Trouble for UK National Lottery

18th January 2010 11:29 AM

For the last year at least we have been bringing you news stories about the sale of the UK National Lottery and the problems that have come with it for the shareholders, but the trouble for the UK National Lottery seems to go much deeper than that and on the face of it, the once much revered lottery seems to have lost it’s shine for the British public a little since its celebrated launch back in 1994.

Anyone who can remember far enough back to the launch of the UK National Lottery fifteen years ago will remember what a frenzy the UK got itself into. It wasn’t prohibited to the launch either, lottery fever went on for months.

	UK National Lottery (UK)
	UK National Lottery (Outside UK)

Then of course, jackpots tailed off a little as players around the UK got used to the idea of it, and realised of course that it wasn’t going to make everyone an instant millionaire.

Then came the launch of the Euromillions Lottery and this meant player numbers, and jackpots for the UK National Lottery tailed off even further and are now as low as £2 million for the midweek draw.

When you consider that every week the Euromillions Lottery has a guaranteed Millionaire Raffle winner worth £1 million and offers jackpots that compete well with other world lottery draws it’s easy to see why players are so taken with our home grown draw.

Last Saturday’s UK National Lottery rollover was billed as an estimated £7 million, small fry compared with the £52 million Euromillions rollover. In the event the UK National Lottery came in at a paltry £5.8 million, indicating much lower ticket sales than anticipated.

By 2012 we should have seen the launch of the Global Lottery, a world lottery draw offering jackpots of up to £100 million. If the Euromillions Lottery seemingly has this much effect on UK lottery players, what will the Global Lottery do to UK National Lottery sales?

Who knows but with dwindling jackpots, and the threat of even more competition, any potential investors may well be thinking long and hard about the value of a company which on the surface – judging by the jackpot amounts – seems to be making little over half the amount it was fifteen years ago.

Written by Kath C

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