What is old will be new again

John Martin of Maryland Lottery welcomes the New Year with new games and a whole year of 50th Anniversary mojo ahead.

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

lottery, maryland, play, week, numbers, game, years, people, logos, hot dog, ravens, baltimore, mobile, super bowl, coney island, dollars, promotions, happy new year, december, november

SPEAKERS

John Martin, Nestor Aparicio

Nestor Aparicio  00:00

What about W en s t Towson Baltimore and Baltimore positive still broadcasting a fantastic mono sound and a 1570 into the new year. And happy new year to you. We’re getting ready for all sorts of things but I’ll tell you what the Maryland crabcake tour and it did have at one crabcake and we’ll crab Imperial during the holidays off of the crab cake tour, so I don’t just eat crab cakes on the crab cake tour, but I will be next week at CHI and a Coney Island hot dog in White Marsh moving from Highland town. First visit we had a little snafu back in the summer we’ve rescheduled I’ll have some holiday cash traps left over from Ross to give away also our friends at Goodwill and when donation that is next Thursday in Whitemarsh John Mark joins us now it is our first visit of the new year. John I want you to know that a bit right before this my wife had some leftover pan atony from wise markets but she put in front of me I’m chewing I’m drinking some coffee from ROFO and you haven’t you know do my thing here and I sit there I got Jonathan it’s just like that we win that we win we win the jackpot I’m like I know I already checked I know that jackpot rolled so I had to break the bad news to her before she I gotta get my app out and all that. But like this jackpot thing starting to get crazy again. It doesn’t take long. Happy New Year

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John Martin  01:15

to you and Jen Nester and yes, it does not take long at all. Matter of fact, last night, although breaking news breaking news, we did have a million dollar Mega Millions winner last night in Harford County in the sleepy little Burg of White Hall at the highs store.

Nestor Aparicio  01:36

So you know this right away, right, like literally you get the information right away.

John Martin  01:40

It’s my job Nestor. It’s what I love that that’s cool. So but but I’ll tell you what. So if someone’s listening to the show, say, Hey, I went to highs, then lucky numbers are 20 520-933-4144 Mega Ball 18. And if you have those numbers, you are the million dollar winner. And you also should have played the Megaplier because with a multiplier for that million other price could have been $4 million.

Nestor Aparicio  02:09

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You know, they didn’t play the winter dat play.

John Martin  02:11

And unfortunately, I think a lot of people, you know, they’re so caught up in the big numbers that they missed the you know, for an extra buck, they can multiply their winnings. And in this case, he had kind of left 3 million on the table.

Nestor Aparicio  02:24

This is why we have these segments with you. So you educate people let them know when they win that, you know they need to go all in when they win.

John Martin  02:31

Well, you know it play responsibly, first of all, but boy, somebody said it was if there was $1 book, it’s a book it was, but the big bucks are 940 as we’re doing this right now it’s $940 million for the next drawing, which will be Friday and don’t forget sleepy little Powerball, which is up to 291 million we’ll have well over a billion dollars of jackpots in play in the days ahead.

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Nestor Aparicio  02:56

So last couple of weeks, I’ve made you a little uncomfortable because it was still last year it was December. And I get out ahead of things right. I mean, Carol would keep me up to date and I would know what’s going on. You even winked at me last year and so we’re doing a 50th anniversary and I was bringing up a couple times last year and you’re like oh no not ready not Can we talk about it now? Are we ready? To finally how can

John Martin  03:18

we talk about it? Yeah, let’s let’s do some of that magic that I know you can do it how’s this with this finely honed show is not rehearsed? We’re going off the reservation here. Can you bring up MD lottery.com

Nestor Aparicio  03:28

I can I keep bringing up empty lottery.com Let me give me one moment and

John Martin  03:33

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lottery.com ready to try to fill the time How about that?

