8 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2023 From the Publisher Congratulations to Cindy Polzin and the Wisconsin Lottery for hosting the Brewing the Best NASPL annual conference and trade show in Milwaukee last month; and David Gale and Team NASPL for your vision and expertise at executing these mammoth projects every year. Thank you to Sarah Taylor for your tremendous service as president of NASPL this past year, and congratulations to Cindy Polzin for your election to president of NASPL for the coming year. Susan and I conduct as many video interviews with industry leaders as we can, and post them to PGRItalks.com. They’re all between five and ten minute discussions about the future of our industry so I hope you’ll take a look. We are so excited to feature the most recent innovation of MUSL (Multi-State Lottery Association). This cover features the Powerball & NASCAR collaboration which represents the ingenuity being applied to expand awareness and playership of Powerball. The partnership is Powerball’s first with a major sports league and allows it to engage with players as the Official Lottery Game of NASCAR. The collaboration also signifies a progression in the game’s national marketing approach, which in recent years, has focused on identifying partners who can help amplify the Powerball brand by delivering unique Powerball-based content to national audiences. Congratulations to TeamMUSL for supporting the promotion, and the participating lotteries for leveraging the incredible brand value of Powerball to collaborate with other uber-brands like NASCAR to bring new consumer groups into the world of lottery for the benefit of good causes. Every issue of PGRI Magazine features a column called “MUSL News” which keeps us all up-to-date with current MUSL innovations and initiatives. You can also visit the official Powerball website at Powerball.com and the MUSL site at MUSL.com to learn more about how the MUSL membership is forging creative new ways to drive progress for the benefit of the good causes supported by government lotteries. New technology and business processes are changing the whole games-of-chance landscape. As the nexus between the communities of compliance and regulatory agents, the commercial companies which produce the products and services that enable lotteries to operate, and the lottery operators themselves - GLI occupies a singularly important role in our industry. Joe Bunevith puts things in context, helping us to make sense out of the disruption of recent years and understand the straight line that connects yesterday to today and tomorrow. How exactly is Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) being applied in the realworld? What are large enterprises doing to integrate DEI into its culture and business processes? Brian Blake talks about how DEI has evolved in his experience outside the lottery industry, how its relevance is increasing going forward, and how it is being applied to at IGT for the benefit of customers as well as organizational productivity, effectiveness, and sustainable growth. Also featured are executive summaries of the panel discussions from PGRI’s Lottery Expo Nashville conference. Gretchen Corbin’s panel explored the ways in which lotteries are vying for the attention of a player who is being wooed by casinos, sports betting, and now online gambling operators. How does Team Lottery attract and retain the playership of a consumer who is experimenting with other gaming opportunities to find what she likes best? The discussion on the Intersection of Lottery and Intelligence Systems, moderated by Drew Svitko, explored the ways in which Artificial Intelligence is already being applied in Lottery as well as outside of our industry. It may seem like more hype than reality right now, but it is not too soon to understand how AI will transform every aspect business functions, the gaming industry, and our lives. iLottery is not just another channel of distribution. It is a new way to play the lottery, and a consumer touch-point with the super-power to reshape the whole playing experience and player journey. Stephanie Weyant led the discussion that translated the experience of U.S. iLottery states into the top-of-mind action-items to help those U.S. states which are new to iLottery, and those prepping to implement iLottery. The only traditional thing about “traditional” retail is that it involves real people interacting with each other in real-time. And as the face of lottery to the consumer, that will thankfully never change. Panelists discussed how digitizing the in-store shopping experience and checkout process; connecting with the shopper via new media, POS strategies, Mobile, and connecting the in-store player with the digital ecosystem is upgrading to meet the needs of the modern consumer. Thank you to Paul Lawson, Chris Shaban and Rob Wesley, Julian Tietz, Simon Jaworski, SciGames, and IGT for your fabulous editorial contributions. Our readers and I appreciate you, your vision, and your leadership. Mark your calendars for March 12 to 14 of 2024. Join us in Fort Lauderdale Florida for PGRI Smart-Tech 2024 to discuss how the Player Journey runs through Digital Lottery, PGRI’s reinvented conference experience. Paul Jason, Publisher Public Gaming International Magazine
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