Introduction
Lotto New Zealand has been operating national lottery games since the 1980s, and today turns over more than a billion dollars a year. With thousands of terminals and kiosks, it runs the largest retail network in the country. To sustain that growth, accurate, timely customer and sales data is essential. Lotto NZ partnered with WhereScape to build a modern data warehouse on WhereScape RED, making marketing decisions easier and improving customer insight.
Pre-WhereScape Challenges
- Aggregated, shallow reporting: Existing systems only provided high-level sales totals, not detailed views by area, store, or customer.
- Limited customer intelligence: Without granular data, it was hard to understand behaviour or target marketing effectively.
- Outdated, inefficient data flows: Data collection and reporting were slow and cumbersome, with no stable, centralised warehouse.
- Unrealised BI investment: Previous attempts to improve business intelligence had not delivered tangible, usable value to the business.
Why WhereScape?
Lotto NZ knew its sales data held the key to sharper customer engagement, but the tools and architecture in place couldn’t deliver the detail or speed required. After trying ad hoc solutions without real payoff, the organisation turned to WhereScape. WhereScape RED, combined with expert guidance from the WhereScape team, offered a way to rapidly design and implement a new data warehouse that could capture detailed sales information and power meaningful reporting for marketing and management.
“WhereScape came in, asked the right questions, and helped us understand our customers”.
– Brett Cross, GM, Technology, Lotto
The Solution
Delivering Detailed Sales Analysis
Using WhereScape RED, Lotto NZ and WhereScape delivered comprehensive Sales Analysis within just 12 weeks. Management gained specialised views of sales by channel, region, store, product and time, providing the depth needed for sophisticated marketing campaigns and retail decisions.
Building a Stable Reporting Platform
WhereScape RED became the core platform for recording and reporting, replacing inefficient, fragmented data processes. The new data warehouse provides a stable, functional reporting environment that can grow with the organisation and its network of terminals and kiosks.
Making Information Accessible for the Business
The solution ensures detailed sales data is available and accessible to business users, not just analysts. Lotto NZ can now slice, dice and analyse information quickly, supporting daily operational decisions as well as longer-term strategy.
Results
🚀 Real-Time, Accessible Sales Data
- Detailed sales data is now available when the business needs it.
- Information is accessible to a wide range of stakeholders, not just technical teams.
- Trends at area, store and customer level can be analysed with confidence.
🚀 Faster, Repeatable Reporting
- Automated and manual reporting is significantly faster and more reliable.
- Reports are repeatable, consistent, and no longer depend on one-off data pulls.
- Management and marketing teams can self-serve without constant IT intervention.
🚀 Integrated View Across the Business
- Data from disparate systems and business areas is automatically collected and stored centrally.
- The organisation has a unified view of sales performance – right across New Zealand.
- Integrated data supports more effective targeting and customer communication.
🚀 Better Decisions, Less Effort
- Accurate, timely information makes marketing decisions easier and more evidence-based.
- Leadership can act on insights rather than intuition when planning campaigns and promotions.
- The data platform continues to evolve with the business, supporting new reporting needs over time.
“Previously it was difficult and time consuming to access data. Now that WhereScape are involved, those problems have disappeared”.
– Wayne Pickup, CEO, Lotto NZ
Deeper Insight Into Customer Behaviour
With WhereScape RED automating its data warehouse, Lotto NZ can explore how customers engage across thousands of touchpoints. Instead of relying on high-level figures, the team can see how different regions, stores, and channels perform, and how players respond to campaigns or new products.
Turning BI Investment Into Real Value
Before partnering with WhereScape, Lotto NZ had invested in business intelligence without seeing real, day-to-day benefits. The new solution changes that. By focusing on delivering a working Sales Analysis environment in 12 weeks, the project demonstrated tangible value quickly and built trust in the data.
A Trusted, Ongoing Partnership
WhereScape continues to work alongside Lotto NZ as reporting needs evolve. The platform is designed to be flexible and to support best-practice agile project approaches, making it easier to add new data sources, refine models, and create additional subject areas as the business and its marketing strategy develop.
Better Data, Better Marketing
With integrated, detailed data at their fingertips, Lotto NZ’s marketing and management teams can run more targeted campaigns, test ideas, and respond quickly to market changes. Data is no longer a bottleneck; instead it’s a core enabler of how Lotto NZ connects with its customers and drives the business forward.