Nestor Aparicio  03:37

No no we don’t have to listen I’ve seen all the commercials I’m singing along I’m seeing winners it’s got its people in and I’ve seen all this oh there you go Hey,

John Martin  03:46

I hear we had a million dollar winner

Nestor Aparicio  03:47

sold him Whitehall at the highs

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John Martin  03:49

wow wow so coming up hopefully in our next run here hang on hang on not not this one of those lovely lovely ladies from Phoenix split the power

Nestor Aparicio  03:59

for 15,000 There they learn more. I want to learn more. There’s 50 years it’s been fun and games around here. Thanks for playing my favorite part of coming and visiting you is seeing all 50 years of the promotions on the wall and all the old logos that’s fine

John Martin  04:14

yeah, that’s a hoot but but if your your your listeners and viewers want to want to play along for the next several months, just refresh this page and you’ll be able to you’re doing well there keep keep scrolling

Nestor Aparicio  04:26

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Fun Facts where the money goes historical photos 50th anniversary perspective. We’re celebrating with exciting prizes and promotions. Oh looking at the wishbone the wish bounce back

John Martin  04:37

well it’d be back in February so our scratch off in February but you know we’ve got lots of new prizes new games new promotions. cosplays back of

Nestor Aparicio  04:47

course we got it’s baseball season soon, right? Yep. Oh, look at the old logo. The old black and white wishbone that’s, that was my favorite lottery logo that reminds me of my childhood.

John Martin  04:57

Coming in March you’ll have the chance to purchase scratch offs with all logos on there. So we’ll have lots of fun. And then we’ve got some things that maybe you’ll see on the radio wave. So, again, the takeaway from all this is, is a big thank you to our players, to our retailer partners to our, our, our vendor partners, all the people who cares to to play along with us, and it’s gonna be a lot of fun going to be a lot of fun.

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Nestor Aparicio  05:23

All right, so John Martin is here. It is sports wagering season as we get into these playoff games and all that stuff. What I want to stay on the lottery side of scratch off in New Year, and this 50th anniversary celebration, you’re going through yours in sort of the making to do this. There are there are, are there how many lotteries have made it 50 years? So you guys like the sixth or seventh lottery or ever? Right?

John Martin  05:46

I think I think we’re the eighth lottery. So you know, theoretically, and there are some people who are, you know, they just celebrated Obviously, last year and 22 was their fifth year Pennsylvania. I mean, this the evolution of lotteries was very much a migratory path. I mean, Lewis and Clark should have been lottery people because as they migrate, you notice that little historical reference there

Nestor Aparicio  06:09

I got that seeking

John Martin  06:10

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I got Yes. So yeah. 1973 So we’re this is our 50th year now. But Ohio will be 74. So I mean, you know, as you keep going along West, you’re almost adding another lottery to so with this would be the eighth lottery that is celebrated 50 years or more.

Nestor Aparicio  06:27

See, what’s cool about this is you’re from Ohio, I’ve been here the whole time, right? I’m 54. Louder has been going since 73, I was four years old. All of the logos and all of the history and all of that it, you know, there’s such anchors, and that would be the case here for old Maddy Bo signs or you know, whatever, that’s older, that’s gone away, that comes back again, the hammer jam had the Amberjacks people, nobody’s seen that sign in 25 years. But if you’ve seen that big yellow hammer, you even remember it. I think the 50 years of doing this, there is a heritage here that you’ve inherited is a relatively newest director of the Merrill lottery, that I think you’ve had a rich well to sort of reach from as you walk around your own building, you see the history of your of your, your agency, little

John Martin  07:14

you know what, and I’ll share with you a timely story that will that will be boring to everyone else. Hopefully you won’t be bored. But this morning, I was taking out the garbage it was garbage day at the Martin household. So don’t think that there’s no job too menial, that my wife won’t say take out the garbage on your way out the door. So I’m leaving the condo and a woman gets on with her little dog because it’s time for the dog to take a little walk. And not a woman I’ve seen in the building. But I know I know. She’s a resident, and she smiles and smile back and she says to go into work. I said yes. She said, Where do you work? I said, I worked downtown. I don’t get into it. And she said, Oh, who do you work for us? I work for the state. And she said, Well, I used to work for the state, really. And she tells me the agency I said, oh well now that she’s opened up, I worked for the lottery. I used to work for the lottery. And so Incidentally, this random meeting, this woman worked, you know, 25 years ago at the Maryland lottery. So you know, there’s there is a heritage and I respect that. And there are a lot of people, whether they were players, employees, vendor partners, you know, the Maryland lottery means something to a lot of people here in the state of Maryland. And we are stewards of that legacy. And And my hope is that we just don’t screw it up on my watch, and that we’re able to hand it off to the next generation of leaders.

