The fresh and innovative approach which Gluto.com has brought to the online lottery world is very much a part of a movement to give power back to the people. Gluto.com’s premise is all about helping its members win more, more often, when playing the EuroMillions Lottery. We provide a way of playing the lottery which, amongst other attractive benefits, increases the members’ chances of winning by 3600%, or 36 times. The way we do this is essentially through collective buying power. In other words, by playing the lottery as part of a Gluto.com syndicate (also known as a lottery pool), more rows and combinations are purchased, and therefore our members win more, more often!

While Gluto.com is new and the website is innovative, collective buying power, or collective action, is something which has been spoken about for many years. It was first discussed by Mancur Olson Jr., an American economist and social scientist, in his 1965 book The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups. In the book, he theorized that “only a separate and ‘selective’ incentive will stimulate a rational individual in a latent group to act in a group-oriented way”. In other words, a benefit or offer aimed exclusively at a group will encourage other individuals to join and contribute to the overall group. This theory is very much a fundamental within the origins of Gluto.com, where we have developed the platform so that the benefits available from playing in a Gluto.com syndicate, contra playing as an individual, are vast. Furthermore, the way the site has been designed, the more people that sign up as ‘referred friends’, the more the members who referred them can win, by earning extra syndicate shares. So, the emphasis is very much on group dynamics.

This theory can certainly be seen in a number of new websites being launched based on collective online buying. In the US, one website which has received rave reviews is Groupon (www.groupon.com), launched less than two years ago with the simple objective of helping consumers save money through collective action. In a nutshell, new ‘deals’ are posted daily on the site and if a certain number of people sign up for the ‘deal’ or offer that day, then the deal becomes available to all. However, if not enough people sign up for that offer, then no one gets the deal that day. Deals range from cooking classes at half price to half price bus trips, to even include fantastic prices at local restaurants. As the company itself states, “We sell stuff we want to buy”, effectively ensuring that the offers available have a mass consumer appeal. Other services based on collective buying power include BuyWithMe (www.buywithme.com), which was launched last year, while closer to home in Europe, is a site called MyCityDeal (www.mycitydeal.co.uk).

Thus, as part of this growing global movement, we at Gluto.com wanted to salute those others who are giving the ‘power back to the people’.