Norway could provide an important test of where that journey eventually leads. Norsk Tipping will withdraw its traditional retail gaming terminals at the end of 2027, moving game entry entirely to digital channels from January 2028, although Flax scratchcards will remain available through physical retail. “Digital grew so much that there is no need for retail points of sale,” explains Gabelica.


So, does that make a largely digital model the eventual endgame elsewhere? “To one extent, yes,” she says, although she does not expect retail to disappear across Europe. “People will still like to socialise in person. You need this human touch.” Te distinction, she argues, is whether the transition is imposed or develops through player behaviour. In Norway, “it was not forced. It just came naturally.”


DIGITISING ISN’T DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION


Tere’s another important distinction between putting lottery products online and building products specifically for digital players. Gabelica has seen lotteries take physical scratchcards and recreate them - almost literally - on a computer screen, with players using a mouse to mimic scratching the physical card. It may be a first step, but it demonstrates the distance between transferring an existing product to another channel and reconsidering the experience around the possibilities of that channel.


Despite expanding into eInstants, sports betting and, where regulation allows, casino-style content, Gabelica says lotteries generally continue


to think of themselves first and foremost as lottery operators. Some have responded by developing separate digital identities. Austria provides one of the strongest examples through win2day, which sits alongside the Austrian Lotteries brand, but has developed substantial recognition in its own right.


“Everybody connects those two,” says Gabelica. “People in the market do not see them as two separate entities. Tey know win2day is online and this is Austrian Lotteries.” Elsewhere, a second brand can help separate different product verticals or address different types of player. In some jurisdictions, the separation is regulatory rather than purely commercial.


Whatever the branding strategy, trust remains one of the lottery sector’s most valuable assets. Players know the organisation behind the product and expect that winnings will be paid. But Gabelica cautions that creating a separate digital brand without maintaining a visible connection to that established identity risks surrendering some of that advantage.


THE LOYALTY GAP


Where lotteries have more catching up to do is in what happens after a player arrives. Across Europe there are around 90 million registered online lottery customers, yet Gabelica says only 22 per cent of lotteries have loyalty programmes. For an iGaming operator, where customer data, segmentation, retention and personalised offers sit at the centre of the commercial model, that’s a significant gap.


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