Experienced the longest market break in lottery history
Beijing Sports Lottery is on the road to restart
With the Beijing Sports Lottery Center resuming sales on May 6, the National Sports Lottery Restoration has finally completed the last piece of the puzzle. Due to the epidemic, this year's sports lottery sales have been greatly affected, and because of the suspension of world sports events, the quiz lottery has encountered the dilemma of cooking without rice. The sports lottery marketing campaign cannot be carried out, the number of customers is drastically reduced, and the consignors are retreating ... The road of sports lottery restart is not destined to be easy.
105 days for Beijing Sports Lottery
"Let's make a good start!" On the first day of sports lottery resumption, an old lotteryman who lives near Taipingqiao Road in Xicheng District told the staff. He carefully selected 5 big lottery tickets, hoping to have good luck to restart the first day to buy lottery. The reporter noticed that the shop was awkward and empty. The old lotteryman told reporters that in the past it was often crowded with lotterymen. Everyone talked about the number selection and chatting, but due to the epidemic situation, everyone now has less awareness of gathering.
On May 6, 2000, Beijing's computer-based sports lottery was officially launched. Twenty years later, the Beijing Sports Lottery Center, which was closed for the epidemic, also chose to officially resume sales on May 6. Due to the customary epidemic of the Chinese New Year holiday, the Beijing Sports Lottery will be closed for 105 days from January 22 to May 6, making it the longest holiday in the history of China's lottery.
With the improvement of the epidemic situation, sports lotteries across the country began to resume work in an orderly manner from March 11, but Beijing Sports Lottery extended the rest period. Continued waiting has put pressure on the owner of the sports lottery shop, and many people retreated. Wang Gang, a sports color shop owner in Miyun District, lit the door lights of his own outlets every night during the epidemic, illuminating the dark streets and the night sky. He explained: "I don't light up the lights, it's the biggest expectation and the strongest confidence in our Beijing sports lottery." Wang Gang wanted to make the buyers feel relieved by this move-his outlets are still there.
However, after the resumption of lottery, a considerable number of outlets chose to continue to close. Some of them are because the street where they need to pass in and out, some because the clerk has not returned to Beijing, and some shopkeepers simply returned to change routes. The impact of the epidemic will undoubtedly continue for some time, and the Chinese color market will enter a new stage after this reshuffle.
K League opens the way back
"This year is really difficult! My sports lottery sales mainly rely on quiz lottery tickets, but now there is no ball to guess, even if it is resumed, there is no sales!" Li Qiang, a sports lottery shop owner in Xicheng District, spit out the reporter. The domestic sports lottery shop first survived an extremely long period of discontinuation of sale, and finally it was possible to open the shop, but the spread of the epidemic abroad led to the failure of Jingcai and Beidan (Beijing single) events.
The most important thing for shopkeepers right now is the foreign epidemic. "I saw the Ligue 1 season cancelled a few days ago, and I'm grumbling. Fortunately, the Bundesliga can return this week." Li Qiang said that in the past three months, the competition Cai's schedule is numbered. "There are so few games. Even if there are games, they are mostly small leagues that lottery players don't like. The ones that really attract lottery players are actually the top five leagues in Europe and the US NBA. These games also support the main sales in our store."
Last weekend, the Korean Professional Football League (K-League) restarted in 2020, becoming the first major event in Asian football to restart. Reporters log on to the official website of China Jingcai and found that the K-League games have been selected into the quiz schedule. With the return of the Bundesliga and other leagues, it is believed that the vacuum period of the lottery schedule will be over.
However, this year's European Cup and the Olympic Games have been postponed to next year, which also made many shopkeepers "excited." "Originally, I also hoped that the lottery sales of the European Cup could be rushed. I didn't expect the game to be postponed until next year. My store doesn't know if I can stick to next year." Li Qiang said helplessly.
Lottery outlets face the survival crisis
In recent years, the operating pressure of lottery outlets has become increasingly prominent, and many outlets are facing a crisis of survival. China's lottery business is originally of a public interest nature, and the rebate point of lottery sales is not high. For most lottery shop owners, after excluding rent, utilities and labor costs, their profits are very limited. The reporter learned that the Beijing Sports Lottery Center will provide a subsidy of 3,000 yuan for physical lottery stores in the city.
For the front-line staff engaged in lottery sales, the most important thing is to rely on sales commissions. Good-selling shop clerks are often very close to big-ticket buyers. However, due to the epidemic situation, many large lottery buyers have chosen to "close up". Even if the lottery returns to the market, their desire to buy lotions has declined. At the same time, because of the epidemic prevention and control, the number of people in the lottery shop has dropped sharply, and it will take time to establish sales volume in each lottery shop.
In fact, national lottery sales have been declining for the past two years. According to statistics from the Ministry of Finance, a total of 422.503 billion yuan of lottery tickets were sold in 2019, a decrease of 89.418 billion yuan or 17.5% from 2018. From a nationwide perspective, except for the increase in lottery sales in Sichuan Province, all other provinces have fallen. Among them, the narrowing of policies has played a large role. After all, it is also important to maintain the normal order of the market and promote the healthy development of the lottery business.
It seems that after the restart of Sports Lottery, there is still a long way to go to restore market vitality.
Our reporter Liu Dawei and the photo together