The new face of Allwyn wants to make the lottery feel like a lifestyle

Khalid Reede Jones doesn't see a lottery ticket as a piece of paper with numbers on it. He sees a school lunch, a teacher's paycheck, a VIP experience nobody else can buy. That reframing runs through everything he told us, from his years running the Virginia Lottery to his newest role as CEO of Allwyn North America, and it's building toward one big bet: that the lottery isn't just a game of chance. It's a lifestyle brand waiting to happen.

A ticket becomes something bigger

Jones traces that shift back to his time at the Virginia Lottery, where he found himself in rooms with the governor, state legislators, and everyday citizens, all invested in the same mission. He recalls:

I interfaced with everyone in Virginia, from the Governor, legislators, and everyday citizens, all of whom were deeply invested in what the Lottery was doing. I hadn't quite experienced that before, and it gave me such a profound sense of purpose.

That purpose rewired how he looked at the smallest transaction at a corner store:

Where most people walked into a store and just saw lottery tickets, my vision quickly transformed to looking at those same tickets as new school facilities, school lunches, educator support, and as a true engine for K-12 public education in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

A ticket, in his telling, was never just a ticket. It was already a stand-in for something bigger, a value proposition waiting to be unlocked.

Building the lottery of tomorrow

That instinct for reinvention shows up in the numbers. The Virginia Lottery generated more than $900 million for public education in fiscal year 2025, and Jones credits a mindset, not a single initiative, for the growth. "I'm most proud of the fact that we thought transformatively about every part of the business," he says. "We were responsive to the needs of today while constantly building the lottery of the future."

He shares the proof:

We instituted innovative AI-driven customer service utensils, we brought the physical scratcher into the digital space, we introduced brand new gaming categories, and we brought functions that have been traditionally outsourced in-house, including our web development, app development, and even commercial content production.

Each move, on its own, looks operational. Together, they read like a company rebuilding itself around the player experience, not just the transaction.

Why Allwyn was the natural next step

Leaving that momentum behind wasn't easy. Jones reflects:

It was the hardest professional decision of my life to leave the Virginia Lottery. I had built a family with the lottery employees, a community with the government and business professionals that I worked with, and a true home in Virginia.

What pulled him toward Allwyn was a shared appetite for reinvention and a brand that stretches past ticket sales.

"What made Allwyn the right next move was their unbridled commitment to the mission of constant evolution," he notes, pointing to how loosely terms like "innovation" and "disruption" get used across the industry, while Allwyn has "demonstrated those values on a global scale." He also points to Allwyn's philanthropic reach beyond lottery funding, from the Community Awards partnership with F1 to the Allwyn Social Value Fund in the U.K.:

The fit with Allwyn was a natural one for me, and something that I hope to showcase here in North America.

An eye for the player experience

Few executives bring the vantage point Jones does. He's been a regulator and a private-sector advisor, and he calls that dual view "a tremendous asset."

"In some very obvious ways, I can place myself into the shoes of a regulator or a lottery director when solving problems," he explains. That instinct, he adds, mirrors how Allwyn approaches its own products: "our products and solutions are crafted from an operator mindset." It's a mindset built around how people actually live with the lottery, not just how they buy into it.

A seamless experience

That thinking shapes how Jones talks about digital sales, too. Conventional wisdom might suggest mobile play cannibalizes retail. He waves that off:

Almost everywhere where iLottery has been introduced, it has helped usher in increased retail sales. They don't just co-exist in harmony; they can actually be synergistic.

The goal, as he frames it, is one continuous experience:

Player transactions should flow seamlessly through the online and offline spaces, and there should be relatively little to no friction as people experience the lottery.

That's lifestyle language, not retail language, and it's deliberate.

The same logic extends to FastPlay, one of the industry's fastest-growing categories. "The ability to bring them to life visually through animation is fantastic," Jones predicts, and he sees speed to market as a launchpad for something more immersive: "games integrated into real-world outcomes from a gameplay mechanic perspective."

Exclusivity is the new jackpot

Nowhere is the lifestyle pitch clearer than in how Jones talks about prizing. He declares:

Exclusivity is the new jackpot. People always want things others can't have, so the surge of 'Money Can't Buy' prizing is reflective of a generational wave that values certain experiences over cash.

The goal isn't a logo on a scratch-off, he says, but "true integrated exclusive experiences" that stretch the industry's oldest promise:

The promise of the lottery has always been that winning could change your lifestyle. I see opportunities to change that value proposition to make the lottery integrated into an aspirational lifestyle.

A legacy built on people, not just prizes

Zoom out five years, and Jones pictures Allwyn North America leading "the lottery of the future," with "previously unimagined retail partnerships," and gameplay stretched past its traditional range. But pressed on legacy, he doesn't reach for a business metric. He credits a Virginia Lottery mentor, Tony Russell, whose advice stuck with him: "It's always about the people."

It's a fitting close for an executive trying to turn a ticket into a lifestyle. "I hope my legacy was that I was always about the people," he reflects.