Over the years we’ve featured a number of newly launched competition and prize draw businesses here on Loquax. These include those that have dabbled with the win a house sector as well as other services like Jumbo Win, Quid Squad and Boom Holidays. One thing that links many of them is that they all start off with the best of intentions of hoping to create big prize winners. Another thing that links them is that most rarely do. But this doesn’t stop others trying and the latest addition to try their luck is site called Kytty. According to a post on Facebook “Kytty is a new prize draw business based in the United Kingdom, dedicated to offering transformative unique, lifetyle-focused jackpots”. A visit to their recently launched website and you’ll be greeted with the opportunity to win “£2* million cash, plus £200k of perks with these carefully selected brands”. In short it’s a bit like Omaze but with cash instead of the house – and the headlining prize isn’t guaranteed!
Who Are Kytty?
Kytty is owned by Kytty Ltd, a company that was incorporated in December 2024. It has four directors, Kenneth Leitch, Charlotte Shaw, Eliiot Shaw and John Shaw. According to their “about us” page they say that they’re “not some fly-by-night operation; we’re a fully registered UK company with all the credentials to prove it”. This really doesn’t mean anything nor does it act as any kind of assurance. They go on to explain that “our leadership team is a powerful mix of experience and fresh thinking. We’ve got seasoned professionals who know the industry inside out, alongside a new wave of energetic innovators who keep things fresh and exciting”. They’re also avoiding giving away houses as they “don’t mess around with property raffles or complex prize structures. We give you what you really want, cold, hard cash”. All this sounds exactly as you’d expect from any new site trying to break into the sector. It’s good to know that they “know the industry inside out” because they’ll know firstly how hard it is to get established and how much money they’re going to need to spend in order to get this thing off the ground. They’d also hopefully know that starting small and building a loyal social media audience would be extremely beneficial.
How To Win £2Million – Maybe!
If you’d like the chance to win £2million (maybe) then you simply need to purchase tickets. For £10 you get 15 entries, £25 buys you 60 entries, £50 gets 150 entries and £150 bags a massive 640 entries. Payments can be made via Paypal, Debit Cards and Credit Cards (which really shouldn’t be permitted for pay to enter competitions as part of responsible play). Your purchased tickets not only get you entries into the main draw but also into bonus draws. Bonus Draws apparently will take place on the 14th, 17th, 18th, 19th & 20th March according to the terms plus the website states “From 10th March 2025 to 14th March 2025, you have the chance to win a £1000 cash prize every single day”. A no purchase necessary postal route is also available and details how to send an entry in via that route are given in the terms. The first main draw is scheduled to close on the 30th April 2025. As far as we can see there are no provisions to extend this closing date but there is a clause that states “if we consider it necessary to change any of the Promotion Specific Terms or Bonus Announcements during the Promotion Period, this will only be in exceptional circumstances”. We think that that clause could potentially be used if not enough tickets are sold. At the end of the promotion “all entries are entered into a random draw performed by an independent third party”.
But Will You Win Big Money?
Selling 200,000 x £10 tickets just to cover the cost of the £2million prize in 6 to 7 weeks for a brand new site with little to no social media following is a tall tall order especially as the headline prize is not guaranteed. But Kytty also need revenue to cover the £200,000 of extras, the bonus prizes, prizes being offered by social media, a charitable donation and their own expenses. So it’s a tall tall tall order. So if Kytty don’t sell enough tickets to pay out £2.2million how much will the winner potentially receive. If not enough tickets are sold then the winner will receive “100% of Mega Draw paid entry sales, less the total value of all Bonus Draw Prizes, less any Exclusive Subscriber Draw prizes, less our expenses and any applicable VAT, less the Minimum Charity Donation; and paid as a cash prize only”. The heavy lifter in this particular equation is “our expenses” because they could amount to anything depending on how much Kytty have spent on setting up the website, legal fees, wages, advertising etc. Have we seen something like this before? Well “yes” is the answer. Remember Win My Villa who set up a legal UK company and offered a £2million villa in a prize draw format very similar to Omaze? The winner of that draw only picked up £5000. Most of the income from ticket sales covered “nearly £200,000 in marketing costs”. Another example would be Win Amazing who set up a £1million house raffle. They actually guaranteed a house winner but ended up filing for insolvency owing over £100,000 to creditors.
The Millionaire Draw
If Kytty know the industry inside out then they’ll be aware of The Millionaire Draw. This is the competition site that features Stephen Webb of Gogglebox fame that launched in November 2024 and it featured in our Loquax Update. The aim of The Millionaire Draw is to “give people a real shot at life-changing prizes” and “to live the millionaire lifestyle they’ve always imagined”. They can do this by purchasing ticket bundles starting at £10. When the site launched they indicated on the website just how many bundles they’d sold but a recent revamp has seen that dropped. However a Tiktok video from December 2024 shows a screenshot of the website that says 149,834 bundles remaining out of 150,000. So that’s 166 sales made in the first 6-7 weeks of the draw. Assuming they were all minimum sales of £10 that’s not a lot of prize fund! Interestingly, following a series of free prize draws on social media, things went very quiet of The Millionaire Draw. Their social media stopped updating and it did look as though perhaps they’d given up with the project. In a quirk of fate they announced yesterday on Instagram that they’re back with a “brand new creative team and a mission to change lives”. They obviously haven’t seen Kytty (or prizes offered by That Prize Guy for example) as they also claim they are “the UK’s only £1M prize draw, and we are waiting to make our first millionaire”.
Will We See Millionaire Winners?
We’d be happy but very surprised to see either of the above sites create a millionaire winner. History is against them both and relying on a few giveaways to build an audience is a tough ask. Raffle House, who operate a very similar model to the above, regularly spend on advertising but still haven’t converted that into a full fat house winner. If you run a prize draw for a million but then end up giving away a thousand then that reflects badly on you as a brand. Initially it might be fine (“they’re new”) but eventually players will start to lose faith and take their money elsewhere. And the problem is for sites like Kytty and The Millionaire Draw is that there are plenty of opportunities for players to take their cash elsewhere. Omaze, Elite Competitions, BOTB and others may prefer to mess around with property raffles but at least the prize they put in front of the player is guaranteed. You know that if you spend £10 then up to a month later the prize that you entered for is awarded. And whilst it’s lovely to want to change someone’s lifestyle by making them a millionaire, people coming up with these ideas need to look at platforms like That Prize Guy. They’re guaranteeing to make their 9th millionaire on the 30th March. To date they’ve sold 250,000 tickets at £1.99 but should easily sell many more. However to reach the point where they can do these draws they’ve had to build an audience. That takes time and a lot of effort. If I had £10 to spend on winning a million quid or similar it’d go to a site that has a track record and that guarantees the full prize. I’d probably only consider spending money on a new site near to the competition’s closing date but not before. In our view both Kytty and The Millionaire Draw would have been better off starting with smaller prizes and competitions and growing that way. But we wish them luck and will keep an eye on how things develop during 2025.