Lottery Sales Increase by More Than 10 Percent for Second Straight Year
The Pennsylvania Lottery, the only state lottery to designate all its proceeds to programs that benefit older residents, had record sales of $2.35 billion in fiscal 2003-04, topping the old record of $2.13 billion, set in 2002-03, by $219 million or 10.3 percent.
"This has been a tremendous year for the Pennsylvania Lottery and for the hundreds of thousands of older Pennsylvanians who benefit from Lottery-funded programs," said Lottery Executive Director Ed Mahlman.
Mahlman attributed the sales surge in the 2003-04 fiscal year, which ended on June 30, to a number of new initiatives, including enhancements to both instant and online games.
Instant games, which accounted for 42.1 percent of total sales this fiscal year, achieved sales of $989,201,706, and topped last year's record by 24.2 percent. Sales this year broke the 2002-03 record of $796,596,219 seven weeks and two days before the end of the fiscal year. Of the 30 best instant games sales weeks in the history of the Lottery, 26 of those weeks occurred this fiscal year, including the best week ever - $30,293,262 the week of Dec. 23 - 29, 2003.
Mahlman credited the success of Lottery's instant games to the variety of games offered, both in price and style of play, a focus on providing more small- to mid-level prizes for players and another successful Tickets-As-Gifts holiday campaign. The introduction of Gus - the second most famous groundhog in Pennsylvania - as the spokesperson for Lottery's instant games also provided a sales boost in the second half of the fiscal year.
The Lottery introduced a new MATCH 6 lotto game on Jan. 28, 2004. MATCH 6 has significantly outperformed its predecessor, Super 6. In just over five months, MATCH 6 achieved sales of $66,036,440. Super 6 Lotto ticket sales for seven months of the same fiscal year grew only to $60,236,888. MATCH 6, the first game of its kind in the nation to offer prizes for matching numbers on a combination of lines, has already produced more than 7 million winning tickets, worth more than $34 million in cash prizes.
Powerball® and its multi-million dollar jackpots continue to appeal to Pennsylvania Lottery players. Sales for the multi-jurisdictional game and its popular enhancement, PowerPlay, reached $307,907,511 in FY 03-04, 5.3 percent higher than sales the previous fiscal year.
"Pennsylvanians have been supporting the Lottery, and by extension the Commonwealth's older residents, in record numbers," Mahlman said. "Lottery sales increased by more than 10 percent for the second consecutive year."
Mahlman said the Lottery has also expanded its efforts to help the community at large.
"During the past year the Lottery offered its more than 6,700 online retailers state-of-the-art age verification technology that will help discourage sales of age-controlled products to minors," Mahlman said. "The Lottery also worked with the Pennsylvania State Police to add Lottery retailers to the Amber Alert program that helps authorities find missing children."
The 2003-04 fiscal year was a great year for Lottery players, as players' winnings for the year totaled $1,307,037,359. The Lottery awarded four Powerball® jackpots during the past fiscal year, including the Pennsylvania Lottery's largest prize ever - a $110.2 million cash prize won by Steven and Kristine White of Skillman, New Jersey.
Looking ahead, Mahlman expects continued growth and success in the coming fiscal year.
"We will continue to work to grow our retailer base," he said. "We're excited to roll out state-of-the-art Player Activated Terminals across the Commonwealth and we expect to impress players with new instant and online Lottery games."
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