For ticket holders,
it’s a Lotto fun

By William Kenny
Times Staff Writer

When most people look at lottery tickets, visions of dollar signs light up their eyes. But when Somerton resident Steve Gilbert looks at them, he sees works of art.
No matter if they’re old or new, big or small, expensive or a dime a dozen, all lottery tickets have a certain aesthetic allure, Gilbert contends.
That’s not the kind one gets when one buys into the Daily Number or Powerball jackpots, but rather the scratch-off variety.
Naturally, or perhaps unnaturally, Gilbert and hundreds of other lottery-ticket aficionados are more interested in collecting the colorful game cards, rather than the riches that the cards rarely provide to the redeemer.
Dozens of Gilbert’s colleagues in this unlikely pastime plan to gather in the area this weekend for the Global Lottery Collectors Society’s 19th annual Lotovention at the Courtyard by Marriott next to Philadelphia Park in Bensalem.
The free public event, scheduled for Friday through Sunday, is meant to give GLCS members an opportunity to barter tickets with collectors from 35 U.S. states, five Canadian provinces and beyond, as well as offer non-members an opportunity to see what the hobby is all about.
Most folks, when they first hear about lottery-ticket collecting, seem perplexed by the point of it all.
"We get that reaction a lot from people," conceded Gilbert, co-chairman of the convention.
What may seem like a straightforward endeavor is actually quite intensive and time-consuming. Gilbert’s collection is in the millions, with 700,000 different tickets, including multiple copies of many.
His organization maintains a list of every ticket variety ever produced in every state. The total is over a million and growing, as states generally introduce new ticket designs each month.
"It’s impossible to get every ticket," he said. "Now they put out a dozen (new ones) a month."
Gilbert treats the roster, which fills a loose-leaf binder several inches thick, as a checklist, marking the ones he has and thereby tracking the ones he needs.
His collection includes early Pennsylvania Lottery scratch-offs from the mid-1980s and present-day varieties. Some originally sold for as little as $1, while the newer ones offering million-dollar prizes have $10 or $20 price tags.
There are almost as many different kinds of collectors as there are tickets, he explains. Some do it geographically, while others pay more attention to the graphic elements on the tickets.
"Some people collect by theme, like sports, patriotic and animals," Gilbert said.
Other popular and interesting themes include the various holidays on the calendar and the signs of the zodiac. Some are printed as "contact sets," where three individual tickets, when placed side by side, create a single image.
Gilbert, meanwhile, seems to be going after pure volume in his collection. Best of all, he doesn’t have to pay for most of his tickets. He simply hangs out at the convenience store, waiting for others to discard their losers. Over the years, he has developed a rapport with some retailers so that they supply him with invalid copies marked "sample" or "void" and used for promotional purposes.
"Fortunately, it’s an inexpensive hobby," he said, before rethinking his statement. "Well, it could be expensive."
Two men — one from Lancaster, the other from New Jersey — created the Global Lottery Collectors Society two decades ago when, as it’s explained, "they each found out that there was more than one person who collects these things."
Pennsylvania had just issued its first sets of scratch-off tickets, following the lead of pioneering Massachusetts.
The first GLCS "convention" was held in the Lancaster home of co-founder Bill Pasquino, co-chairman of this year’s Lotovention. Gilbert got involved several years later as an outgrowth of another of his many hobbies, matchbook collecting.
One evening, Gilbert was hosting an out-of-state matchbook collector for dinner when the guest asked where he could buy lottery tickets. That sparked a conversation about the new hobby.
When the guest went home to Illinois, Gilbert began sending all of Pennsylvania’s new tickets to him.
"I was feeding his hobby," Gilbert said. "After about two years of me sending him tickets and him sending me tickets, I became a collector."
As one of 17 GLCS members from Pennsylvania, Gilbert acquires many copies of each of the state’s newly issued tickets. Then he ships them out to other traders throughout the nation. They, in turn, send him tickets from afar, such as California, Arizona and Idaho.
Like Gilbert, most collectors don’t trade winning tickets. They cash them in like everybody else does.
However, a few odd souls actually collect valid, but unused, tickets — their satisfaction in owning pristine copies outweighs their curiosity about whether riches could exist behind a ticket’s shiny surface, just one scratch away.
"Some collect mint tickets just from their own state," Gilbert said. "And there are a few that trade mint tickets with each other."
You don’t find many "mint" tickets among the high-priced varieties when a simple scratch could mean the difference between missing a mortgage payment and retiring to Easy Street.
Gilbert cautions that waiting to play any valid ticket isn’t the wisest move, since just about all tickets eventually expire, so the state won’t honor them even if redeemed as a winner.
Personally, Gilbert has never encountered that dilemma.
"I’ve always played them and I still play," he said. "I’m always looking for that big win, I guess."
Ironically, the most he’s ever won on a single ticket was a mere $100.
"That’s it," he said. "But I have a friend who won fifty-thousand once. He moved from Pennsylvania to Florida and started a business."
If that friend is smart, he didn’t start a lottery-ticket trading shop. Unlike other collectibles, such as stamps, coins and baseball cards, lottery tickets don’t gain any value over time. In fact, they lose it. Spent or voided tickets can sell for pennies on the dollar.
"It’s a hobby. It fills your time," Gilbert said. "I trade with people. I correspond with people.
"There’s a market for certain tickets to be sold, but it’s not a hobby you’re going to get rich with." ••
For information about the Global Lottery Collectors Society and the 19th annual "Lotovention," visit www.lotterycollectors.com or e-mail Steven Gilbert at SteGil919@aol.com
Reporter William Kenny can be reached at 215-354-3031 or bkenny@phillynews.com