Nestor Aparicio  08:23

Well, there’s also some news we’ve talked about. And I feel like I need to bring this up again, because my wife and I do talk about the lottery. You’re not just the sponsor, she plays it’s fun. We have a good time the whole deal. But she she said to me, she used the exact same terminology I use last week I will have you know about the big air machines that had the balls and the suction device that pulled the ball out that you had to turn them six and eight or nine you had to look at it seems zero or what was what it was. Right. She also said to me, they don’t do that anymore. She said that this week, and I’m like, well, they just stopped last week. So it’s good that you would ask about this. But I want to give you a little bit more option to talk about that. Because I bet this young lady that you ran into the work for lottery a bunch of years ago doesn’t know about this give me the Jeremy’s computer generated the thing that we see when we’re a Costas and look up when the the you’re you’re playing Keno right, like literally, it’s randomly generated right there you

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John Martin  09:21

go random number generator RNG. All right. And this is a system that’s been in place for several years. We’ve been using it in Maryland since we launched Keno back in the in the early 90s. So it’s not a new technology. And today there are over 30 lotteries in the United States and Canada that use our NG to generate the daily numbers. And the reality is is it isn’t a lot of businesses that over time, you know costs and some of the traditional methods tend to increase and you have to look at more cost effective ways to do that. And we had a great partner with our television partner and it’s no surprise WB al are the folks that we worked with I knew in a great relationship and it came to a time at the end of that contract that we had looked for ways as a lottery to manage not only our cost base, but you know, what are the things that really worked best for us. And over several years, the viewership on television has declined as people went to mobile phones and our app to look at the numbers. You know, they knew when the store is posted winning numbers.

Nestor Aparicio  10:23

Well, in the old days, it was a destination thing, right? Like, literally, if you want, you can watch the number being drawn at seven o’clock 730 Whenever 740 whenever it was, in the evening. And I that is interesting that as to how many people play versus how many actually want to watch the draw. Right?

John Martin  10:41

Yeah, and I understand from a player’s perspective, it is about the integrity right. I mean, that’s really what they’re saying is hey, is it on the here we go, Nestor is it on the up and up?

Nestor Aparicio  10:50

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Thank you. That’s reference to my dad and 2020 going there, you appreciate that. There you go.

John Martin  10:54

And, and the reality is RNGs are extremely secure, they extremely reliable, extremely safe. I mean, we’ve did all the due diligence, when you have more than 30 of 45 lotteries doing something it’s not a fad. You know, it’s it’s it’s an established business practice, and it will save us significant dollars in labor and resources in an out of pocket, and still provide a variety of options and flexibility to players. The games haven’t changed same games, same odds, same times, same drawers, and now they can go to our YouTube channel to actually see a video animation of the same thing we’ve been we’ve been created the animation nester, I don’t know if you’ve had a chance to see it, we take these machines and graphically depict the same process. So the balls look like they’re coming through the tube. And there they are on the screen. So it’s, you know, from from a player’s perspective, nothing really changed. They can still get the numbers they just have to go to a YouTube channel now to view it or they can look at their phone, they can download the app and get the numbers and certainly the numbers aren’t displayed retail but all things considered it’s been a very smooth transition.

