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GambleAware Reports Success for Public Health Campaign to Raise Awareness of Gambling Harm and Stigma
GambleAware has revealed the impact of its groundbreaking three-year marketing campaign to reduce gambling stigma and encourage people to seek support for gambling harms. The charity’s campaign drove significant behaviour change, with over 90% of the target audience reached taking action, including seeking advice and using digital tools for support.
Despite these achievements, GambleAware warns that urgent action is needed to curb gambling advertising, as operators spend up to £2 billion annually – far outweighing the amount spent on public health messaging. The charity is calling for more public health campaigns to reduce gambling harms in 2026 and stronger restrictions to ensure people are aware of the risks.
GambleAware’s campaign, “Let’s Open Up About Gambling”, was the first public health campaign of its kind designed to reduce the stigma people face, which can stop people asking for help when experiencing gambling harm.
The campaign ran across three phases between April 2023 and May 2025, and featured advertising, media campaigns and partnerships with other organisations, with creative assets co-created with individuals with lived experience of gambling harms. The campaign followed a strategy to use the real stories and feelings of real people to ensure its messages truly resonated, and aimed to raise awareness of gambling harm, stigma and the support available for anyone who may be struggling.
The campaign has been independently evaluated by Ipsos, who produced the new report. It found that the campaign led to change, including increasing people’s awareness and understanding of gambling harms. As well as the 90% of the target audience who saw the campaign and said they had taken action as a result, such as searching GambleAware online for more advice, two in five of the target audience also said they had a conversation about gambling as a result of the campaign. The campaign also increased uptake of support and digital tools on GambleAware’s website, such as its Service Finder tool and Self-Assessment tool.
The report also contains learnings and recommendations gained from the campaign, which are being shared by GambleAware to help inspire and inform future campaigns to reduce gambling harms. Recommendations include that future campaigns should be co-created with people who have lived experience, who can share their personal stories to build trust and connection and reduce stigma by showing how anyone can be affected.
GambleAware is calling for similar campaigns to reduce gambling harms to be run in 2026 – following the introduction of the new statutory gambling harms system – any future public health campaigns will be carried out by the new prevention commissioner. GambleAware is also calling for more restrictions on gambling advertising including for health warnings to be put on all gambling advertising and for them to signpost to where people can get help3.
Emma Munro-Faure, GambleAware Director of Marketing, said: “We’re proud that this campaign helped thousands of people to seek support for gambling harms. But stigma remains a major barrier, and with gambling companies spending £2 billion a year on advertising, we need stronger restrictions and clearer signposting to the free help and support available.”
Matt Gainsford from Lucky Generals, the lead creative agency that worked to produce the campaign, said: This was one of the most important briefs we’ve worked on. We’re incredibly proud of the impact the campaign has had, particularly when you look at it in the context of what the gambling industry spend on advertising. However, breaking down stigma is more than a three year job and we hope this is the beginning of a long-term, sustained effort to get millions more across Great Britain to open up about gambling.”
Maxine Ames, Strategic Planning Business Director at Manning Gottlieb, added: “Working on GambleAware’s ‘Let’s Open Up About Gambling’ campaign was one of the most fulfilling and impactful projects I’ve had the privilege of working on. The media strategy we developed was built around three carefully orchestrated phases – Educate, Reassure, and Enable – each designed to meet people where they are in their journey and guide them toward support. What made this campaign so special was how we used behavioural signals and contextual targeting to intercept people at moments of risk, while leveraging trusted environments to model help-seeking behaviour. Seeing our strategic approach achieve 98% reach across our target audience was incredibly rewarding but this wasn’t just about reach and frequency; it was about using our craft to genuinely help people and reduce stigma around gambling harms.
Tracy Madlin, who shared her lived experience of gambling harm as part of GambleAware’s campaign, supporting its installation featuring 85,000 poker chips at Westfield London, said: “Throughout my life I felt stigma on occasions, especially in my teens and later in life due to being female. Being part of the stigma campaign was amazing and I felt so very proud to be part of such an amazing campaign to help prevent gambling harm, the campaign I believe is saving lives and shows there is nothing to be ashamed of.”
