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FLORIDA LOTTO™ OFFERS PLAYERS A LITTLE SOMETHING "XTRA" TALLAHASSEE - The Florida Lottery is adding to its flagship game, FLORIDA LOTTO™, an exciting new feature called XTRA®! Similar to POWERBALL® with Power Play®, FLORIDA LOTTO with XTRA will offer players the opportunity to multiply their non-jackpot winnings by two, three, four or five times for just $1 more per play. The new feature will go on sale October 11, 2009. "Florida Lottery players have embraced the Power Play multiplier offered with POWERBALL; so much so that Florida boasts the most Power Play winners in the country, with more than 1.7 million since the game launched in January," said Florida Lottery Secretary Leo DiBenigno. "By adding this popular feature to FLORIDA LOTTO, we are able to give back to our players with increased lower-tier prizes on a longtime Florida favorite." By adding a 2-of-6 prize level, FLORIDA LOTTO with XTRA offers better overall odds of winning than the FLORIDA LOTTO base game. Players who match just two numbers will win a FLORIDA LOTTO with XTRA ticket. And, from October 11 to December 27, 2009, FLORIDA LOTTO with XTRA players who match three of six winning numbers will win $25, the 3-of-6 prize multiplied by five, regardless of the multiplier selected for that drawing. FLORIDA LOTTO with XTRA will replace the current LOTTO PLUS feature. Sales for LOTTO PLUS will end at 10:38 p.m. on Saturday, October 10, and FLORIDA LOTTO with XTRA sales will begin at 6:00 a.m. on Sunday, October 11. The Florida Lottery will continue to honor any jackpot-winning LOTTO PLUS ticket purchased prior to October 11, including Advanced Play tickets. Players who redeem an Advanced Play LOTTO PLUS ticket will receive a continuation LOTTO PLUS ticket for the remaining draws. New FLORIDA LOTTO playslips, which will be necessary to play the game, will be available at retailers statewide when the game changes take effect. FLORIDA LOTTO drawings will continue to take place on Wednesdays and Saturdays at 11:15 p.m. ET. "FLORIDA LOTTO continues to be an important part of the strategy in meeting our statutory mandate of maximizing revenues for education," added Secretary DiBenigno. One of the Lottery's first On-line games, FLORIDA LOTTO was originally introduced in April 1988 as a once-a-week, multimillion-dollar jackpot game. After 1,631 draws and more than 17 billion tickets sold, FLORIDA LOTTO is still one of the most popular games offered by the Florida Lottery and one of the strongest lotto games in the nation, even after the introduction of POWERBALL in Florida. In fiscal year 2009, the game generated $650 million in sales and $260 million in transfers to the Educational Enhancement Trust Fund (EETF). The changes to FLORIDA LOTTO are expected to generate tens of millions of dollars in additional annual revenue for the EETF. Florida voters, by a two-to-one margin, approved a constitutional amendment in 1986 authorizing the state to operate a lottery for the purpose of generating significant additional moneys for education. Since the Lottery's inception, the agency has contributed more than $20 billion to the Educational Enhancement Trust Fund. Today, Floridians continue to show their support by purchasing nearly $4 billion in Lottery products per year. For more information regarding the Florida Lottery, its games and its contributions to education, visit www.flalottery.com. # # # |
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