28 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2025 With a last name echoing the Polish Rifle (or Uncle Ron as we call him locally here in New Jersey), Simon Jaworski, Founder and CEO of Lotto Research, decided to poll a large, representative sample of Americans to discover what’s happening ‘in the huddle’ of one of America’s favorite pastimes. Since its relaunch in April 2025, the Mega Millions game has been fighting an uphill battle on various fronts, several of which are outside the games’ control. Please don’t judge me too harshly for the NFL-inspired puns in the article below. Let’s focus on the facts. 1st and 10, calling plays with statistics As of early July 2025, only half of all Americans (51%) are aware of the changes to the Mega Millions game. That means approximately a quarter of Americans who have played the previous iteration have no idea what to expect the next time they roll into a convenience store on a whim and go to buy Mega. However, men are significantly more likely to be aware of the Mega change than women, and it’s not even close. (See Fig.1). Perhaps more disconcerting is the fact only 37% of Americans are aware there is a bonus multiplier included that increases all non-jackpot wins by either x2, x3, x4, x5 or x10. (See Fig. 2). However, this is significantly higher (61%) among recent jackpot game players (past month), which means that at least a majority of the core players have seen and understood the new benefits of Mega Millions. Sadly, only 13% of lapsed Powerball or Mega Millions currently know about this play-friendly bonus multiplier feature. 1st and 15. False Start (penalty) Jackpot growth trends are currently down (See Fig.3), with the latest August jackpot about two rolls behind pre-$5 Mega levels, so one of the key questions the industry has to answer is … how do we attract former players back into Mega Millions before they stop thinking about it altogether and never play again? (I wrote a piece on this for the May/June PGRI magazine that I highly recommend reading as a complimentary piece to this. Spoiler alert of one research finding, older Americans, especially women, are finding other forms of entertainment to replace Lottery). 2nd and 5 reasons to be optimistic 1. Among Americans who have ‘ever played’ Mega Millions or Powerball, 30% say the changes to Mega Milions are positive, with only 17% saying MEGA MILLION’S FIRST MAJOR NATIONAL CONSUMER DATA SUGGESTS A GOOD ROLL (OUT) COULD MAKE IT ROCK. Simon Jaworski, Founder & CEO, Lotto Research
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