British Columbia Lottery Corporation launches ad campaign targeting illegal markets

The British Columbia Lottery Corporation is running a new marketing campaign aimed at persuading more B.C. players to keep spending their gambling money on the province’s legal igaming website and in B.C. casinos.

Called “What’s Played Here, Stays Here,” the central message of the campaign is that all net profits from BCLC’s PlayNow casino and sports betting online platform and the province’s 33 casinos and 3,400 lottery retailers stay in B.C. and get funneled to services like education, health care and community programs.

According to H2 Gambling Capital, the global specialist gambling sector market data provider, the size of the gray online gambling market in B.C. is estimated to be CAD$440 million in GGR in 2025 – CAD$133 million from sports betting, CAD$292 million from casino gaming and CAD$15 million from lottery. That would make the offshore market 47% of the market, with BCLC at 43% (CAD$481 million GGR in 2025).

H2 utilizes sources like web traffic, affiliate traffic and search volume data to estimate market size and growth rates in regulated markets where there is no official data.

When contacted by COMPLETE iGAMING, a spokesperson for BCLC said the organization couldn’t share specific information regarding the B.C. igaming market “due to competitive interests”, but that PlayNow was well established and successful in B.C.

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In a statement, BCLC said in 2024 CAD$1.5 billion in net income was generated for the province, funnelled to public programs and services like education, B.C.’s Community Gaming Grants program supporting a range of non-profit organizations, local B.C. governments and First Nations that host a gaming facility, and the Provincial Health Special Account that supports health initiatives.