Luck strikes in Illinois with $2m lottery ticket

Lotteries in the United States continue to turn players into millionaires, as is their design. Yet, every story deserves its spotlight, and this is the case with one lottery ticket that was bought on Saturday, July 13, at Foodsmart, a family-owned grocery store, at 3415 W. Diversey Ave. in Chicago’s Logan Square neighborhood, the Illinois Lottery said in an email sent to the media.

Turning a $2 ticket into a $2m payday

The ticket fetched its owner the eye-watering $2m payday off the Powerball draw, and although the player missed the big payout, they are still walking away from the lottery draw significantly richer than when they started.

Understandably, the Illinois Lottery has made a bit of a sensation of the whole affair, issuing a press statement in which it interviewed the shop's owners and offered further details about the win.

The owners shared their excitement to have sold the winning ticket, arguing that it was indeed a very special day for the person who had bought the ticket. Yet don’t count on the people over at Foodsmart to tell you who won, they admit themselves.

Foodsmart’s owners were also very excited to have sold the ticket not least because a few months before, they said, another big ticket winning $277,777 from a scratch-off game was also sold at the venue.

"The customer who won the $277,777 prize was so ecstatic, and it was her first time in our store. She mentioned she was feeling lucky that day and bought a $5 scratch-off lottery ticket," the owners added, fleshing out some of the details of the previous win.

Illinois Lottery celebrates one of many wins

As to what the owners would do with the bonus, they got from selling the ticket – they already have a plan. Since it’s a family-run business, the owners are keen to reinvest back.

"We always want to be adding new products and more variety for our customers," the unnamed owner mused in his interview with the Illinois Lottery. Although the identity of the $2m winner is not known, the Illinois Lottery did mention that there has been a total of 13,000 winning tickets purchased on July 13 alone.

With Powerball tickets costing only $2 to buy, a $2m payout certainly seems like a reasonable return. Still, keep in mind that the actual odds of winning the Powerball are 1 in 292.2m, so playing for anything but fun would be unreasonable.

Earlier this month, a 72-year-old woman in Illinois also scooped up a big jackpot. The woman played the Celebration Instant Ticket scratch-off game to secure a $1m jackpot win.

Image credit: Foodsmart/Illinois Lottery