When you play the lottery, you hope to win a big prize one day. So how many times did players win at least seven-figure prizes last year? Fifty-five times.
Yes. Fifty-five times between July 1, 2014 and June 30, 2015, someone walked into lottery headquarters and collected prize ranging from $1 million to our biggest prize of the year: A $188 million share of a Powerball jackpot.
What games led to those wins? Well, 41 of those winners won with a scratch-off ticket. Twelve won with a Powerball ticket. One won with a Mega Millions ticket. And one came in our special drawing for the MONOPOLY MILLIONAIRES’ CLUB™ draw game.
Where did the winners come from? If you look across the state, the new lottery millionaires came from 36 of North Carolina’s 100 counties, including:
- Five from Wake County.
- Three from both Cumberland and McDowell counties.
- Two from Buncombe, Cabarrus, Gaston, Johnston, Mecklenburg, Orange, Randolph, Sampson and Union counties.
- Two others were out-of-state visitors to North Carolina, one from South Carolina and one from New York.
Who were they? The million dollar winners we met represented a cross-section of North Carolinians. We met a construction worker, an art teacher, retirees, small business owners, homemakers, painters, a sales rep, a handyman, a plumber, Navy and Army veterans, bank employees, carpenters, an engineer, and an insurance agent.
Their plans for using their winnings varied greatly too. Some said they planned to buy a new home or pay off the mortgage. Some said they would buy a new car or new boat. Some had travel plans, to Disney, to Hawaii, to Alaska. Some planned to save for retirement or for a child or grandchild’s education. One planned to buy a rescue dog. A couple said the winnings would help with a wedding or a honeymoon they never got to take. Many had plans to help their family or a cause important in their lives.
In all, the lottery awarded $1.2 billion in prizes, large and small, during the year. That averages out to about $3.4 million a day.
We wish all our players luck and hope to meet even more million dollar winners this year.
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