Atlantic Lottery is a purpose-driven organization, with a deep commitment to the people and places of Atlantic Canada. We are proud of the work we do each day with our products, but also of the positive impact we have on the lives of our fellow Atlantic Canadians. As we look back over all we accomplished and celebrated last year, we can’t help but feel nostalgic for 2024. So, we are sharing some of our most memorable moments from throughout the year:

We shone a light on gambling myths at Sommo Festival with an exciting new activation.

At Atlantic Lottery, we care about educating our players to ensure everyone has the tools they need to keep their play for fun and entertainment. Since the festivals and events we sponsor are all about fun and entertainment too, we took our PlayWise Coin Flip game to Sommo Festival to shine some light on gambling odds and myths.

Read more about how we brought this visual representation of gambling odds to life.

We gave an Atlantic Canadian a cheque for $64 million

While we awarded many prizes of varying sizes in 2024, one stands out as particularly memorable. Merel Chiasson claimed his $64-million Lotto 6/49 Gold Ball Jackpot prize just 19 days before it was set to expire one year after the draw. Talk about a close call!

More on Merel’s win can be found here.

Before Chiasson came forward to claim his $64-million prize, we sent the Lotto 6/49 Gold Ball Crier to raise awareness

Following the April 15, 2023 Lotto 6/49 draw, the $64-million Lotto 6/49 Gold Ball Jackpot remained unclaimed for 347 days. The Atlantic Lottery team always held on to hope that the winner would come forward to claim their prize, however, we wanted to ensure we did everything in our power to raise awareness around it.

So, we sent our friend, the Lotto 6/49 Gold Ball Crier, to Gloucester County to ensure residents of the area knew about the outstanding prize and to encourage adults in the area to check any unclaimed tickets they may have had.

While the Crier claims no credit in the matter, Chiasson came forward to claim his prize just days after his visit to Gloucester County.

A family-owned N.B. business celebrated a $640K seller’s prize

Merel Chiasson purchased his $64-million Gold Ball Jackpot winning Lotto 6/49 ticket at Depanneur Pokemouche in Pokemouche, N.B. Owners Chantal and Katy Mazerolle were in complete shock when Chiasson came in to check his lottery tickets to find not only had he won a $64-million prize, but that he purchased the ticket from their store too. Atlantic Lottery pays its retail partners a one per cent seller’s prize on winning tickets, meaning the retailer prize awarded to Depanneur Pokemouche was a whopping $640,000.

Read more about the seller’s prize and how it impacted this family-owned business.

We revealed a true community canvas

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As a publicly owned and purpose-driven organization, Atlantic Lottery is committed to Atlantic Canadians and their communities. In an effort to share the organization’s pride and love of this place to be enjoyed by everyone, Atlantic Lottery decided to turn its head office into a work of art dedicated to Atlantic Canada.

40 artists from across Atlantic Canada submitted eye-catching designs for the Community Canvas initiative that captured what they love most about this region. The chosen concept came from Molly Margaret, an illustrator and muralist from St. John’s and currently living in Halifax and was installed at Atlantic Lottery’s head office at 922 Main Street in downtown Moncton, wrapping the building for the next year.

Details on the Community Canvas initiative and more on Molly Margaret can be found on The Ticket.

Boo Birds arrived to share an important message about illegal online gambling

Without realizing it, many Atlantic Canadians are playing on and seeing advertising from gambling sites that are illegal to operate or advertise in Atlantic Canada under both Canadian and provincial law.

Atlantic Lottery is the only 100% legal and government-regulated provider of online gambling and sports-betting products in Atlantic Canada, making it your only legal online bet in the region.

Ever heard the term “Boo Bird” before? If you are a sports fan, you probably have. Boo Birds is a well-known sports term used to describe fans who boo their own home team when they aren’t playing up to their potential. In this spirit, the Atlantic Canadian Boo Bird was born, to deliver a clear message to every Atlantic Canadian: if you want to keep the Boo Birds at bay, support your local community by only gambling with Atlantic Lottery.

Learn more about the Boo Birds and why they chirp illegal online gambling on alc.ca.

Lotto Max held not one, not two but three record-breaking jackpots throughout the year

As of Sept. 10, 2024, Lotto Max offers players the chance to win more than ever before as jackpots can now grow as high as $80 million – that’s $10 million higher than the previous maximum and the highest jackpot any Canadian lottery has ever offered.

On Sept. 13, 2024, the jackpot grew to $75 million for the first time in history. There was no jackpot winner for the Sept. 13 draw as no ticket sold matched all seven Lotto Max numbers drawn. This resulted in the jackpot growing once again and to another record-breaking draw, featuring the first ever $80-million jackpot available for the Sept. 17 draw.

However, the excitement didn’t end there. Just two months later, the Nov. 22 Lotto Max prize pool was worth a whopping $87 million in prizes when the jackpot grew to $75 million for just the second time in history. An estimated 12 MAXMILLIONS prizes were also available, resulting in the largest prize pool ever available for any Canadian lottery draw.

The most recent story on Lotto Max record-breaking draws was featured in this article on The Ticket.

Atlantic Lottery released our 2023-24 Annual Report, and shared that we were proud to return $487 million in lottery profit to the four Atlantic provinces

In addition to the financial results outlined in the report, we also communicated how we’re taking steps forward on our social responsibility journey by developing a new ESG framework. This new framework will help us evaluate our current environmental, social and governance practices, while also exploring new initiatives.

Learn more about our game-changing impact here.

We gave back this holiday season with United Way

The holiday season is all about giving, and at Atlantic Lottery, that’s what we’re all about. We were proud to donate $10,000 to United Ways in Atlantic Canada in December 2024 to help local communities in all four Atlantic provinces.

However, we didn’t stop there—our employees volunteered their time to support various United Way initiatives, making an even bigger impact with their hands-on support all across Atlantic Canada.

Learn more about how our team gave back and how you can support your local United Way any time of year.

As you can see, there’s never a shortage of fun projects or positive initiatives happening at Atlantic Lottery. While it’s been fun to look back, it just makes us even more excited to see all that 2025 brings!