Not only casinos have been affected so far by the pandemic, lotteries in Colombia have also seen how the decisions and the reality of the country have put their business model in check.
In fact, Loteria del Quindio's vendors are worried as they are observing a drop in their physical sales as a consequence of the current national strike in Colombia. The main reason for the reduction in sales is since the printing of tickets is done in different areas of the country, and these have not been able to be transported as multiple land routes are closed for the moment.
"It was much more complex the second week, we stopped selling 40,000 fractions in relation to May 6. This strike came at an unfortunate time because we aspired to increase sales after starting with the new prize plan" assured the manager of the Lottery of Quindio, Rocio Acosta Jimenez.
The affectation created a decrease in sales of 30% in the last draw held last Thursday, May 13. In fact, new logistic strategies had to be implemented to collect the tickets, taking them to El Edén airport.
The collection to Health suffered a decrease of 17.65% with respect to 2019, the collection of 1.4 billion corresponds to the revenues of 2020.
Even Armando Cardona, lottery operator of Quindío added that the situation is not only hurting the people of the area, but the whole country: "This strike has affected everyone, and we are no strangers to the moment. The lotteries are not arriving because of the traffic jams on the national highways, there are no tickets to sell. We have stopped receiving the daily newspaper".
The Quindío lottery is not the only one that has seen a drop in sales. The national strike also affected other national lotteries such as those of Medellín, Bogotá, Cruz Roja, Santander or Manizales.
On the other hand, the Tolima lottery modified its prize plan and improved the chances through the incorporation of new staggered modalities where there will be a dozen different ways to win without changing the price of the ticket, looking for strategies to create products that reactivate sales in these complex times that the country is going through at a social and biosecurity level.
"Our goal has always been to work for health, which is why today we want to have a game that encourages sales for the benefit of the more than 10 thousand lottery sellers in Colombia, while generating more resources for the health sector of the people of Tolima and Colombia," said the manager of the Tolima Lottery, Victoria Castillo Gonzalez.
Every Monday more than $5,400 million (about US$ 1,500,000) will be awarded, divided into a $2,000 million (US$ 550 thousand) jackpot, three 'SecoRevancha' of $70 million (US$ 20 thousand) and a $15 million (US$ 4 thousand) win, two 'Quincenazos de la Tolima' of $24 million (US$ 6. 500), one 'Disfruta' of $40 million (US$ 11 thousand), one 'Vive' of $20 million (US$ 5,500) and 10 'Emprende' of $5 million (US$ 1,360).
