39 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • JULY/AUGUST 2023 similar type of product suite performing so much better? We can try and use the RMI data to derive an answer. The tool itself serves those different interests. Desautels: Yes, an example is how we've been able to work with a major grocery chain to improve sales, which ultimately becomes helpful for multiple jurisdictions. With the support of RMI data, the retailer found that putting a large jackpot sign above a lottery vending machine (LVM) not only helped bring more awareness to the LVM itself, but made shoppers who wanted to play lottery aware that they could go there to get their numbers for Powerball and Mega Millions. The retailer wanted to expand the same strategy to other jurisdictions, and we quickly started working with other states where the retailer sells lottery to support this. Kriger: And I would say there's a third component. We have done the work to use what we call session data to package the performance of a vending machine itself. For vending machines in certain RMI jurisdictions, every single action on the machine is a line of data. For those jurisdictions, we can report more than just “This machine sold $100 in a day.” We can report on what time of day had the most sales, for example, or what products are selling and at what times, some session analytics. If they don't have cashless it’s more challenging, but even in a state that doesn’t offer cashless sales, we put together a session proxy report where we can bucket transactions and tell you, for example, these products are typically bought together at this retailer. That could eventually feed some suggested selling or just inform the lottery of what gets bought together most. If a lottery wants to do some promotions, they can use that data to help inform those. Riley: We’ve also been able to leverage RMI to respond to specific queries around LVMs for a lottery that is new to vending. Some of the analysis we're doing is on the performance of a single LVM versus multiple LVMs, and what performance they can expect from an all-cashless deployment. Each market is going to be unique, and we acknowledge that, but existing RMI data is another tool that helps provide guidance on some very focused, specific queries. Desautels: Regarding the expansion of LVMs, one of the things that RMI monitors is the LVM saturation of corporate chains versus one another. And one of the first things that stood out is that the #1 lottery retailer in the country had the most sales but the lowest percentage of LVM locations across the board. What we were able to do using RMI data was to compare the average weekly sales in stores that had an LVM versus those that didn’t. And it was a night-and-day difference — in many cases it was almost double the sales simply by having an LVM in that store to complement the sales-counter offering. It helped to make the retailer aware of the opportunities, and we’re already working with them to do an LVM expansion in other jurisdictions. If this works well for that retailer, other retailers and lotteries may benefit. Is the predicted recession a factor in the growing interest in RMI? How does participation serve the prospects of future growth by lotteries? Worley: Lotteries in the United States and other parts of the world saw record sales for the past two to two and a half years. That also means that lotteries’ stakeholders now expect a higher level of transfers to good causes than ever before. Beneficiaries are counting on those returns. And for the first time, it does appear as if macroeconomic factors are having an influence on spend. We devote a lot of time analyzing why that is. Why wasn't this true nine months ago? Why wasn't it true even six months ago? It appears that the cumulative impact of persistent high inflation, declining household savings, and greater reliance on credit cards has diminished disposable income. This has caused some lottery players to reduce their lottery spending. Riley: RMI brings transparency. The numbers are the numbers, but we can share what we see going on and ask, what are you seeing? RMI isn't necessarily going to address it directly, but it gives us some indicators. For example, if we see average price-point purchases go down, it's another kind of measurement and a source of dialogue with retailers, which strengthens their connection with the lottery industry. Aligning lottery with chain retailers is a critical component of lottery growth plans. How can RMI help position lottery products to drive retailer business success? Worley: One of the ways the RMI data can now tangibly help address businessopportunity questions is that it includes product and product-category level information at the retailers. Steve and Gina constantly help retailers to refine the product mix in each store that will drive optimal performance for the store. And as Tim was saying, RMI is a great tool to look at which products are selling in which stores at which time of day. The ongoing consumer shift toward $20, $30, and $50 tickets, because the winning experience is so appealing to a lot of players, is one directive that we can give to retailers: Offering the right mix of price points to appeal to the widest range of your consumers satisfies the retailers’ customers and drives their commissions. I think that product performance by store is a big one. Kriger: If chains can’t measure how they're doing across jurisdictions, they don't know if they're doing well. The consolidated reports give them context. Lotteries obviously have their own data if they want to look at chains in their state, but with RMI they can get some context on how that chain is doing for the neighbors or peers in RMI states they want to compare to. If you can’t see it, you can't change it. Those chain reports give them some insights on what a certain change of tactic might mean for them. Worley: Tim's point is really an important one for lotteries, because the question of whether they should spend money on consumer-engagement elements like digital signage that are successful at driving lottery — that's a huge investment in some jurisdictions where you’re doing thousands of new displays. Lotteries can
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