £6.5 million ($8.67 million), to £133 (177.36) million, an equivalent of about £3,000 ($4,000) for each of the 44,000 Camelot retail stores across the UK.
Likewise, the in-store standards program for the independent retailers of the UK National Lottery has also continued with its successful stint. Over and above Camelot’s retail commission, the shopkeepers of independent retailers received a total of £288,000 ($384,000) in cash rewards over H1 2021/22. On top of that, the satisfaction scores for Camelot retailers tracked at their highest level yet.
Better still, the amount of money produced for Good Causes from Camelot’s ticket sales grew to a total of £884.5 million ($1.18 billion), 6.5% more than the £863.7 million ($1.152 billion) yielded over the same period last year. Overall, the volume of returns that The UK National Lottery has generated for Good Causes since its debut in 1994 has surpassed £45 billion ($60 billion).
In light of the record-breaking performance, Sir Hugh Robertson, the Camelot Chairman, voiced his excitement in a few words saying:
Quote“I’m delighted to announce another record sales performance for The National Lottery. Crucially, this meant that we were able to deliver growth in returns to Good Causes, prizes paid to players, and Lottery Duty to the Treasury. Our profit was once again aligned with returns to Good Causes at the half-year stage and will be around 1% of sales for the full year in accordance with our license. An incredible £45bn has now been raised for National Lottery Good Causes – 65% more than the most optimistic Treasury forecasts at the time of launch.”
Nigel Railton, Camelot’s CEO, also voiced his enthusiasm for the brilliant H1 2021/22 numbers in a statement as follows:
Quote“With National Lottery sales up across the board and very high levels of public participation, we’ve once again proved that our strategy of offering great consumer choice in a safe and convenient way continues to deliver vital contributions to Good Causes across the UK. The National Lottery’s continued strong performance is testament to the resilient, responsive business model that we have put in place since our 2017 strategic review.”
Meanwhile, the demand for online tickets jumped to a historic £1.62 billion ($2.16 billion). Even so, the growth curve this time was not as massive as what Camelot saw in 2020 when the UK was undergoing its first Covid-19 induced lockdown.
2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics Campaigns Catapulted Camelot Sales
Ticket sales soared notably over the H1 2021/22 period because the UK National Lottery promoted its largest-ever brand campaign for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics summer games. Throughout the summer, Great Britain’s lottery ran a program that kept reminding locals that they directly supported the national Olympics and Paralympics team whenever they played any of the National Lottery games.
On top of that, Camelot also went the extra mile to create a link ‘play and purpose’ via two live entertainment events dubbed the National Lottery Homecoming at the Wembley Arena. The events were aired live at primetime on Channel 4 and BBC One, giving thousands of players of the UK National Lottery a special opportunity to welcome heroes of Great Britain’s Olympic and Paralympic teams.
Owing to these publicity tactics, the brand positivity ratings of the UK National Lottery grew to record levels. The last time such high brand positivity was recorded was when the National Lottery Community Fund made its Covid-19 support commitment during the first lockdown in 2020.
The Camelot CEO further added that:
Quote“Lotto is a great barometer for the overall health of The National Lottery, so I’m really proud that, as a result of the series of Lotto enhancements we’ve made, we continue to be one of the only major operators in the world to be growing sales of our flagship game. That – paired with a steady retail recovery and our summer-long campaign celebrating the contribution of National Lottery players in helping propel our Olympians and Paralympians to success – all added up to a record first-half performance.”
Looking at the first six months of 2021, players of the UK National Lottery games received a total of £2.275 billion ($3.033 billion) worth of combined prize money, £30.6 million ($408 million) more than the same period last year. As a result, the games created 184 new millionaires in the UK.
Under the terms of Camelot’s license, about 1% of sales are retained as profits, whereas 4% is channeled to operating costs. This means that the UK National Lottery continued with its initiative to return about 95% of all its sales revenue to winning players and give back to the community.
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