BATON ROUGE - The North American Association of State and Provincial Lotteries (NASPL) awarded Louisiana Lottery Vice President of Sales Brad Menard with its 2017 Powers Award at the organization’s Professional Development Conference in Nashville, Tenn. in July. Menard was recognized for spearheading efforts that increased scratch-off ticket sales by 30 percent since he joined the Lottery in 2012.

“Brad’s innovative nature is a great asset to the Louisiana Lottery team in achieving our mission to maximize revenue for the state,” said Lottery President Rose Hudson. “This recent honor is greatly deserved.”

Menard’s contributions include streamlining processes to improve the Lottery’s inventory management system, launching a self-service web portal for retailers and overseeing an initiative to develop a consumer based mobile application.

Out of 10,000 North American lottery and vendor employees, only two-tenths of 1 percent are honored with a Powers Award each year.

The Powers Awards are presented in recognition of the significant contributions lottery and/or vendor employees have made through exceptional job performance. The award is named in honor of the late Edward J. Powers, the first director of the New Hampshire Lottery, the first modern lottery in the U.S.