March/April 2015 // Public Gaming International //
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be a useful tool when launching exciting new
games. This is especially true at our higher
price points, where we want to do everything
possible to ensure a product stands out at re-
tail. Through focus group testing, we know
that the use of foil and holographic board defi-
nitely has an impact on player purchase habits.
It’s attractive, eye-catching and conveys some
sense of increased value to the player because
it’s not used on every single game. We often
associate foil board with our spotlight tickets
(higher top-prizes, better odds, etc) which
obviously helps to bridge the increased value
perception. Foil tickets stand out exceptionally
well in dispensers, making it easy for players
to identify games when making their selection.
For those reasons, I feel confident that we will
consider using use foil board, and likely holo-
graphic, in our Scratch-Off portfolio.”
Strategies for Increasing the
Sales of Higher Value Instants
Higher Payouts
• To incentivize players to play higher value scratch games, payout
percentages have to be increased, sometimes as high as 83% which
is the case for “Granite Millions,” a $25 game that is currently
being sold by the New Hampshire lottery. This game is being pro-
moted as having the highest payout in the USA.
• By definition, higher payouts result in lower profitability percent-
ages, which have to be compensated for by higher sales of these
games. Higher face value games must have better sales perfor-
mance to optimize the profits that they will return to the lottery.
Larger tickets
• Additional ways that are being used to promote the sales of high
value instants are to use larger tickets, sometimes as large as 12in
x 4in, which allow extra space for additional scratch areas, there-
by giving players more opportunities to scratch and win.
Higher top prizes
• Of course, players of high value games are also incentivized by
the use of higher prize structures as demonstrated in the three
recent games cited below:
Florida Lottery
$25
$10,000,000 Florida Cash Top prize $10,000,000
Georgia Lottery
$30
$10,000,000 Cash Spectacular Top prize $10,000,000
Ohio Lottery
$30
$500,000,000 Spectacular
Top prize $10,000,000
• Featuring larger, multi-million dollar top prizes
will certainly provide additional incentive for
players to play instant games for $25 or more.
Enhanced visibility
• In addition to increasing the size of their tickets
to make them stand out, the high value games
shown above from Florida, Georgia, and Ohio
all used foil or holography to increase their
visual impact at the point-of-sale.
• There is an additional cost to use these materi-
als, however when they are used on higher
value games, the extra cost can be quickly
absorbed by the incremental sales that
they generate.
• A profitability calculator has just been de-
veloped by the Hazen Paper Company to
demonstrate that only small a sales increase is
needed to pay for these materials:
(Profit Calculator)
• To illustrate this, a 10in x 4in, $30 holographic game needs
only a 1.8% sales increase to fully pay for the cost of hologra-
phy. This same game on foil needs only a 0.5% increase to fully
pay for the foil.
• These “break-even” points are surprisingly low, especially when
considering that foil and holographic games both have proven
track records with generating double digit sales increases.
• A study conducted by Scientific Games in cooperation with the
Tennessee lottery demonstrated that when holography was add-
ed to one of their existing games (with all other key variables held
constant) the sales of the holographic version exceeded those of
the same game on plain board by 79%:
(Test done by SGI and TN Lottery)
• It may seem “counter intuitive” that using scratch tickets that
cost more can increase lottery sales and profits, however the lot-
teries that are using these materials on their higher value games
are continuing to use them because
they are working.
• In 2015, the trend toward the use of
higher value games is continuing to
grow, so optimization of the profit-
ability of these games will become
increasingly important, especially in
light of the higher payout percent-
ages that are typically associated with
these games.
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