Prime Sports launched its online sportsbook fully on Wednesday in New Jersey without a seven-figure marketing campaign.
There were no paid celebrities on commercials, no social media ads beating bettors over the head, and no wild bonus bet offers.
That’s exactly how Prime executive chair Joe Brennan Jr., and Adam Bjorn, the industry veteran and COO of platform company Plannatech, wanted it.
Prime, which was already operating in Ohio, simply opened up shop and offered any and all bettors a focus on customer service, reduced juice, max wagers on markets, and no fears of being limited or having accounts closed due to winning.
“It’s just simple, basic, old-school bookmaking,” said Bjorn, who spent years with renowned offshore books The Greek and BetCRIS.
American-style sportsbook
Prime’s two leaders told Covers that they partnered to fill what they believe is a gap in the U.S. sports betting industry.
Brennan said when PASPA was overturned in 2018 and the industry began to open across the country, the rush to launch led to U.S. operators partnering with British and European suppliers, which created a vastly different betting market than what Americans were used to previously.
“I kept waiting for some company in the U.S. to wise up and take advantage of that, especially because the offshore and street markets in the U.S. markets didn’t go away,” Brennan said. “If anything, they grew a little bit. That told me there was an opportunity to go in that direction, to open up an American-style sportsbook.”
Not the typical competition
Much like the very-established Circa Sports, Prime is about offering the best pricing and taking on professional bettors, arbitrage bettors, and betting syndicates, as well as anyone in between who’s seen their max wagers at the big-name shops go from thousands per game to dollars and cents.
Getting paid in cold, hard cash is one of the major benefits. Prime Sports offers a plethora of depositing and withdrawal options, including debit/credit cards, ACH, wire transfers, PayPal, and Venmo.
Brennan says their approach allows big bettors to stop relying on volatile cryptocurrency to fund accounts and to protect themselves from the less-assured offshore shops.
“We don’t have to take players away from DraftKings or FanDuel or Fanatics or BetMGM or Caesars,” Brennan said. “Our opportunity is enticing players away from those unregulated markets, away from the street, away from offshore, and into our regulated shop.”
The company prides itself on fast payouts and allowing users to contact a real person, not just an AI-generated chat. The sports catalog is geared toward traditional sides, totals, and halves, not as many same-game parlays and exotic offerings, although the menu will continue to expand.
Proof is in the pudding
While Prime didn’t launch a massive marketing campaign, it certainly picked up street cred from one of the most well-known sports bettors in the U.S.
Professional bettor Gadoon “Spanky” Kyrollos placed the first New Jersey wager at Prime during the site’s soft launch. Kyrollos has waged public battles with U.S. sportsbooks for years and has called them out for limiting himself and other bettors because they win.
Just placed the first bet ever in NJ at @primesportsbook!
— spanky (@spanky) March 31, 2024
First of many more to come!!!
Thank You @joebrennanjr @AdamBjorn2 pic.twitter.com/gCfrMccdoG
Prime had no issue taking action from the New Jersey resident, showing how open the sportsbook is to all action.
“If you see Spanky walking in the front door welcomed and being able to bet $2,500, $5,000 ... then you’ve got to think ‘Oh, this is a place I can go to without the headaches and bull---t you run into everywhere else,’” Bjorn said. “That was definitely done with reason and purpose. He’s just looking to bet somewhere.”
More than one way to skin a cat
Prime is simply running a different business than the high-margin, big brands like FanDuel and DraftKings.
Their strategy centers around offering a price, taking bets, moving that line based on the bets, and going from there. Prime doesn’t move lines just because another sportsbook did.
It will create lower margins and some bad days, like the recent Super Bowl, but they feel their style will keep bettors coming back and give the bookmaker information other shops aren’t getting since they won’t take wagers from the pros.
“I was seeing what such a bad job these operators were doing in the U.S.,” Bjorn said. “For every dollar that goes on these reports from (U.S.) regulators, I believe there’s a dollar or two dollars left on the table, or under the table, because there’s just not real bookmakers in the country.”
Come and get ‘em
Prime is affecting its margins by not giving away millions of dollars in promotional credits.
According to the Ohio Casino Control Commission’s February revenue reports, Prime took in a handle of $10.04 million for the month. DraftKings spent more than that in taxed promotional credits. Prime gave away $938.
Still, a sportsbook that launched in the Buckeye State in September 2023 had the ninth-best handle in a 20-operator market without spending a dime on marketing.
Brennan said Prime was minutes away from a huge score, but the Kansas City Chiefs changed that in the Super Bowl with an overtime win that led to a $583,149 loss in February.
Since the 2023 launch, Prime is down about $400,000 on a handle of more than $32 million without the costs spent by competitors. Fanatics Sportsbook, which took in $14.6 million in February, spent nearly $1 million in promos on gross revenue of $1.2 million.
“I guess based on our February numbers we look beatable,” Brennan said. “I’m expecting a lot more guys to come at us now.”
On the horizon
Prime is currently focused on the Ohio and now New Jersey sports betting markets. The sportsbook already has a partnership with Churchill Downs in Kentucky and still hopes to launch in the Bluegrass State before the Kentucky Derby.
Once they launch there, they’ll have a region locked in with several legalized sports betting markets around the Buckeye and Bluegrass states to invite bettors who’ve been limited by the big names.
New Jersey is the first market that Prime tried to get into because of the abundance of big sports bettors from the greater New York area, through New Jersey, and down to greater Philadelphia, allowing them to capture action in multiple states.
Prime will start to do more marketing with the Garden State launch, and for now, the company is being very strategic about future market launches. It wants to really establish itself in New Jersey, Ohio, and Kentucky while perfecting its craft before expanding.
And with the highly competitive Garden State to prove itself, Brennan knows there will be doubts about sustainability. He says Prime is well-funded with its own money and prepared to be the kind of sportsbook Americans want while also setting lofty goals.
“I’d like to be in the top five in New Jersey. I really would,” Brennan said. “With the kind of product that we have and the kind of player that we serve and knowing how abundant they are in that greater New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia area, I think we probably have a good shot at doing that.”
