M&C wins £8m online lottery task

M&C Saatchi has been awarded the &£8m account for the launch of a new online lottery game by Inter Lotto called Daily Number.

The agency worked on the failed launch of Inter Lotto’s last lottery game Pronto, which collapsed after a few months (MW August 27 1998) following a dispute with BT over its online network. M&C was awarded the new account without a pitch.

Inter Lotto marketing director Peter Dow says: “It is very much a new organisation. Pronto had problems because the game was wrong and there wasn’t enough marketing spend.” Dow has been poached from the Tote, where he was marketing director.

Inter Lotto has attracted a new investor, US lawyer Norman Feinstein, and recruited a new managing director, Lou Burns, from ILTS, the US lottery games company behind Daily Number.

To play the new game, players select three numbers from zero to nine to win prizes of about &£250 or &£40 respectively. There will be a test launch in the North of England through 3,500 CTNs (confectionery tobacco and newspaper distributors), with winning numbers broadcast nightly on Yorkshire and Granada TV. Dow says if this is successful, the game will be launched nationally.

Dow says: “In the UK, the Lottery takes 80 to 83 per cent market share. In other countries, it is 30 to 50 per cent. There is an opportunity to create a large new lottery.”