Lucky Day Competitions
That’s Farming editor, Catherina Cunnane, in conversation with Samantha Heaney, aka Sammy, Forkhill, Newry, Co. Down, from Lucky Day Competitions.
“My partner and I came up with the idea of Lucky Day Competitions in the summer of 2019 to offer people the chance of winning life-changing dream prizes, including tractors, cars, machinery, tools, technology and holidays through low-cost competitions with outstanding odds.
I have been here from the get-go as we launched our first product on the website in November 2019.
We want to give people the opportunity to win life-changing prizes at an affordable cost while providing entertaining content to our audiences along the way.
As the company director and presenter of Lucky Day Competitions, my responsibilities vary from sourcing prizes, customer relations, delivering big bundles and meeting winners, creating social media content, going to tractor runs and agricultural shows and doing live draws, as well as overseeing the company’s running.
How Lucky Day Competitions works
When we launch a prize on the website, there is a limit to the number of tickets that can be sold for any one particular prize, and there is also a draw date listed for the draw to take place for that prize.
All of that information is available to the customer to view on the website for each prize.
If someone wants to enter a draw, all they have to do is choose the draw they wish to enter, answer a simple question and then proceed through checkout.
Once their order is complete, they will receive an email confirmation of their order with their ticket numbers.
When the prize comes up to the draw date, the live draw will take place for that prize regardless of whether it has sold out or not.
The only time a draw date might change is if a prize sells out way before its draw date; we pull that draw forward to take place sooner.
In this case, entrants do not have to wait as long to find out if they have been our lucky winner.
Prizes
We can have anything up to 30 prizes up for grabs on the website at any one time, but there will be different draw dates listed on each prize.
Typically on a draw night, there can be anything from 3 to 8 prizes being drawn.
We specialise in agricultural prizes, but we have everything from large machinery bundles to classic tractors, quad bundles, kit sheds, jeeps, lorries, tool kits, tech bundles, cash prizes and holidays up for grabs.
There is something for everyone. We are always taking suggestions on board from the audience about what prizes they would like to see.
Prices vary depending on the prize and the number of entries, but ticket prices start as low as 97p.
Drawing winners
All of our draws take place live on Facebook, so customers can interact with me during the draw, and we always have a bit of fun.
We use Google’s random number generator to select the winning ticket number for each prize. The live draws are available to watch back at any time on the live draw section of the website as well as on Facebook.
Once we have our winners for a particular draw night, we post the winners list on our social media platforms, and we also email out the full list of winners to everyone subscribed to our mailing list.
At the moment, we hold two draw nights a week on Mondays and Fridays, and there can be up to 8 prizes being drawn on a draw night.
We usually let competitions for individual prizes run for two to three weeks, but if they are selling very fast, we pull the draw forward, so it takes place sooner.
Winners
If you are one of our lucky winners, you will receive a phone call from either myself or one of the girls in the office, who will arrange for the delivery of your prize at a time that suits you.
If you are lucky enough to win one of our big bundles, I usually try and deliver those prizes in person so I can meet some of our lucky winners. We have had winners all across Ireland and the UK.
Some of our recent big winners include a winner on the Isle of Wight, who won our Redrock & Roll Bundle, which consisted of a John Deere 6930, a Volvo EC140 EL and a brand-new Redrock low-loader and dump trailer.
We had a Honda quad timber bundle winner in Scotland on Christmas Eve, a 1455 XL International winner in Wales and an Amarok winner in England.
Our 40 Shades of Green bundle was won in Galway, and it comprises a John Deere 7530 Premium, John Deere 6830 Premium, a Mc Hale Fusion 3 Plus Baler and Krone front and side mowers.
We regularly update our winners’ gallery on the website with our prize winners’ pictures.
A day in the life
Running Lucky Day Competitions is a full-time job for me – it never stops, even on weekends. There is always something happening.
Whether it is filming promotional videos, delivering prizes, running the live draws, editing TikToks, or doing general yard work, there is always something that we need to do.
Here at Lucky Day, there are 13 full-time staff employed. It takes time to build the right team around you, but after three-and-a-half years in business, I am really happy with my team.
We all work very hard because, honestly, it never stops. We have a great laugh, and we work so well together; it is such a nice feeling to come into a happy working environment every morning.
A day in my working life varies so much; sometimes, I have crazy days where a lot of prizes are ready to go on the website all at once, so the whole day could be filled with just filming the promotional videos.
Other days, I could be travelling with a big bundle delivery to meet the winners. Sometimes, days are more chill, and I have time to write scripts for our short story video content or just make some TikToks here in the yard with the prizes.
Social media
We rely heavily on social media as a means to reach our audience regularly.
So many people are online these days, and it provides a great opportunity for regular engagement with the audience.
I absolutely love TikTok. For me, TikTok is where I get to learn from my followers and have fun while doing it.
I was not into TikTok at all until a year ago when I downloaded it. I love how it allows you to be so creative, and I love taking certain trends and putting an agricultural twist on them.
That is great fun, but probably my favourite type of video to make is where I am just hopping into a tractor or lorry and talking and trying to figure out how to do something.
I love the interaction in the comments section on these videos, and I get to learn lots from my followers who have years upon years of experience working with machinery, and we have great fun along the way.
We have a Facebook and Instagram page – Lucky Day Competitions, and my TikTok handle is @sammyluckydaycomps.
Future
We plan to keep building and growing our audiences and delivering top-class prizes to our winners all over Ireland and the UK.
Also, we are going to increase our range of merchandise which has been a big hit with our audience at the shows we attended last year, and hopefully, we will have it available to purchase through our website soon.
Delivering bigger, more top-class prizes to more of our customers and lucky winners is our ultimate goal.
We also want to build new audiences in different sectors, so we will be pushing hard towards that goal this year.
Moreover, we want to continue growing the company and attending shows to meet our audience face-to-face.
Also, we plan to start visiting previous winners and see how their lives have changed since their big win with Lucky Day.
Reflection
It has been an incredible journey to be involved in and to watch the progression of the business as it has grown and the audience has increased.
Lucky Day has grown from strength to strength, particularly over the past year, and I have to give all the thanks to the strong team around me and our wonderful audience.
The company grew a lot throughout Covid-19, but it was only last year, when restrictions were lifted, that we finally got to attend shows and meet people face to face, and that has been incredible.
It is my favourite part of Lucky Day; the audience interaction and meeting people face-to-face and having a great time chatting with them.”
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