YouGov looked at lucky draw competitions run in the UAE to understand a little more about who takes part and what they may want from such draws in the future.
YouGov surveyed a nationally representative sample of 1,000 members of the public across the UAE, drawn from its own panel of research respondents. Individuals were interviewed anonymously online during October 2020. The poll discovered that 83 per cent are either very or somewhat interested in participating in lucky draws, specifically, the Big Ticket Abu Dhabi Duty-Free or the Dubai Duty-Free Millennium Millionaire draws.
However, only 29 per cent say they actually buy a ticket in at least one of the draws every month while a further 39 per cent say they play less often, and 32 per cent say they never play in either draw.
Even among those that say they have never bought a ticket, 60 per cent are somewhat or very interested in doing so, showing a great deal of latent demand.
Those that say they buy a ticket at least once a month are more likely to be higher earners – of those earning over AED 25,000 we find 34 per cent play ‘Big Ticket’ at least monthly and 27 per cent play ‘Millennium Millionaire’. Younger people are more likely to play every month (33 per cent of 18-24s play monthly) but the largest group of players are those aged 25-34 who make up 37 per cent of all monthly players. Women play less frequently and are more likely to say they have never played. Of all nationalities, it is Emiratis who are more likely to have played either game in the past month (35 per cent) though they make up only 14 per cent of all players, and more of those from any nationality living in Abu Dhabi than in Dubai play each month (32 per cent vs 28per cent).
The games appeal to an interesting group: among those more likely to play each month are new car buyers (37 per cent), regular donators to charity (36 per cent) and fast food eaters (44 per cent). Ticket buyers are also more likely to say they ‘don’t mind taking risks with my money’, with 48 per cent agreeing compare with only 36 per cent of those that don’t buy tickets.
Overall, 65 per cent of the population say they actually would prefer to buy cheaper tickets for smaller prizes rather than more expensive tickets for larger prizes. For those who buy tickets monthly this drops to 60 per cent but for those who never play it rises to 72 per cent (and up further to 80 per cent for women who never play) suggesting a cheaper ticket may be a way of engaging more people to play.
With the launch this year of the Mahzooz lottery it will be interesting to monitor the impact, if any, on the popularity of these two prize draw games.