The post GambleAware Reports Success for Public Health Campaign to Raise Awareness of Gambling Harm and Stigma appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
Rising-star casino brand becomes front-of-shirt partner, with a focus on fan engagement, storytelling and content.
Mr Vegas has announced a front-of-shirt partnership with Reading FC after identifying the club as one of the most compelling growth stories in English football.
The fast-growing UK casino brand will feature on the front of Reading men’s first-team shirts throughout the 2026/27 season. The partnership represents a broader investment in audience growth, supporter engagement and innovative content creation with a series of supporter-focused initiatives set to be unveiled throughout the campaign.
Instead of pursuing a conventional sponsorship strategy, Mr Vegas has been attracted by Reading’s ambition to increase its visibility beyond the traditional footprint of a League One football club and build stronger connections through storytelling, digital content and community engagement.
The partnership will see Mr Vegas support a range of initiatives aimed at helping Reading reach new audiences and build a stronger national presence.
Licensed and regulated by the UK Gambling Commission, Mr Vegas has built its profile through a series of partnerships across sport and entertainment, including title sponsorship of the Mr Vegas Grand Slam of Darts and broadcast sponsorship of Big Brother UK.
‘Part of a bigger conversation’
Marco Trucco, Chief Marketing Officer at Mr Vegas parent company Immense Group, said: “Mr Vegas is not a traditional brand and this is not a traditional partnership.
“We were actively looking for a club that we believed could grow beyond its traditional footprint and become part of a bigger conversation.
“What attracted us to Reading was their ambition. We saw great creative ideas from the ownership group, the staff and the fan base, alongside a genuine desire to build something that reaches beyond matchdays and beyond football itself.
“We believe Reading has the potential to become a social team with a national footprint – a club that people engage with because of its stories, personalities and culture, not just because of the result on a Saturday afternoon.
“That means working to develop content that goes far beyond goal clips and highlights. We want to help tell the stories around the club, the people in it and the community that surrounds it.”
Joe Jacobson, CEO of Reading FC, said: “We’re delighted to welcome Mr Vegas as our new front-of-shirt partner.
“From our earliest conversations, it was clear they understood what we’re trying to achieve as a football club. This partnership is about more than visibility – it’s about finding new ways to engage supporters, tell our story and expand our reach beyond our traditional audience.
“Mr Vegas recognised the work being done across the club, from investment in infrastructure and facilities to the impact of our Community Trust. Their creative approach and willingness to think differently makes them an exciting partner as we continue building for the future.”
The post Mr Vegas backs Reading FC’s bid to become English football’s next breakout story appeared first on EE Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
Boomerang Partners
Overtime begins: Boomerang Partners launches the final stage of the Golden Boomerang Awards 2026
The Golden Boomerang Awards 2026 by Boomerang Partners is moving into its decisive phase. The third and final stage of the tournament – titled “Overtime” – will run from 20 July to 31 August. It marks the last opportunity for participants to reshape the leaderboard and compete for the season’s main prize – an exclusive private dinner with a football legend in September 2026.
Overtime mechanics: points allocation
To intensify competition during the final stretch, Boomerang Partners is introducing an updated scoring system. From now on, affiliate teams will earn 3 points for every FTD generated on any partner brand from the Agency’s clients’ portfolio. In the previous stage, participants received 3 points for each sports FTD and 1 point for each online casino FTD. Now, the value of all FTDs is identical.
Overtime mechanics: performance boosts
Within the Overtime stage of the Golden Boomerang Awards 2026, a set of performance boosts remains active. These mechanics give participating teams the opportunity not only to catch up but also to overtake the leaders.
- Welcome Boost – x2 points for the first 14 days after entering the stage
- Lucky Five – +5 points for achieving 10 Casino FTDs per week
- Last Minutes Winner – x3 points during the final 7 days of Overtime
Martin Černý, CEO at Boomerang Partners said: “Overtime brings the Golden Boomerang Awards 2026 to its most competitive stage. At this point in the tournament, every result can influence the leaderboard, and teams still have the opportunity to improve their positions. We expect the final weeks to bring strong competition and determine the final standings.”
