Luke Brill, CEO of Lottoland, visited the ALNA head office to talk newsagents, almost a year after his company started attacking and mocking our channel, calling on shoppers to stop shopping in newsagents.
here is a report from ALNA about the visit:
Lottoland’s Desperate Plea
Lottoland CEO Luke Brill visited the ALNA head office to ask us to join them and refrain from the fierce lobbying campaign that we have been undertaking in the last 18 months.On the top of his agenda was the plan to engage newsagents to sell his product. ALNA CEO Adam Joy made it very clear that Lottoland had damaged the relationship with news and lottery agents by:
- Producing advertisements that intended to harm newsagents and humiliate them publicly by labelling them unable to move with the times.
- Leveraging of the news and lottery agents hard work in the misleading way he communicated to members of the public
- Holding interviews outside newsagencies
- Using imagery and wording so close to the official lotteries that led to confusion for customers
- Ignoring the original and official channel for news and lotteries initially by taking a belligerent approach to proceed without any consideration for the community benefits from news and lottery agents
- Deliberate marketing to undermine current jackpots.
- Promoting large discounts and special offers to gamble with Lottoland instead of playing the official draw
- Misleading social media advising customers they could play all their games in one APP.
- Dishonesty in interviews where Lottoland claimed to not be targeting newsagent customers and claiming they are seeking new customers, Adam challenged this and asked why they use imagery, wording and colours of an Official Lottery? The answer provided by Brill did not answer the question.
Mr Brill said he would happily run a new TV advert where the person went back into the newsagent and was elated they could now access Lottoland. Adam advised that this was patronising and further enhanced the feeling that we were behind the times and late to the party.
Adam challenged Mr Brill on his comments from last meeting, where he claimed they will fly as close to IP replication without infringing, Mr Brill confirmed this was still their intention.
ALNA feel a public Apology in TV, Radio and print apologising to the network and transparently declaring that they have used existing IP and Newsagents to leverage their business and in our opinion that this was misleading.
It is apparent the recent announcements we have achieved by working in unison with the WA VIC, NSW and Tasmanian Governments have them rattled. He tried to talk about Tatts Lotteries with Adam about what Tatts are doing to retailers, Adam advised him that we have a separate discussion with Tatts and that this is irrelevant to the Lottoland plan to leverage newsagent customers.
ALNA continue to work with the other states and federally for a total announcement. We heard in Tasmania on the weekend even if the opposition win the next election they will also ban the wagering on the outcome of lotteries.
Further evidence of Lottoland’s plan for official lottery customers, Lottoland again extended an offer to pay newsagents a monthly marketing fee and a trailing commission on all transactions. Adam challenged why he would do this if he did not want newsagent customers and were focused on new customers? The response was so ALNA would leave Lottoland alone.
Mr Brill then went further and said, “what if we stopped focusing and transacting on domestic lotteries and only focused on overseas jackpots?” Adam advised this was an unanswerable question as there are many variables to this
- This does not stop other lotto wagering companies in the domestic market. E.g. nedd lotto, magpie millions and others.
- Lottoland could trade under another name and do this e.g. the white labelled William Hill product Planet Lottery.
- There is no guarantee of the length of time Lottoland would commit to this
- How could we trust Lottoland going forward?
Adam asked if they could change their name to Bet on Lotto and be transparent to what it is? The answer was that they have built a good brand around Lottoland. Adam interrupted and said on the back of news and lottery agents and the official imagery and words?
Mr Brill ended the conversation advising he will put an offer in writing to Adam, Adam advised he would share it with the Board and members but did not hold high hopes for its adoption.
Its healthy alna maintains a dialogue with lottoland. We need to leverage it with tatts. I think newsagents would be deluded though to think the latest push by state governments is about protecting our interests. They are protecting their revenue and licences and leveraging newsagents as political pawns. All fair play but i cant help to feel we are being led down the garden path.
Lets face it Lottoland is worried they have lost customer support since campaign started. Even non lotto customers are coming in wanting to support the banning of Lottoland. Australians era sick and tired of having foreign companies taking money out of this country and not paying their way this includes ones like Apple among others. There is no way we should trust Lottoland or Brill after all he is going around trying to save his own skin. Once they would have our support it would make us look silly in the face of all the customers supporting us and in no time they would dump us.
The Lott still wants its customers to deal with itself direct with a mobile app (I should that old word “Computer Program).
When are Newsagents going to realise that Tatts own yearly report indicated that the lack of jackpots was a major reason for diminished income not only for them but us as well. Not to mention that their online sales have risen to 15%.
Tatts have access and target our customers. They are just as dangerous as Lottoland and when was our last increase in commission.