Nestor Aparicio  12:02

Well everybody’s familiar with this whether you’re at an Oracle game seeing the shell game, you know on the screen or whether you go into a casino and you play any number of you know video based applications to play. John Martin is here I use the director of all things Maryland lottery gaming, I’m gonna have some holiday cash drops still left to get away because it still feels like the holidays. I say pan atony a minute ago, so we’re gonna be at G and a Coney Island hot dog doing the crab cake tour with Andy who was had his business with his family in Highland town for a million years. million Coney Island hotdogs on the way out to Morial stadium for colts and ravens care colts and ravens and Orioles games I should say back in the 70s. Now out in White Marsh. We’re looking forward to doing that next Thursday as well. Sports wagering any any updates things to say me mobile that was so 2022 right now they’ve been they’ve been here seven weeks. But it does feel like I guess for the people that are playing it feels like they waited a long time and the ads are still here. All that’s still happening. And fantasies over now. They had their Super Bowl last week and so people can settle anywhere. And if you want to bet the game this weekend, it’s all available. You’re in the great state of Maryland. Absolutely. The

John Martin  13:12

results for the month of December will be available on January 10. So when we talk next week, I should have the first full month because remember when we launched in November, and they launched on November 23, we only had basically eight nine days of sports wagering in November when we reported the numbers in December so this will give us a good barometer. Hopefully some of the promotional spend will be more in line that remains to be seen but we know going into the the the marks of the Super Bowl we’re still gonna see a lot of heavy promotion from the sports books we’re gonna see a lot of play from very eager fans who are going to live and die with the with the ravens, soap opera as that continues for the next several weeks, and we’ll see how that plays out. And then there’ll be a little lull I would expect after Super Bowl not very long until March Madness heats up again. So we’ve got a lot of things happening over the next two, three months. Maybe bring on a couple other new entrants either on the retail or the mobile side. Right now we’re we have seven mobile operators and nine brick and mortar locations. That may not change before March Madness, but if it does, or maybe one or two added on on either side of the ledger, and then we have a lot of work in 2023 We’ve got a lot more applicants to get through and and I think the steady climb will be towards next football season in September. So we’ve got several months to work through and get these other entities licensed and up and running.

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Nestor Aparicio  14:42

John I put out and you know this with Chris and the folks at Greenmount station when they came online and Carroll County did a show out there the day literally that they open with that parks and this was still bricks and mortar which is so 10 weeks ago right literally won me through what you it’s Back are what you saw in November and maybe into December and into the future. Let’s just say there was a million dollars bad in September. And that’s the wrong number. There’s 100 million, whatever it was, that spent all of it had to be I got in my car I drove to live, or I went up to Perry, Ville, Barstow, wherever you had gone at that point, the percentage and how quickly that’s going to change to this and to mobile in regard to total handle brought in on any, not just a Sunday, I mean, any given month, I would think that December, the thing would skew even more toward mobile, am I correct in saying that, and that you’re fully expecting it to be a majority mobile handle? Is that correct?

John Martin  15:44

That is correct. And we have the benefit of looking at a number of jurisdictions that have already gone through these cycles. So we’re the beneficiaries of knowing what to expect and, and eagerly rolled back even to November, you know, the first three months, between November 1 and November 22, the brick and mortar locations, were having a pretty good month, since they’ve been in place for just about a year at that point, it was probably going to be their best month ever. And then once we flip the switch on November 23, you can see the pendulum swing hard and fast to the other direction to the mobile platform. Which is why when we get December’s full month, the first of the 31st and both platforms in play, I would expect about a almost a 10 to one ratio, you know, and then you’d have the vast majority of that spend being on the mobile side to to the retail side and one wow, that’s huge. You know, it could be I mean, it’d be eight but it’s not good to. Right, right. Yeah. Right. Right. And that’s, you know, that’s that’s the reality and you know, that that will not really determine or be determined by the sports calendar, because you know, that thing’s gonna rise and fall. So whether you’ve got a Super Bowl on the calendar, or it’s the middle of June and you have nothing on the calendar, you’re still gonna see that that proportion of nine to 110 to one being in play regardless of what’s what the actual betting options are.

