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Dutch State Lottery Tells the Netherlands Not to Wait for Happiness
Dutch State Lottery's 2022 New Year's Eve campaign, titled "Don't wait for happiness to happen to you," is a narrative film created by TBWA\NEBOKO in the Netherlands that positions the lottery not as a vehicle for financial gain but as a prompt to act on meaningful relationships before luck ever arrives.
Published on 10 December 2022 and running through the 31 December draw period, the campaign launched across television, social media, online, radio, out-of-home, and retail channels throughout the Netherlands. At its centre is a single film: a son who, rather than waiting for a lottery win to change his life, takes his father on a transformative journey. The story carries no fantasy of instant wealth. Instead, it argues that the more valuable prize is already within reach, requiring only the decision to pursue it. The campaign earned a Clapboard Score of 63 out of 100, reflecting its strong creative ambition and cultural specificity balanced against the inherent complexity of converting an emotional narrative into measurable commercial outcomes within a regulated gambling category.
The campaign's emotional architecture is reinforced by an original musical composition created through a collaboration between Dutch composer Jorrit Kleijnen and Jacqueline Govaert, the lead singer of Dutch band Krezip. That pairing lends the film a distinctly Dutch cultural identity, anchoring an international creative format — the prestige New Year's brand film — firmly within the Netherlands. Media planning and distribution were handled by Mindshare.Greenhouse, as documented by Little Black Book, ensuring the narrative reached audiences across every major touchpoint during the lottery's highest-stakes commercial window.
Dutch State Lottery's creative strategy rests on a consumer insight that gambling communications rarely articulate openly. Lottery players do not participate solely for the mathematical chance of winning. They participate for the feeling of possibility — the brief, pleasurable suspension of present limitations. TBWA\NEBOKO's strategic move was to intercept that feeling before the draw and redirect it toward action rather than anticipation.
Creative Director Erik Falke articulated the brief precisely, as quoted by lbbonline.com: "The idea behind the campaign is that 'some things in life are more valuable than winning the Jackpot prize'." He expanded further, noting that the 2022 campaign took that philosophy forward by "inspiring people to do things with loved ones now instead of waiting till the day they win the lottery." That shift — from deferred gratification to immediate emotional agency — is the campaign's central strategic proposition and its clearest departure from conventional lottery advertising, which typically amplifies the prize rather than questioning the cost of waiting for it.
The competitive context in the Netherlands makes this positioning strategically acute. The Dutch licensed gambling market generated approximately €3.4 billion in net gaming revenue in 2022, up approximately 85% year on year, according to Kansspelautoriteit Nl, the Dutch gambling regulator. Within that market, online casino operators and sports betting platforms — including competitors such as Unibet and bet365, both active in the Netherlands following market liberalisation in October 2021 — competed aggressively on promotional incentives and odds-based messaging. Lottery operators, as a category, accounted for the majority of market participation by player volume, according to focusgn.com, but faced mounting awareness competition from digital-first gambling brands spending heavily on performance advertising. Against that backdrop, Dutch State Lottery's decision to invest in a prestige narrative film, rather than a promotional offer, represents a deliberate brand-building counter-strategy designed to protect emotional loyalty rather than chase transactional acquisition.
Dutch State Lottery's 2022 campaign was directed by Ismael ten Heuvel of production company Pink Rabbit. Ten Heuvel brought to the film a measured, observational visual language that keeps the father-son dynamic at the story's emotional centre without resorting to sentimentality. The director of photography was Martijn, as documented by lbbonline.com, whose work gives the film its sense of unhurried, textured realism — an aesthetic that contrasts deliberately with the heightened visual registers common to lottery advertising in the Netherlands and across Europe.
Creative direction was shared between Dennis Baars and Erik Falke at TBWA\NEBOKO. Falke described the musical dimension of the production in terms that clarify the creative intent, as quoted by lbbonline.com: "Jorrit always brings in the musical magic in each spot." The 2022 film marked a continuation and an evolution of that collaboration. Falke noted that earlier campaigns in the series functioned as film scores, whereas from the "Fritsie" campaign onward, the creative team chose to commission original tracks rather than adapt existing compositions. For "Don't wait for happiness to happen to you," Jorrit Kleijnen composed an original piece performed by Jacqueline Govaert, the lead singer of Krezip — one of the Netherlands' most recognised pop acts. Govaert's vocal performance provides the film's emotional resolution, transforming a visually restrained narrative into something that resonates beyond the screen.
