The turmoil engulfing the Texas Lottery over the past three months may seem like a black eye for the industry, but to some insiders, it’s an unlikely sign of progress.
Speaking at the SBC Americas conference earlier this month, Lotto.com CEO Thomas Metzger suggested that recent controversies are paving the way for better regulation and long-term legitimacy for digital lottery couriers.
“What I see as the whole silver lining behind the situation in Texas…is that our business is going to be legitimized with regulations in other jurisdictions,” Metzger told the crowd during a panel titled “Lotteries – a Road to Relevance?”
Texas lottery courier ban
Metzger didn’t just sit back when the ban came down. Lotto.com took action and filed a lawsuit against the Texas Lottery, which has now been dissolved. They submitted a large amount of evidence showing that lottery officials were well aware of how courier services operate. He had even raised red flags about the questionable bulk ticket purchases at the center of the controversy while it was happening.
https://t.co/c9DXGHPTGo’s filing also detailed how CEO Thomas Metzger reached out to previous TLC Executive Director Gary Grief with his concerns about the bulk purchase. Grief did nothing at the time to halt the bulk purchase but then expressed remorse over his inaction.
— Lottery Geeks (@lotterygeeks) April 25, 2025
The evidence includes written communication from both Lotto.com and Jackpot.com with lottery officials, including former commissioner Ryan Mindell. In those messages, officials made it clear that courier services were allowed in Texas and technically outside the Lottery’s control, since the agency regulates retailers, not delivery companies.
But to Metzger and his fellow panelists, the uproar has had unintended consequences that may ultimately help the industry.
“Tom isn’t just being an eternal optimist about this,” said Mike Silveira, chief of staff at Jackpot.com. “Since the controversy started, we’ve seen states like Colorado, Arizona, Illinois, and Missouri take steps toward legalizing couriers. That’s real progress.”
The panel also featured Matt Stemkoski, an executive with the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians in Michigan, who predicted future adoption of courier services among tribal gaming operations. “I think in time, tribes will use the courier service,” he said. “I think that will be the next area of growth that the tribes will go after, once more states go live in iGaming.”
Clarifying the Texas courier model
A recurring theme in the discussion was public confusion over what courier services do.
Metzger explained that companies like Lotto.com and Jackpot.com don’t sell lottery tickets online. Instead, they take orders for ticket delivery. The courier services act as intermediaries. Customers place their orders through an app, and a company representative goes to a licensed retailer to purchase the physical tickets on their behalf.
He continued: “We’ve never gone into a state without explicit permission from that state in writing. So, in the 12 states that we’re operating in, we walked through the front door.
“We’ve been in favor of regulation for years, since we started operating.”
He added: “There’s this misconception in Texas that we were somehow operating in the shadows.”
Former lottery officials, including Mindell and Gary Grief, told lawmakers they weren’t aware of what courier companies were doing. But according to Metzger, that’s hard to believe given how closely the lottery monitors activity within the state.
“Every lottery in the country has very sophisticated central systems that monitor every terminal in the state,” he said. “The lottery most certainly knew how many terminals we had, what our sales were, what products we were offering, and we had a very, very conducive working relationship.”
Silveira added levity to the explanation, comparing lottery tickets to Uber Eats.
When asked if the situation in Texas caught the industry off guard, Silveira was blunt. “Definitely foreseeable,” he said. “They tried to do this two years ago. … These kinds of things can’t be surprises. This is what you signed up for. … You have to have thick skin in this industry.”
Metzger provided a cultural lens on Texas politics: “There are some people in Texas who think that the lottery is a sin. It’s like in the movie Footloose, where they don’t want dancing.”
Industry growth and competition
While Jackpocket, the third major courier in the space, didn’t have a representative on the panel, its presence loomed large. DraftKings’ $750 million acquisition of Jackpocket last year was hailed as a major milestone.
“It’s great for the industry,” said Silveira. “As a competitor, it’s hard for me to say that. … But, all in all, it brought the spotlight to the courier industry that it deserves.”
When asked whether the industry can support more courier entrants, Metzger replied, “We’re really focused on growing the market and increasing digital penetration.
“We don’t worry about competing with each other. There’s room for all of us.”
Lotto.com, Jackpot.com, and Jackpocket have, in fact, teamed up to create a new trade group called the Coalition of Texas Lottery Couriers.
With US lottery sales hitting $120 billion a year and only a small portion of that coming from online, the thinking is there’s plenty of room for everyone to grow. That includes not just the couriers, but also the state lotteries themselves.
Featured image: LinkedIn / Lotto.com
