Atlantic Lottery unalarmed by British troubles with Geosweep
Map-based lottery game in United Kingdom being refined before relaunch in March
The Atlantic Lottery Corporation says it is not alarmed the latest version of the game Geosweep failed to catch on in Britain and looks forward to better results when the game is relaunched in March.
"We’re aware of the refinements to the beta version of the GeoLotto UK game. Once the game is fully optimized, out of beta form, and supported by a marketing effort, we’ll be watching how it performs."
Geosweep originally launched in Britain three years ago as a map-based lottery game and has undergone several adjustments already.
In the British version, the country is divided into more than 59 million separate squares which can be "occupied" for a fee. Originally the fee was set at 10 pence per square per day but after a year that was lowered to one pence. Then last year the fee was raised to 1 pound to find a system that would appeal to the public. Prizes have also been adjusted up and down but nothing has seemed to click with the public.
It was originally promoted as a likely hit with younger players — or the so-called Facebook generation — because it's played exclusively online and utilizes Google Maps technology. And even though sales have never showed much life in Britain, ALC executives were smitten with the game and spent millions to invest in the company behind it and millions more to launch a version of it in Atlantic Canada. The Atlantic Canadian game was abandoned last summer following a little more than a year of disappointing sales.
In March the British game, which was renamed Geo Lotto in its last makeover, is switching to a weekly game instead of a daily one and the squares on the game map are being redrawn so they are all the same size.
ALC says it still has faith in Geonomics, the company behind the game.
"There is no change to the status of our investment," said Pringle-Carver.