Retailers have expressed concern that changes to the National Lottery will lead to a drop in ticket sales for the mid-week game.

The new game changes were introduced for the 5 October Saturday draw. As well as a rise in the price from £1 to £2 per line, the prize structure altered to include larger jackpots of £5m on Saturday and £2.5m on Wednesday.

While the Saturday draws led to a huge increase in sales, some retailers fear that the Wednesday draw is less of an attraction to players.

Harj Dhasee of Nisa Village Stores in Mickleton, Gloucestershire, has noticed a drop in Wednesday draw sales. “The first week was equal sales value to previous weeks. However, this week has seen a fall of more than £100 compared with the average takings on a Wednesday,” he said.

Abi Amar of Amar News in Brighton, East Sussex, said: “If the jackpot for Wednesday is half what the Saturday jackpot is, then people won’t want to play it,” he said. “Customers need an incentive to play on both days, or they’ll play one as it’ll be the same cost as playing two draws with the old price.”

A Camelot spokeswoman said: “We recognise a small number of players may decide to change the number of lines they play or switch to other National Lottery games priced at £1, but we’ve always maintained that the new Lotto would reinvigorate interest in the game, and deliver a significant increase in sales. That’s what has happened so far on both draws.”