A final stretch where every day counts
With fewer than 40 days left in the GBA 2026, the competition enters its most volatile phase. The leaderboard remains open, and even small performance shifts can significantly alter final standings. Participants are now entering a stage where strategy, timing, and consistent activity define the outcome – and where the final push may determine the season’s ultimate winner.
Overtime has begun. TIME TO WIN THE TITLE.
About Boomerang
Boomerang Partners is a rapidly growing global marketing agency offering a wide range of services. In 2024, it launched the inaugural Golden Boomerang Awards – a global tournament for affiliate teams. More than 400 affiliate teams participated in the second season of the tournament in 2025. Martin Černý – Boomerang Partners’ CEO since June 2025.
The Agency’s clients’ portfolio contains brands offering affiliate and entertainment services across multiple markets in compliance with local regulations. These products provide incentive programs and 24/7 multilingual support.
The post Overtime begins: Boomerang Partners launches the final stage of the Golden Boomerang Awards 2026 appeared first on EE Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
The trophy has been lifted. Now comes the most interesting part for operators: counting the revenue, assessing what worked, learning from what didn’t, and deciding what to change before the next betting event.
On Thursday, August 20, at 4:00 p.m. CEST, GR8_TECH will host “The Locker Room: World Cup Numbers”, a closed-door benchmarking session created to help operators make sense of their tournament results and see how their performance stacked up against the room and the wider market.
Led by Dinos Doxiadis, Head of Sportsbook Business at GR8_TECH, the session will combine anonymized benchmarks with in-depth post-World Cup platform data on margin, player behavior, retention, and peak-load performance. It isn’t a tournament recap, but a working session built around deeper analysis than GR8_TECH releases publicly.
A First Look at the World Cup Numbers
Initial aggregated data from the GR8_TECH platform shows an average tournament margin of over 12%, alongside a significant increase in staking during the knockout stages.
Average stakes during the play-offs were 53% higher than during the group stage, while the average stake on the final was 89% above the tournament average.
Player interest was highly concentrated. Matches featuring Spain, Argentina, England, or France generated 42% of the total World Cup turnover. Argentina was the tournament’s most-bet-on team, accounting for 12.5% of all bets, although Spain finished only 0.09 percentage points behind Argentina by turnover.
The final also created one of the tournament’s most demanding operational moments. Within one minute of the final whistle, GR8_TECH’s platform settled more than half a million bets, demonstrating the level of processing performance required when a global audience reaches the same outcome simultaneously.
Inside The Locker Room, participants will examine what happened across:
- Live betting and bet builders
- Margin and staking dynamics
- Peak-load and settlement moments
- Acquisition compared with player reactivation
- Retention beyond the final whistle
- Unexpected geographic performance
- Operational, product, and campaign failures
- Priorities for the next major event
“The World Cup generates a huge amount of data, but the value comes from understanding what sits behind it,” said Dinos Doxiadis, Head of Sportsbook Business at GR8_TECH. “This session is about identifying the patterns operators might miss in their own reporting, challenging assumptions, and turning one month of World Cup activity into better decisions for future events.”
See How Your World Cup Stacked Up
Leave the session with anonymized benchmarks, exclusive GR8_TECH platform insights, and a clear view of where your World Cup performance led—or lagged—the market.
Turn the lessons into your next strategy. Join The Locker Room: World Cup Numbers on Thursday, August 20, at 4:00 p.m. CEST.
Register here to secure your place.
GR8_TECH. Platform for Champions
GR8_TECH is an award-winning provider, delivering high-performance sportsbook and iGaming solutions that empower operators to lead and win in competitive markets. GR8_TECH’s comprehensive portfolio includes the GREAT_TURNKEY and GREAT_CRYPTO TURNKEY solutions, GREAT_SPORTSBOOK, and GREAT_CASINO AGGREGATION.
With a geo-specific approach to solutions, a focus on practical innovations, and an operator-first mindset, GR8_TECH helps its clients achieve measurable results in their target markets quickly and efficiently. Trusted by top operators worldwide, GR8_TECH has over 100 successful cases and earned multiple recognitions, including the title of Platform Provider of the Year by SBC Awards 2025.
The post The World Cup Is Over. GR8_TECH Opens “The Locker Room” to Count What It Was Worth appeared first on EE Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
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