The UK National Lottery operator Camelot has brought some changes to its games in an attempt to deal with sales decline. The company also revealed that a new Chief Executive Officer is to join the operator tomorrow.
Nigel Railton, who is to take over the position of CEO of Camelot, is currently the boss of the Group’s international technology and consultancy unit, Camelot Global. The 50-year-old Mr. Railton has also been the interim head of the company’s UK business since the departure of Andy Duncan this April.
Apart from appointing a new Chief Executive Officer tomorrow, Camelot is also expected to announce the results of its strategic review which has been primarily focused on bringing back the company’s former glory by swinging its operations back to growth.
The Chief Executive’s appointment comes at an important for the UK National Lottery operator, since Camelot has been focused on securing a fourth National Lottery license as its current one is expected to expire in 2023.
Camelot to Release Strategic Review Results Tomorrow
Camelot launched the afore-mentioned review in June under the lead of Mr. Railton after the ticket sales of the UK National Lottery marked a 8.8% decline in March. Reportedly, the year was a poor one for the main Lotto draw of the company. At the time, the National Lottery operator also reported that its returns to good causes declined by 14.1% and reached £1.63 million.
The six months ended on September 23rd 2017 saw the UK lottery sales of the company decline by 3.2% to £3.2 billion.
Despite the fact that the sales registered were the fourth highest ever in the company’s history, Camelot’s Chairman Jo Taylor shared that they failed to reach the estimates the company has set as a goal. In addition, Mr. Taylor shared that bringing things back to Camelot’s usual performance would take time. He further projected that the half-year sales of Camelot’s lottery would probably mark another decline.
The review which has been carried out under Mr. Railton’s lead and supervision have probably been focused on the ten extra balls that were added to the company’s Lotto draw back in October 2015. This addition has been blamed as one of the main reasons why the operator’s sales declined, saying that customers felt like it was harder for them to win the jackpot with the ten extra balls included in the draws.
The increase of the Lotto ticket’s price to £2 in 2013 has also been included in the review, as well as the mixed performance of the Euro Millions draw.
Dealing with Slumping Sales
As mentioned above, the UK National Lottery operator has been trying to deal with the slumping lotto sales, so it has decided to introduce a new game in which an annuity is to be granted to the winner. The so-called annuity-style games, winners are given regular sums of money over their lifetime.
Such a game introduced to the company’s offerings is expected to turn out to be attractive to different players. Still, a new game will not be officially brought to Camelot’s offerings until 2019.
The company has been looking to reverse some of its moves from the last few years, which turned out to be no so good for the business such as doubling its lottery tickets’ price to £2 and adding extra balls to the main lotto draw. So, Camelot has now been aimed at testing some changes that could be implemented to Lotto draws in order for the jackpot to be won more easily.