Nestor Aparicio  17:07

John Martin is here he is the Director of the Maryland lottery and gaming keeping us informed of all thanks 50th anniversary, new games, new technology, plus those sports wagering and mobile and all the licensing and all the other stuff that’s going to happen. Your plates full. Oh, and we’ve got jackpots of hundreds of millions of dollars. Is there anything that we haven’t got here this week? Yeah, you know what, things over there.

John Martin  17:30

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A couple of things just to throw out there. And let’s kind of you know, this last week we snuck in for new scratch off. So for those of you that are scratch off players, we have available for us a number of new options at a $20 price point A $50,000 Cash game at a $10 price point, a game called six figures and these are all scratch offs at the $5 price point a game called Cash Money top prize $50,000 And at the $1 price point a fun game called match to win. So they’re at the top price $1,000 So those are some some new scratch offs entering the marketplace. So just this last week, but you know, we did wrap up our ravens promotion, we did finally pick all entrance so now the next step is for six lucky Ravens fans. They will now sit in wait through the playoffs, and we will invite them typically to m&t Bank Stadium at a date to be determined and one of these lucky six will win 20 years of ravens season tickets and let me just mention very briefly we had Angelo country no familiars were Millersville. Barnard Lulay from Baltimore. And these are two of the six Ron Mullen from Grafton West Virginia. I hope he’s not wearing a Steelers. Boy, that could be trouble. Teresa Bard from Elkton, Maryland, I hope she’s not wearing your Eagles Jersey boy you know what we should have qualified this. Thomas Barker from Laurel, Maryland, and last of the six t a Beverly from Baltimore. So one of those lucky six wills at a date sometime and we did we do it right after a Super Bowl. Win 20 years of season where were you 20 years ago?

Nestor Aparicio  19:11

Oh, at the Ravens game. Oh, free. We just won the Super Bowl. Things were getting not so good. We I think we had drafted Chris Redman, that that we were about to Cabo or was about to come aboard. So yeah.

John Martin  19:28

Wow.

Nestor Aparicio  19:30

Look how far we’ve come. Look at how far we’ve got. Hey, I’ll bring up the Browns don’t get me started. We’re in the playoffs around here. I get one more week. I get to say we’re in the playoffs around here.

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John Martin  19:40

Yes, you are. Yes, we are. Oh,

Nestor Aparicio  19:43

Lamar. You know, I don’t know it’s football season. And by the way, the tragedy the other night to just kind of unbelievable, you know, they’d be on the field thing and football has been so good. And then this happens and we’re in sort of that weird point here. It is New Year’s and the Ravens tickets look just like this. I fill out a handful of these left as well.

John Martin  20:02

They’re so good. They’re so good. Please hand them out because even though we finished up our second chance drawings, the game is still viable. And thank you for letting me make that information known don’t give up on it just because the second chance contest is over. You still have cash prizes on the $2 ticket up to $20,000. And then the $5 ticket up to $100,000. So many cash prizes still available.

Nestor Aparicio  20:23

All right, well, we’ll make sure we give a bunch of those away we’re gonna be out at G and a Coney Island hot dog. Don’t get the leftovers and win some big dough. We’re gonna be out in White Marsh, and by all means stop by get a hot dog if you’re in White Marsh, nothing else. I haven’t had one of Andy’s hot dog while I had breakfast at his place. The week he opened but I haven’t had a hot dog for Mandy since he was in Highland town. So we’re gonna call it the hot dog and crabcake tour. Or we’re gonna be doing that next Thursday at a GNA Coney Island hot dog show brought to you by our friends at the Maryland lottery and gaming as well as our friends at Goodwill. And when did ah, John, take care of yourself. I have one more week to get together with you when the Ravens season is still alive and then then we all get nervous on the weekend of wildcard activity around here. Hope you have a great week. Happy New Year to you. Happy New Year to you. Thanks Nestor and good luck to my wife $800 million. She’s in there already ready to go play. I am Esther we are WNS TA and 1570 Towson Baltimore, Powerball and Mega Millions. The Baltimore positive.com Stay with us happy new year.