EVERETT — Every year, the folks at Washington’s Lottery send out a “luckiest retailers” list.
After all, to lottery players, you can never have too much luck.
The lucky list is a data thing, but hunches play into the game of chance.
Retailers in seven regions are ranked based on the number of prizes $1,000 or more in 2021. It’s not by total big bucks paid out.
Snohomish County lucked out.
In the five-county North Puget Sound list, eight of the retailers are here. The region also covers Skagit, Whatcom, Island and San Juan counties.
The top two lucky Snohomish County retailers were Safeway stores at 4128 Rucker Ave. in Everett and at 19651 U.S. 2 in Monroe.
Others are Safeway stores at 7601 Evergreen Way, Everett; 3532 172nd St. NE, Arlington; and 16304 Bothell Everett Highway, Mill Creek; as well as the Fred Meyer stores at 12906 Bothell Everett Highway, Everett; 18805 U.S. 2, Monroe; 2902 164th St. SW, Lynnwood; and 1225 W. Bakerview Road, Bellingham.
Rosario Market, 3101 Commercial Ave., in Anacortes, topped the list statewide.
It stems from a sixth sense.
Last year, a record 53 winning Match 4 tickets of $10,000 were sold for a single drawing. Rosario Market sold 50 of those winners, all to the same guy, who wants to remain anonymous.
The story goes something like this, lottery spokesperson Dan Miller said: “The person was driving down the road and had a vision of some numbers and pulled off into the closest lottery store and was like, ‘I want to buy 50 tickets with these numbers.’ And that was the set of tickets that won … He didn’t win once, he won 50 times.”
The odds of winning $10,000 are 1 in 10,600 in the Match 4 game that costs $2 to play. Each ticket matching four numbers gets the prize, unlike some draw games where winners share the jackpot.
The guy invested a total of $100 on his hunch.
Intuition wins have happened in other states as well, Miller said. “It’s one of those things where somebody has a feeling. Today’s the day.”
OK, so bottom line: Do you increase your chances if you go to one of these “lucky retailers” to play?
Nope. Where you buy a lottery ticket has no bearing on whether you will win.
The odds are based on the game played.
“When the games are created the company that makes the tickets does a random distribution of those tickets,” Miller said. “So we don’t know where they are.”
That is, until the prize is claimed.
The Everett Safeway at 7601 Evergreen Way sold a $20 scratch ticket with a photo of Benjamin Franklin worth $500,000. That’s a lot of Benjamins.
Lottery ticket winners have 180 days from the draw date to claim the cash prize. Check your tickets. The state’s official lottery app has a ticket scanner.
March is Problem Gambling Awareness Month, endorsed by Washington’s Lottery to spread awareness about responsible gambling.
Wager only what you can afford to lose or dare to win.
Andrea Brown: abrown@heraldnet.com; 425-339-3443. Twitter @reporterbrown.
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