Southland's Lucky Lottery Stores: 11 Places to Buy Powerball Tickets

Photo: Citgo Station at 6801 W. 87th St., Oak Lawn, where a winning $700,000 Lucky Day Lotto ticket was sold on New Year’s Eve.

By LORRAINE SWANSON (Patch Staff)

Is it possible for lighting to strike twice in the same place? How about three or four times?

With the Powerball Jackpot jumping to $900 million -- the largest lottery jackpot in U.S. history -- in advance of Saturday night’s drawing, players are ducking into corner convenience stores and gas stations across the nation to snag a ticket or two.

Honestly, we haven’t seen this much gambling in the Southland since Illinois legalized video gaming seven years ago.

The chances of matching all five numbers, plus the Powerball, are 1 in 292,201,338.

• Powerball Hits Record $900 Million Jackpot

Although his new Lucky Lottery Sign hadn’t yet arrived from the Illinois Lottery people after selling a $700,000 Lucky Day Lotto ticket on New Year’s Eve, Amin Hafar’s Oak Lawn Citgo station at 6801 W. 87th St. was doing brisk business in Powerball ticket sales.

“We sold a $350,000 Lucky Day Lotto ticket here two years ago, too,” Hafar said.

The retailer said people who’ve heard about the New Year’s Eve winning ticket being sold at the Citgo station have been coming from all corners of Chicagoland to buy Powerball tickets.

“We’re still getting our regulars,” Hafar said. “We had a guy come in from Palatine. People tend to be superstitious.”

The place that sells the winning Powerball will receive a 1-percent bonus, which, if there is a single jackpot winner, could mean $7 million for some lucky retailer.

Hafar said he is going to use the $7,000 bonus he receives for selling the New Year’s Eve jackpot winner to pay the business’s bills.

Meanwhile, his employee, Bobbie, was schooling non-regular players on how to play the Powerball game.

“How many numbers do I pick,” a customer asked.

“Five, plus a Powerball number,” replied Bobbie, who told us there aren’t a lot of Powerball winners from Illinois.

If you don’t want to drive to Oak Lawn, you may want to set your GPS for the Jewel-Osco store at 3795 Orchard Road, in Oswego, which sold a $1 million Lucky Day Lotto winner on Dec. 29.

And for all you skeptics out there, Illinois HAS resumed lottery payouts on Dec. 14, 2015, just as Patch reported.

To help you find your Lucky Lottery store, we dug deep into the Patch wayback machine to pull out retailers that sold big jackpot winners.

1. Shidra Citgo, 6801 W. 87th St., Oak Lawn. Sold two prize-winning Lucky Day Lotto tickets for $350,000 and most recently, $750,000 on Dec. 31, 2015.
2. Marathon, 14144 S. Pulaski Road, Crestwood. Sold a $650,000 Lucky Day Lotto winner on April 20, 2015.
3. 7-Eleven, 4502 W. 95th St., Oak Lawn. The store sold its first big winner, a $250,000 price on Sept. 14, 2015.
4. Prestige Hoyne Liquor, 2043 W. 79th St., Chicago. Manager Sam Gavrilos was unaware the store had sold the winning Lucky Day Lotto mid-day pick with a prize of $200,000 on June 19, 2015, until Patch called them. Lucky South Side grandma Vivian Wilson won the jackpot playing her grandchildren’s birthdays. Sam says the store is going crazy with Powerball.
5. E&M Food and Liquor, 7758 Archer Road, Justice. Jo Hurley, an occasional lottery player, used a dime to scratch off $100,000 on a $100 Million Money Mania scratch ticket.
6. Jewel-Osco, 21164 South La Grange Road, Frankfort. Christopher Bielecki, of Burbank, won $250,000 on a Black Diamond 7 instant lotto ticket in September 2014. His advice to others: “Don’t give up!”
7. Super Mercado Imelda, 13036 S. Western Ave., Blue Island. Owner Delores Diaz was shocked when she learned her store had sold the $260 million winning ticket in the Mega Millions drawing on June 2, 2015. Diaz planned to use some of bonus the retailer received to treat employees to dinner. The prize winner matched all six numbers.
8. 7-Eleven, 10301 S. Sawyer Ave., Chicago (Mt. Greenwood). It’s only fitting that the$1 million winning lottery ticket in the St. Patrick’s Day Millionaire Raffle was sold in Mt. Greenwood on March 18, 2015. City of Chicago retiree Edward Casper waited until July to claim his $1 million prize, after seeking professional financial advice.
9. Foodie Foods, 9652 S. Pulaski Road, Oak Lawn. As of November 2011, neighborhood convenience store Foodie Foods had sold two quarter-million jackpot lottery winners in six years.
10. Gennaro Liquors, 5549 W. 87th St., Oak Lawn. Gennaro is due.
11. Danny’s Market Place, 1965 Vermont Street, Blue Island. Alice Griffin, of Alsip, won $1 million on a $10 Cash Spectacular scratch ticket on March 25, 2013. The year before she won $5,000 purchasing a scratch ticket at the same store.