We get a lot of criticism here at the Missouri Lottery, but two of my favorite are... "How come all the winners are in St. Louis or Kansas City?" And "How come all the big Scratchers winners are from small towns?" Notice the irony of the two contradicting ideas. I realize it's frustrating not to win, and that it might be nice to have a winner from your town, so that at least you know someone who is benefiting from playing the Lottery. Better yet, it would be nice if everyone could be winner, but that's just not how it works.
The truth is our games are random, and as a result, the winners come from everywhere. We don't know where the winners are in advance, and we certainly don't target areas for the winning tickets to go. They just get mixed up and sent all over. There are a lot of winners from the major cities, but that's relative to their population and sales. There are a lot of people playing the Lottery in St. Louis. And with thousands of retail locations across the state, there's going to be a lot of people that win in places you may have never heard of.
A good example of this is the list of winners from the Million-Dollar Raffle game. Click and download the file below to see a list of all the retail locations that sold a winning Raffle ticket. It doesn't tell you about the people who bought the ticket, but it shows that the tickets were purchased from lots of different places.
You never know where luck will turn up next. Download mdr_winners.doc
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