50 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2022 Grocery and convenience retailers are making large investments in technology to address the labor shortage while finding ways to manage operating costs and provide a quality customer experience. Investments, such as home delivery, curbside pickup, increasing self-service checkout and the closure of customer service centers, are impacting lottery exposure in grocery stores. Likewise, selfservice checkout, ‘Just Walk Out’ technologies are reducing visits to the checkout counter in convenience stores, while hybrid and electric vehicles are reducing trips to the gas pumps and to the store. The recent Mega Millions $1.3 billion jackpot created long lines and it is difficult to estimate sales lost because retailers were limited to selling lottery products through existing lottery selling systems. Competition in gaming, including the expansion of casinos and sports betting vie for the gaming dollars and lottery managed iLottery and sports betting offer higher sales but much lower profit than traditional games. Does this paint a bleak picture for our industry? It does not have to and can be seen as a big opportunity. Abacus’ “Lottery Everywhere” solution can help address these challenges. Once the Abacus gateway connects the retailers’ POS (registers) or retailer ecosystem to the lottery’s gaming system a whole new distribution channel for the lottery is established. Abacus does not provide a ‘one and done’ solution but provides lotteries a customizable solution. “As a 30+ year retailer in Kansas and the Director of the Kansas Lottery for 5 years, I can quote you every verse and song of the Kansas Lottery going back to 1987 with the launch of “Up, Up and Away”, their first game. The lottery terminal was a godsend to the business when it was first introduced in 1991. But now in the digital age, not being in the retailer’s register is an impediment to that digital progress. I firmly believe that what Abacus has developed is the distribution system of the future. Putting lottery in every lane, manned or not, and the various other channels. And you can’t get there via a lottery terminal”, Abacus Head of Business, Terry Presta. “We have more than 25,000 enabled POS terminals and 5,000 self-checkout terminals live in Europe today. We have developed a new self-checkout solution for the Canadian market and plan to go live with Print on Receipt in Iowa with major grocery chain stores,” said Simon Butler, Abacus CEO. “We expect to add several additional US lotteries in 2023,” added Butler. Services offered Print on Receipt You are familiar with Print on Receipt technology developed for grocery stores. Print on Receipt allows consumers to purchase draw games through the grocery check stand lanes and the consumer’s draw game ticket is printed on register receipt paper. The in-lane lottery purchase is intuitive for both the consumer and retailer, as lottery draw game purchases are handled just like any other products the store sells – scan, pay and print. Instant Tickets Abacus has been developing solutions to offer instant tickets in-lane. This innovative solution offers a secure integration into the retailer point of sale, reducing shrink in the category. The Abacus system offers an intuitive way of selling a wide range of instant tickets just like any other item in the consumers basket. Abacus is actively working on ways to explore other methods of delivering the solution to retail such as ticket by ticket activation through the retail POS system. Adding a layer of security to instant tickets, such as ticket-by-ticket activation has been requested by numerous lotteries to address the escalating theft issues facing retailers. With ticket-by-ticket activation, tickets remain in a dormant status until the ticket(s) are activated by scanning the ticket(s) for sale through the retailer POS. Ticket validations cannot occur until tickets have been activated by scanning the tickets for sale through the retailer POS.
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