Although Florida Lottery sales have picked up and the numbers are very positive, they are facing new challenges to improve sales.  This gaming system helps to provide around $1.2 billion for public schools each year and is a very important  source of extra cash for them, however their doing good is still not enough, it seems.

According Florida Lottery representatives, they have announced  that ticket sales reached $4 billion for the last fiscal year, the first time sales were over $4 billion since 2009. Also, scratch-off ticket sales hit $186 million last month, beating the previous monthly record of some $173 million set in 2007. Powerball lottery

However a forecast by state economists last month showed Lottery sales have had a tendency to reach a plateau,  this happened  in 2007-2008 after peaking at $4.2 billion.  According to their projections the Lottery will sell about $4.1 billion tickets this year, an increase of just about  $100 million.

Part of this increase in revenue is contemplated by changes in the Lottery games, with one major change impacting the popular Powerball game, a multi-state game that Florida joined in 2009. In January, Florida will raise the price of its Powerball tickets from $1 to $2, and $3 for those using the “powerplay” option to potentially increase their prizes.  This change in price will also come with an improved jackpot of $40 and will have better odds at winning the top prize – 1 in 175 million instead of 1 in 195 million. Mega lottery

Although this increase in price is likely to generate more money for state, projections anticipate a 35% drop in ticket sales.  Also it is projected that Powerball will have a high impact on Lotto so it is anticipated that it will drop to $366 million  a total cut of $46 million.

Powerball, which hit a low revenue of $393 million last year, is projected to grow to $434 million in sales this year.

However the target of all of these projections is to be able to be able to increase contributions to Florida schools, last year it registered a fall to $1.18 billion and for this year it is projected to be $1.2 billion.  

Another strategy is to increase the number of retailers from 13,270 to 13,700.  And a month ago, as part of a pilot program the Lottery became the first one to partner-up with Walmart. 

With all of these implementations, the Florida Lottery aims to be able to be equipped with the right strategy to be able to reach their target contributions designated specially for public schools.