West Virginia Lottery
Kari Blankenship, Promotions Manager, West Virginia Lottery
What events (fairs, festivals, concerts) will you sponsor/engage with this year? If applicable, what physical presence will you have at the event?
- WV Strawberry Festival, Buckhannon
- Spring Flea Market, Lewisburg
- Upper Ohio Valley Italian Festival, Wheeling
- State Fair of West Virginia, Lewisburg
- Fall Flea Market, Lewisburg
- State Forest Festival, Elkins
- Apple Butter Festival, Berkeley Springs
- Chilifest, Huntington
We will be working with a retailer at each event and conducting a wheel spin promotion.
In the past few years, have you made any changes to your event strategy that were either a success or a failure? What did you learn?
Several years ago, we moved from a physical wheel to a digital wheel. Then we integrated an option to auto-generate the wheel results for players with 25 or more spins per turn. This past year we added POS equipment for promotional events. This was a curve ball for the retailers at first, but once they mastered the new process, it made their accounting much easier and prevented clerk theft.
Although the initial changes were difficult for players, it dramatically reduced the wait time to play. The result is happier players and increased sales.
If you have a physical presence at an event, what types of activations/engagement opportunities do you employ and why?
We use our digital wheels at all our events. We also have a daily VIP drawing at every wheel spin event. Entries can only be won on our digital wheels. At special events, we often have additional drawings where they can enter VIP entries for a chance at a different prize such as concert tickets. At the West Virginia State Fair, we also have two special days where we offer a digital PLINKO game, but we call it the Big Drop ‘N WIN game. It is a minimum $50 lottery purchase to play with a max of $100 per turn and a rolling jackpot. It is very popular with our players.
It’s a way to give back to our players. Our promotional lottery tickets are funded through our un-claimed prize fund. Players really enjoy our special events where they can win free promotional tickets.
- Do you incorporate a prize wheel?
Yes
- Have you tried any other form of game?
Yes
- Do you sell tickets?
A licensed West Virginia Lottery Retailer will sell tickets at our events.
- Do you use a selfie booth?
No, but it’s next on our list.
- Anything else?
Do you have certain KPIs you measure success with for events?
We do an ROI for all our major sponsored events with onsite promotions. Our most successful event last year was the State Fair of West Virginia. Ticket sales for the 10-day event were $862,237, and our ROI was $336,882.