National Lottery operator Allwyn is on the hunt for community-minded National Lottery retailers for its new ‘Local Retail Champions’ campaign. Members of the public are being asked to nominate retailers who have gone above and beyond to support their community.
With total prizes worth £140,000 up for grabs, ‘Local Retail Champions’ will recognise and reward over 100 National Lottery retailers across the UK and the Isle of Man.
Winners could include those who deliver to customers unable to reach the shop or who have widened their aisles to accommodate wheelchair users, or retailers who support or sponsor local sports clubs, who focus on stocking locally produced products or who organise local litter-picking sessions.
The prizes are:
- Two overall winners will scoop a cash prize of £5,000*, plus a ‘social value store makeover’ worth £20,000. The makeover will help the shop do more for its customers, community or environment. For example, it could fund energy efficient fixtures, pay for lessons for staff who want to use sign language, or refurbish space designed for community use.
- 16 regional winners will be awarded £5,000* each.
- 100 runners-up will receive a £100 cash prize.
Working with publisher, Reach plc, ‘Local Retail Champions’ will be promoted across a wide range of consumer-facing national and regional publications and websites, and the competition will be supported on National Lottery retailers’ in-store media screens.
Retailers can also spread the word about the competition face-to-face with their customers and encourage their shoppers to vote for them via their store social media channels by directing them to the campaign website, with Allwyn providing guidance to retailers on this.
The initiative is being paid for with money from Allwyn’s dedicated Social Value Fund, which is an annual £1m that the company has committed to using to support operating The National Lottery in an environmentally and socially responsible way.
National Lottery operator Allwyn‘s CEO Andria Vidler said: “Retailers are the heart and soul of their communities. By selling tickets, we have more than 40,000 National Lottery retail partners helping us to raise an average of over £30 million each week for National Lottery-funded projects. But they also support their local areas in many other ways.
“That’s why we are delighted to launch the Local Retail Champions campaign, through Allwyn‘s Social Value Fund, which will recognise those National Lottery retailers who go that extra mile to give back to their communities. We can’t wait to see all the fantastic stories and urge every one of our retail partners to share details of the campaign with their customers and get involved – as there are some brilliant prizes up for grabs!”
To nominate a local retailer, a customer must be 18 or over and should write up to 150 words before 20 October on how their local National Lottery retailer has made the community a better place. To find out more about the campaign, visit www.TNLLocalRetailChampions.co.uk.
*Or cash equivalent to their local charity partner