The decision to use original music rather than a licensed track reflects a creative maturity in the campaign's production approach. It allows the brand to own the emotional texture of the moment rather than borrow it from an existing cultural property. The result is a film whose sound and image work in genuine synthesis, produced across television and digital formats to function equally well as a sixty-second broadcast piece and as shorter social variants across the Netherlands.
Dutch State Lottery's 2022 New Year's Eve campaign won a Bronze Lion at Cannes Lions 2023 in the Film category under Travel and Leisure, as documented by tbwacannes.com and confirmed by lbbonline.com. That award represents the most significant independently verified measure of the campaign's creative standing and places it among a select group of gambling-category films recognised at the industry's most prominent global festival.
The campaign was also nominated as a finalist for the Gouden Loeki 2022, the Dutch public's major advertising award, as reported by Tbwa Nl. The Gouden Loeki carries particular weight for this brand: earlier Dutch State Lottery New Year's Eve campaigns — featuring animal characters Frekkel, Freddie, and Frummel in 2018, 2019, and 2020 respectively — each won the Gouden Loeki during their respective years, according to Staatsloterij Nederlandseloterij Nl. The 2022 film's finalist status therefore sits within a campaign lineage of genuine popular recognition in the Netherlands, even if it did not claim the top prize in that specific cycle.
The associated video recorded 7,821 views and 94 likes on its primary upload platform. These figures reflect the film's role as a broadcast-first asset rather than a platform-native piece, and should be read accordingly rather than as a proxy for total audience reach across the campaign's full distribution footprint, which included television, out-of-home, radio, and retail across the Netherlands. No additional verified performance data quantifying reach, brand lift, or lottery ticket sales attributed directly to this campaign is publicly available. The Bronze Lion and Gouden Loeki nomination together confirm, however, that the campaign achieved recognition on both international creative and domestic public measures — a structurally rare outcome for a gambling-category film.
Dutch State Lottery's 2022 New Year's Eve campaign is a narrative film created by TBWA\NEBOKO in the Netherlands. It follows a son who takes his father on a meaningful journey rather than waiting for a lottery win. The campaign ran from 10 December through 31 December 2022, with music by Jorrit Kleijnen and Jacqueline Govaert of Krezip.
Ismael ten Heuvel directed the 2022 Dutch State Lottery campaign film. Ten Heuvel worked through production company Pink Rabbit. Creative direction was provided by Dennis Baars and Erik Falke at TBWA\NEBOKO, and media distribution across the Netherlands was handled by Mindshare.Greenhouse, as documented by lbbonline.com.
The 2022 Dutch State Lottery campaign won a Bronze Lion at Cannes Lions 2023 in the Film category, as documented by tbwacannes.com. It was also nominated as a finalist for the Gouden Loeki 2022, the Dutch public advertising award, according to tbwa.nl — a category the brand had won in three consecutive prior years.
Dutch composer Jorrit Kleijnen created the original music for the 2022 Dutch State Lottery campaign. Jacqueline Govaert, lead singer of Dutch band Krezip, performed the vocal track. Creative Director Erik Falke noted, as quoted by lbbonline.com, that this continued an approach of commissioning original compositions rather than licensing existing music.
Earlier Dutch State Lottery New Year's Eve campaigns featured animal characters — Frekkel, Freddie, and Frummel — that each won the Gouden Loeki award, according to staatsloterij.nederlandseloterij.nl. The 2022 campaign shifted to human intergenerational storytelling, following a son and his father, while maintaining the same strategic principle that emotional connection outweighs the prize itself.
The Dutch licensed gambling market generated approximately €3.4 billion in net gaming revenue in 2022, according to kansspelautoriteit.nl. Following market liberalisation in October 2021, digital competitors including Unibet and bet365 entered the Netherlands aggressively. Dutch State Lottery responded with brand-building narrative advertising rather than promotional performance campaigns, positioning emotional value against transactional competitor messaging.
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