Grover Gaming announced that it is officially seeking licensure from the Ohio Attorney General’s Office to both manufacture and distribute Electronic Instant Bingo devices to charities, fraternals, and other nonprofit organizations in Ohio.
Grover has made sizable investments already in Ohio. According to Wil Riesgard, Vice President of Operations for Grover Gaming, “We have had a large distribution center here in Columbus for a while and are currently adding another office/warehouse in the northeast part of the state. We will very soon have over fifty employees just in the State of Ohio including a dedicated marketing team.”
“We are already licensed as a Bingo Supply Manufacturer in Ohio, but we have also applied for the separate Distributor license and the Electronic Instant Bingo endorsement to each of those licenses,” said Dorwin “DL” Howard, Compliance and Licensing Specialist at Grover Gaming. “The Ohio Attorney General’s Office, by law, cannot issue any of those licenses until April 1, 2022, but we hope to receive our endorsements on that date or soon after. We do anticipate that they will issue licenses to every manufacturer and distributor entitled to a license at the same time to avoid giving an advantage to one or the other.”
“We cannot offer any proposals to any potential customers in Ohio until we receive those endorsements,” stated Marc Downing, Chief Counsel and Director of Compliance for Grover. “But we do have a plan.”
“We intend to bring the same industry leading software and hardware that has been so successful for our charitable customers in states like Virginia, North Dakota, New Hampshire, and Kentucky,” stated Garrett Blackwelder, President and owner of Grover Gaming. “We are fortunate to be the leader in all those markets by a large margin, and in Virginia and New Hampshire we distribute our products directly to our customers. By distributing our own product, we are able to deal directly with the charities which streamlines our customer service and takes it to an even higher level. This will allow us to further our mission of providing entertaining gaming experiences through a team committed to growth and progress.”
Not only will Grover distribute its own product, but they also intend to place Electronic Instant Bingo equipment and supply Electronic Instant Bingo tickets without requiring any long-term commitments from the charities and fraternals in Ohio. “We will not be requiring contracts of any kind from the charities,” stated Jimmy Forrest, Vice President of Sales for Grover. “We want to earn your business by providing the best performing games and world class service, not because we lock you down with a piece of paper.”
Forrest continued, “another market changing innovation is the integration of our redemption kiosks. With this kiosk a player can just insert their ticket and get cash without having to see an attendant to redeem their winnings. In Virginia, not only has security drastically increased, but we have also seen an increase in net revenue to the charities of over 15% in some locations.” Grover plans to offer those kiosks free of charge along with the biggest selection of custom game terminals.
Grover Gaming develops software, game content, and gaming systems for lotteries and charitable gaming jurisdictions, and is licensed in Ohio, New Hampshire, Kentucky, North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, Washington, Ontario Canada, and Virginia. Based in Greenville, NC, Grover Gaming has over 360 employees across nine states including a design studio in Wilmington, NC and a Software Development Center in Chicago, IL.
The company is also a 3-year Inc 5000 award recipient, recognizing the fastest-growing privately held companies in the United States and was recently honored with a Glassdoor Employees’ Choice Award. Glassdoor ranked Grover Gaming Number 2 in its Best Places to Work list in 2022 among companies across the US with less than 1,000 employees.
