* Not all journalists are good at talking. Especially with someone you see for the first time. Material is required. Anyone can easily access and enjoy it,’Lotto’. It is not free from roor or specularity. However, if you focus on’people’, you can see joy, sadness, and sorrow. If you focus on’winning money’, you can talk about taxes, finances, statistics, and more.
Long lines lined up in front of lottery stores around Sanggye-dong, Nowon-gu, Seoul on the 31st of last monthIt was a long line after a long time. It was much longer than the line I stood to buy a public mask for the day of the week.
On the afternoon of the 31st of last month, a day before the New Year, about 100 people stood in a row from near the entrance of Madeul Station on Line 7 of the Seoul Subway. “Oh, what’s this short for?” A passerby asked a reporter walking around. “Lotto.”
The thought of’No way many people come to buy a lotto in the corona, cold weather? To the people who came with the hope of’unsuspecting luck in the New Year’, it seemed like a cold of minus 10 degrees was okay. The news that the first lottery winner, who won 3.43 billion won on the weekend just before, came from the store seemed to attract more people. So far, I went to a store that produced the first lottery winner 43 times and became the so-called’Lottery Myeongdang’.
Even though it was a weekday, the longer the line was over time, which had a great effect at the end of the year. The store owner said, “In general, more people buy lotto at the end of the year and at the beginning of the year,” he said. “It can be said that sales volume is about 30% compared to normal.” In the vicinity, the crackdown on illegal parking and stopping vehicles was in full swing. The police said, “Even if the CCTV is cracked down, there are many reports of illegally parked vehicles,” he said. “Most of them are cars of people who come to buy lottery, which is more early this year.”
Lotto store located in Sanggye-dong, Nowon-gu, SeoulLotto is often referred to as’a week’s happiness’ and’small luck (small but sure happiness)’. Those we talked with on this day also filled with hope for the new year in a single lotto.
Mr. A, in his 60s, who just came out of the purchase, said, “If I win, I should pay my son’s debt… (laughs)” and put it inside his wallet in case he might lose the lottery paper. Officer B, who came after the closing ceremony, also said, “Last week was bad, but if you put good energy into the new year, everything will work out.”
At the store, the number is separated into a line so that the number can be automatically picked up the day before, and a line for those who want to automatically pick up the number on the day of visit or write it manually.
Most people lined up in the latter. I didn’t mind even though I had to wait 30-40 minutes or more in the cold.
The store owner said, “It seems that I think that the chances of winning will be higher if I wait and wait in a long line,” he said. “There are a lot more people who want to buy new year luck, hope, and sincerity.”
Outside the store, mothers and fathers with strollers and young couples in their 20s and 30s also stood out. When it comes to lottery, it seems that the perception that older people were doing it was very different from the perception. When C, in his 30s, who buys lotto every week, asked where he would use the money when he wins, he said, “I want to add to my house,” and a man from Incheon said, “I want to invest in stock.” I was able to get a glimpse of the young people who bought a house and were actively investing in stocks.
Long lines in front of lottery stores around Sanggye-dong, Nowon-gu, Seoul on the 31st of SeoulThe difficulties engulfed by the Corona 19 incident in the ongoing recession were also buried. Mr. D, a self-employed person, said, “It’s been a long time since we’ve put our hands on Corona’s business,” he said. It has been said that these days it has become difficult to see people buying lottery for gifts. The store owner said, “I used to buy and distribute a lot of (lotto) worth 100,000 won each for a new year, but now it’s not the atmosphere because of the corona,” he said. “There are few people who buy for gifts.”
There was also a skeptical response to the word’reversing life with a lotto’. Mr. E, who is self-employed, said, “Look at the price of a house in Seoul these days. I wonder if I should buy a house even if I have 1 billion…”
A typical’recession-type product’ that sells better as the economy worsens. The number of people who want to greet the New Year with the energy of the lottery celebrities increased even more as the time for work neared.
According to the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, the sales amount of the 943th lottery sold on December 20-26 last year was about 101.1 billion won. The weekly sales exceeded 100 billion won in 9 years since October 2011 (1268 billion won).
Lotto sales, which remained at around 2 trillion won until 2013, have been on the rise since it increased to 3 trillion won in 2014 when the recession deepened. The annual sales of lottery in 2019 exceeded 4 trillion won for the first time in history, and 2,3082 trillion won worth of sales were sold in the first half of last year alone. The Ministry of Science and Technology expects that the 2020 lottery sales will break the record for the highest sales ever thanks to the sales tax.
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