Director Bishop Woosley said the best part of having record-breaking sales and revenues is it means more money for scholarships

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – Contact Kara Lee Ford at 501-683-1646 for more information. 

Arkansas Lottery Celebrates  Record-Breaking Year 

July 10, 2018

LITTLE ROCK – The Arkansas Scholarship Lottery’s (ASL) fiscal year ended June 30, and it is celebrating recording-breaking sales and revenue for the year. Sales reached $499,704,976, and revenue was $500,490,212.

 ASL Director Bishop Woosley said the best part of having record-breaking sales and revenues is it means more money for scholarships. Proceeds to scholarships were just shy of $92 million – the third highest amount since 2012 when more than $97 million went to help fund the Academic Challenge Scholarship.

 “Our mission is to maximize proceeds to scholarships in a responsible way,” Woosley said. “With outstanding sales and revenues, we are doing just that. We have provided more than $781 million for the Academic Challenge Scholarship program, which equates to more than 275,000 scholarships. And that number will exceed 300,000 next month when the Arkansas Department of Higher Education awards scholarships to Arkansas students for the 2018-2019 school year.” 

Instant lottery ticket sales also set a new record of $407,604,791, and Arkansas draw game sales had the second highest sales ever at $92,103,185. 

“In 2016 draw game sales were more than $95 million,” Woosley said. “That was the year that the Powerball jackpot went over $1 billion.” 

The Lottery also paid out the highest amount of prizes ever to players this year – nearly $342 million, which is about $27 million more than the second highest amount paid to players in 2012. And retailer commissions of more than $28 million were record-breaking as well this year. 

Woosley added that the Arkansas Scholarship Lottery staff’s hard work contributed to the record year.

 “Our excellent sales staff worked extremely hard this year,” he said. “Our gaming division introduced several new recording-breaking instant tickets, and our marketing group introduced a new advertising theme which featured real winners. I think all those efforts influenced our sales. I’m proud of the entire staff.”

To read the entire financial report presented to the Arkansas Lottery Commission, go online to http://MyArkansasLottery.com/reports and click on “June 2018 Monthly Disclosure Reports” under “LOC Reports.”

 About the Arkansas Scholarship Lottery

More than 92 cents of every dollar of Lottery revenue goes to prizes, scholarships, retailer commissions, and other expenses in Arkansas. Since 2009, the Lottery has provided more than $781 million for more than 275,000 college scholarships, more than $2.6 billion in prizes to players, about $224 million in retailer commissions and more than $116 million state and federal tax revenue.

  Follow the Arkansas Scholarship Lottery on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Visit MyArkansasLottery.com for more information on scholarships, winners, games, odds, promotions – and to join The Club for free. To hear winning numbers, call the Winning Numbers Hotline at 501-682-IWON (4966). To get help with problem gambling, contact the National Problem Gambling Helpline at 1-800-522-4700. 

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