Soaring Lottery jackpots fuel big dreams, big ticket sales

Massive lottery prizes are leading local retailers to see an uptick in lottery sales.

On Monday, the Powerball jackpot was $900 million — the third-largest in its history and the seventh largest U.S. lottery jackpot — and worth an estimated cash value of $465.1 million.

There have been 37 consecutive drawings without a jackpot winner, after the last Powerball jackpot was hit April 19, winning a grand prize worth $252.6 million.

Top-winning tickets in Saturday’s drawing included three tickets, two sold in Texas and one in Colorado, that won $1 million prizes.

According to Powerball, the overall odds of winning a prize are 1 in 24.9, and the odds of winning the jackpot are 1 in 292.2 million.

But the Powerball isn’t the only rising prize. After nobody won Friday, the Mega Millions jackpot winnings grew to an estimated $640 million, with an estimated cash value of $328 million. The next Mega Millions drawing is Tuesday night.

• No winner in latest Powerball drawing — jackpot hits $1 billion

In Upper Burrell, Eric Weaver, owner of The Little Store, said people often come to the store and play the lottery, but he noticed the high prizes are attracting some customers who don’t usually buy tickets.

“We know we’re going to be busy Monday, Wednesday and Saturday (for the Powerball),” he said, “but with them both being high, we know we’re going to be busy.”

He said some customers’ strategy is to buy just one ticket, while others spend about $20 on tickets. Regardless, if “you don’t play, you don’t win,” he said.

“We genuinely hope you win, too, because we win with you,” he said.

Naeen Uddin, an employee at BZ Mart in Apollo, put it simply: “When it’s high, they’re spending more money.”

He said the store typically has a regular flow of lottery tickets but is experiencing a spike.

“The Powerball got high, so people are taking interest in it,” Uddin said.

Manager Keith Brancato of Myrna’s Brew’ry Outlet in New Kensington checked his sales. Two weeks ago, the Carl Avenue store sold 224 lottery tickets that week — they weren’t all Powerball and Mega Millions, but he estimated most of them were — and this past week, he saw that number jump to 384 sales for the week.

Two weeks ago, the store sold $500 worth of tickets; last week, that number was more than $1,300.

“We don’t do it a ton, but it’s definitely picked up,” Brancato said. “Our regular customers are adding lottery tickets on.”

By 1 p.m. Monday, about 450 people had purchased lottery tickets at the Charley Family Shop ’n Save supermarket on Greensburg’s East Pittsburgh Street.

Many of them tried their luck on the Powerball drawing.

Charlene Wolff of Greensburg added lottery tickets to her shopping list at the supermarket. Citing the soaring jackpots, she paid $10 each for multiple Powerball and Mega Millions tickets.

“When it gets up like that, I thought I’d try my luck on it, like everybody else,” she said. Her previous Powerball purchase earned her a $7 return on the $2 price.

If Wolff would win a big jackpot, she would take immediate cash in the form of a smaller lump sum instead of annual payments.

“That’s probably what most people would do,” she said.

But, she isn’t sure how she would spend such a large bonanza.

“That’s an awful lot of money to have to figure out,” she said. “Maybe I would buy a yacht and travel the world.”

Greensburg resident Colleen O’Neil doesn’t often play lottery games, but Monday she also put money down on both the Powerball and Mega Millions drawings, purchasing $20 worth of tickets for each at the Shop ’n Save.

“Everybody is doing it,” she said. “I thought I may as well stop in.”

The timing would be perfect for her family if one of her tickets turned out to be a big winner.

“The kids are getting married this year,” she said. “I have two weddings, and it would take care of absolutely everything.”

O’Neil carefully considered where to buy her tickets.

“I’d rather do it here because this store is family-owned, and it gets a bonus when someone wins,” she said.

According to Pennsylvania Lottery practice, a retailer who sells a winning ticket worth $1 million receives a bonus of $5,000. The bonus increases to $10,000 for a ticket worth more than $1 million and up to $10 million; it increases to $100,000 for a ticket worth more than $10 million.

The Greensburg Newsstand in April shared in the luck of one of its customers, who won $1 million on a Mega Millions ticket purchased there.

“We’re looking to do even better this time,” owner Allan Lydic said. “I’m hoping for the big one.”

On Monday, Lydic said, “We’re seeing all our regulars and quite a few new players.

“We get people who have never bought a lottery ticket before and people who play every day. Everybody has a dream.”

Retiree Ron Geier of Greensburg came to the newsstand to buy two Powerball tickets — one for himself and one for his wife.

If one of them matches the big jackpot drawing, he believes they would opt for a lump sum.

“We’d probably move to Hawaii,” he said. “Her cousin lives there.”

Sheila Smouse has been a regular lottery player for about three decades. She bought three Powerball tickets Monday.

“That’s just so much money,” she said of the jackpot. “I really don’t think I’m going to win it, but somebody’s going to.”

If she won, she would take the lump sum and “give a lot of it away to friends and family.” She mulled using the remaining winnings to trade in her Greensburg house for a new one and take a trip to Ireland.

Mary Ann Dicks of Greensburg came to the newsstand to purchase 40 Powerball tickets, pooling funds with eight co-workers at a local law office.

If they claim the jackpot, she’s been advised, “We need to change our names and move.”

James Melago, 77, of Derry Township has mostly had luck buying scratch-off lottery tickets, claiming as much as $300 in prize money.

That didn’t stop him from purchasing two Powerball tickets and the same number of Mega Millions tickets Monday at the Plaza News Stand in Unity.

“It’s worth a chance,” he said. “What the heck?”

If he would win a big prize, he said, “I would want to make sure all my children got something, and then I would donate a lot of it. I’m not a greedy person.”

Regis Kurella has been selling lottery tickets for 22 years at his East Way Auto Parts store in Unity.

“We’ve had some big winners,” he said, “not any millionaires, but a lot of ‘thousand-aires.’

“If the prize is real high, you get a lot of people buying the tickets.”

Kurella believes most lottery players don’t have their hearts set on the big jackpot.

“With 50 or 100 grand, they’d be happy,” he said. “So would I.”