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Florida Lottery Sells More Tickets Than Ever Before As Floridians Hope To Strike It Rich

By Charisse Van Horn
Published on: 16:15 PST, Jan 26, 2016

It’s been a groundbreaking month for the Florida Lottery and it’s no surprise. After having the largest Powerball jackpot in recorded history, the Florida Lottery announced through a press release that January 2016 has been the largest month ever in the lottery’s history. According to a release on the official Florida Lottery website, January has seen record breaking sales of $603 million in lottery tickets with a week still remaining in the month. The January numbers beat the previous record that occurred in March 2015 when the Florida Lottery reached $539.5 million in sales. Powerball fever spread nationwide and resulted in a $1.58 billion jackpot drawing on Jan. 13, 2016. There is no question that the record-breaking sales are attributed to the enormous jackpot and Floridians hopes to strike it rich.

“These tremendous sales mean great things for Florida, as Lottery players, retailers and the state?s education system will directly benefit,” said Tom Delacenserie, Secretary of the Florida Lottery. “To be just three weeks into 2016, and already have hundreds of millions of dollars in prizes won, and an estimated $187 million in revenue generated for education is truly unprecedented.”

As Powerball fever spread across the nation, people throughout Florida rushed to their local convenience stores in order to play a ticket or more. The $1.58 billion jackpot caused an excitement about the lottery not seen before. As more billion dollar jackpots are likely in the future, one can expect that it is also likely Florida Lottery will see a phenomenal year. This not only means more money for Floridians who win the jackpot and other prizes, but more money for education.

According to the Florida Lottery release, since 1988, Floridians have played the lottery resulting in 1800 millionaires, and won more than $48.5 billion in prizes. More than $29 billion has been contributed to education through the Bright Futures Scholarship Program. It is estimated that more than 725,000 students have attended college thanks to the money the Florida Lottery contributed to Bright Futures.

The Florida Lottery consists of scratch off and draw games. The two largest draw games are Powerball and Mega Millions. Other Florida Lottery draw games include Florida Lotto, Fantasy 5, Lucky Money, Play 4, Cash 3, and Millionaire Raffle. Scratch-Off games range from $1 to $25. Increased Florida Lottery sales is attributed to more than just the record-breaking Powerball jackpot, as other games have seen a surge in sales due to jackpot roll-overs. Powerball sales contributed $237.6 million of the total $603 million so far in January sales.

Florida has also seen a surge in Powerball winners from the state. On the January 13, 2016, record-breaking Powerball jackpot for $1.58 billion, Florida saw 13 winners for top prizes. There was one grand-prize winner from Melbourne, Florida who has yet to claim their share of the jackpot prize, a $2 million winner and 11 $1 million winners. The Powerball had 19 roll-overs from November 2015, which caused it to accumulate to the whopping jackpot. The Florida Lottery reported the winning figures.

“The January 13 drawing for the world-record $1.5 billion jackpot resulted in Florida having one jackpot winner, one $2 million winner and 11 $1 million winners, including Ferguson. In total this series of 19 Powerball jackpot rollovers, which began November 7, 2015, generated more than $114.6 million for education, $14.4 million in retailer commissions and bonuses and created 5.3 million winning Florida tickets totaling more than $558.8 million in prizes, including 18 new millionaires.”

[Photo by Syda/Shutterstock]

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