Operator News
UK – Digital lottery helps Camelot to record financial year
By Phil - 14 June 2021
National Lottery sales in the UK have broken the £8bn barrier for the first time, despite the ongoing pandemic impact with Camelot reporting record National Lottery sales of £8,373.9m for the 2020/21 financial year (1 April 2020 to 31 March 2021), an increase of £468.8m.
Total National Lottery sales for the year surpassed £8bn for the first time, resulting in the best-ever returns to Good Causes from sales revenue alone. Despite the negative impact on sales from the pandemic last Spring, swift interventions supported a speedy recovery which, in turn, allowed National Lottery Distributors to award more than £1 billion in funding to Good Cause projects across the UK, responding to the impact of COVID-19.
Camelot Chairman, Sir Hugh Robertson, welcomed the record year: “This is the fourth consecutive year of rising sales since our strategic review in 2017. The National Lottery has delivered for the UK again this year, with the highest-ever returns for Good Causes from sales alone. A remarkable £1.2 billion has been distributed to help the country respond to the impact of coronavirus. Without this money, many organisations would have ceased to function.
“This has been achieved by making the right strategic calls as a business alongside the support of players and the wider National Lottery family. I would like to thank government, the National Lottery Distributors, our retail partners and, most importantly, National Lottery players – without whom this remarkable success story would not have been possible.”
With unclaimed prizes factored in, £1,887.5m was generated for Good Causes in 2020/21 – the equivalent of £36m every week. Lottery Duty to government exceeded £bn for the first time, which contributed to a record £3.1bn that was delivered to society through Good Causes returns, Lottery Duty, and retailer commission. With approximately 1one per cent of sales retained as profit by Camelot under the terms of its licence, and 4% spent on operating costs during the period, The National Lottery continued to return around 95 per cent of all sales revenue to winners and society – delivering for everyone.
Announcing the results, Camelot CEO Nigel Railton said: “In what has been an extraordinarily challenging year, The National Lottery has demonstrated incredible resilience and flexibility to achieve this record performance. These results are a culmination of all of the work we’ve done over the last few years in the areas of brand, games, retail and digital. This, together with our years of experience and longstanding commitment to being a world leader in healthy play, have helped us ensure this vital boon for society when it’s been needed most. And it’s these strengths that mean that we will continue to deliver for the benefit of everyone.
“I’m very grateful to our partners in retail who went to work each day to serve their communities, and to National Lottery Distributors who got funding out the door when it was essential. As ever, I’d particularly like to thank National Lottery players because more than 37m people bought a ticket last year, and when they did they played their part in an extraordinary national effort.”
Camelot succeeded in growing sales of all six of its draw-based games to £4,690.7m, an increase of £153.6m. This was primarily driven by Lotto, with a new feature introduced in November that sees around a million players win an additional cash prize of £5 for matching two main numbers in a ‘Must Be Won’ Rolldown draw. This innovation has proved popular and has supported the growth of the flagship game while most others in international markets around the world are in decline. The newest draw game in the portfolio, Set For Life, continues to exceed expectations, while EuroMillions grew marginally despite depressed ticket sales in some partner countries. When international partner sales are lower, EuroMillions jackpots – which are the key drivers of sales – start lower and grow more slowly.
Meanwhile, sales of Instants grew to £3,683.2m. Growth in the sales of online instant games offset a decline in scratchcard sales which were down year-on-year due to lower retail footfall, particularly in the first half. This growth was driven by digital player registrations, up 2.7m in the year. Average digital weekly spend remained broadly flat, up less than three per cent – with fewer than two online instant games played per person per week on average.
The National Lottery recorded its highest ever digital sales at £3,509.5 million – an increase of £1,052m (up 42.8 per cent) investment plan for the digital channel to ensure additional traffic could be accommodated. This ensured The National Lottery was able to serve a record number of players online when they chose to switch, or in some cases play for the first time. It also used its Contact Centre to help players not accustomed to using digital services, to register. The National Lottery is the largest digital lottery in the world by revenue.
Within digital, mobile sales grew by £876.4m to an all-time high of £2,481.9m, with the majority of these sales via The National Lottery’s apps. By significantly increasing resources on its technical support helpline, introducing ‘how to’ videos and making a number of user experience improvements, it is now easier for people who might traditionally play in retail to play online.
Mr. Railton continued: “My first priority last March was to look after the people who work for us and ensure our operations would be fit to manage whatever came our way. So I’m particularly proud that Camelot was recognised by Best Companies not just for being in the top 10 large employers in the UK, but with a special award for wellbeing. Throughout the pandemic, we looked after them, and they looked after the operations of The National Lottery and, for that, I’d like to say a huge thank you. We know that last year could have been very different and it reminds us we can take nothing for granted. In the year ahead, we’ve got plans to give players more reasons to play and more ways to enjoy the fantastic projects made possible by The National Lottery. For that reason, I’m more optimistic than ever.”
