Yesterday, officials announced that a lottery game, which was launched only two months ago, will be suspended towards the end of December. The reason for this is the fact that ticket sales did not meet the initial expectations. It was planned that the game would distribute prizes adding up to $1 million.
Terry Rich, president of the North American Lottery Group and Iowa Lottery’s CEO, said state officials decided that the Monopoly Millionaires’ Club lottery game should be suspended for an indefinite period of time. Its future is absolutely unclear, as last week, the Texas Lottery announced the suspension of ticket sales.
Rich said that the game had its “small dedicated group” of people who seemed to really like the game. Yet, the low ticket sales led to this turn of events.
However, he refused to comment on how much money has been generated through ticket sales since the game’s launch in a total of 23 states back in October. What is more, no information was given on the expectations that industry officials initially had.
Players had to pay the amount of $5 so as to acquire a ticket for the game.
Rebecca Hargrove, Monopoly Millionaires’ Club’s chairwoman and president and the Tennessee Lottery’s CEO, shared that officials wanted to gain some experience from the game and its performance on the market. As she pointed out, this particular lottery game was intended for players who wanted the winnings to be distributed between more people.
She said in a special statement that every single enterprise of this kind gives officials the chance to gain more experience. Hargrove also pointed out that her primary goal, as well as that of all other lottery officials, is to provide customers with the best possible products, i.e. with games they like.
Unlike Powerball and Mega Millions, two other games offered in various states, which promised players to win various large jackpots, Monopoly Millionaires’ Club offered a top prize of $25 million. In addition to this, players had the chance to win some other prizes totaling $1 million.
Mr. Rich said that Powerball and Mega Millions are improved and redeveloped versions of two older games. He promised that they will be examined closely so as for officials to be able to understand what worked well and what went wrong. Thus, they will help all those states whose well-being partly depends on revenue from lottery games and other similar gambling activities.
Monopoly Millionaires’ Club’s last weekly drawing is scheduled for Friday, December 26. It was announced that tickets will be suspended shortly before it takes place.
