The Florida Lottery’s Cash Pop™ launched on January 3, 2022, at the $1, $2, and $5 price points. The game has five draws a day. Players can advance play for up to two days. Prize payouts are slightly less than scratch-offs at the same price point.
The majority of draw games have the traditional payout of 50%. We’ve always been conservative with our prize payouts on the draw side, but we’ve seen the success of increasing payout, so it’s changing,” Shelly Gerteisen, Director of Product, Florida Lottery, said.
Audience
“We hear things from the public, particularly nonplayers during big jackpot rolls. They don’t like play slips; they’re intimidated by buying Lottery products; they feel the odds of games are astronomical to win,” she explained. “Just picking one number with odds of 1 and 15 eliminates a lot of these issues.”
Cash Pop also mitigates other problems for new players. For instance, new players don’t need to know what day of the week there is a drawing because it draws five times a day; they don’t need to know how many numbers they must match to win because they only have one number; they know how much they’re going to win because the prize amount is on the ticket.
Cash Pop also lends itself to core players, who understand different types of wagers and play options. Savvier players will also notice a higher return if they track their winnings because of the improved odds.
Messaging
The Florida Lottery’s messaging focuses on non-core players. The pseudo tag line is One-Number Wonder. “We’ve stripped back the marketing pieces for the campaign. We don’t want to communicate everything at one time,” Gerteisen said. “We’re focusing on the core messaging that it takes one number to win and one dollar play, so we can get them trying it.”
A TV advertising campaign also supported Cash Pop. The spot has a Good Will Hunting theme, where a professor is trying to solve a long, complicated equation. A pizza delivery girl walks in, circles one number, and then the professor is shocked that it only takes one number to win.
“Again, we’re conveying how simple the game is to play by showcasing it takes just one number on the ticket, $1 to play,” Gerteisen said. “It makes it stand out.”
The Lottery has avoided images of balls flying around or paper play slips in its messaging. Since drawings occur on a terminal, advertisements depict players checking numbers on their phones or using the app to buy a ticket.
“We’re marketing it differently than our traditional games,” Gerteisen said.
Promotions and Grouper
At the same time as the Cash Pop launch, the Lottery relaunched a promotion in which all daily draw game tickets are eligible. Players are entered into bonus drawings to win cash prizes and Cash Pop tickets.
“Our daily players are the most engaged with us with these types of promotions,” Gerteisen said. “We’re seeing this promotion being a huge driver of our existing player base to Cash Pop.”
Additionally, following the introduction of Cash Pop, the Lottery updated its sampler offering, called Grouper, which is used to encourage players to cross play, try new games, and sample add-ons. Players who purchase Grouper get multiple draw games tickets at a slight discount. The $5 Grouper was very successful, so a $10 Grouper was also added last year. The Lottery added Cash Pop into Grouper.
Sales
The Lottery’s forecasted projections for the game were between 7 to 10 cents per capita or between $74 million and $113 million in total sales for the year. The game is outperforming all expectations. In its inaugural week, Cash Pop produced more than 70,000 winners and topped $2 million in sales.
In the first 11 weeks, average weekly sales have been around $2.5 million with a per capita of $0.13. In the first 7 weeks, an average of more than a quarter-million dollars in prizes were won each day, and more than 10,800 daily winners, which is about 7.5 winners every minute.
After about eight weeks in the market, Cash Pop surpassed Fast Play’s annual sales from the previous year.
“Redeemable prizes at retail stimulate players and retailers at a local level. Cash Pop will not make anyone a millionaire, but when people win, and retailers see players reinvest the churn, it creates a lot of excitement. That is why we see sales build every week for this game,” Gerteisen said.
$10 Price Point
The Florida Lottery is considering launching a $10 price point in the future. There are a few reasons for the lottery waiting. First, it wanted to see the distribution of play across the $1, $2, and $5 price points.
Second, the Lottery had a $50 ticket launching at the end of the month. “We wanted to be mindful that there was something for every budget in our portfolio,” Gerteisen said.
Finally, the Lottery wants to analyze Cash Pop’s effect on existing and similarly priced products. “We aren’t ruling it out for the future, but we’re happy with the game’s performance thus far, so we’ll see how it continues to enhance our product mix and ability to maximize revenues overall,” Gerteisen said.