With no Powerball winner Wednesday, jackpot surges to third largest ever

It is the third largest Powerball jackpot ever.

Meanwhile, the Mega Millions jackpot is at $560 million for Friday’s drawing, with a cash option before taxes of $287 million, according to the Mega Millions website. It is the seventh largest Mega Millions ever.

Bee Mounts, of Kettering, stopped by Bee-Gee’s Mini Market on Bigger Road in Kettering on Thursday to purchase tickets for both Powerball and Mega Millions drawings.

“If you want to win, you gotta put in, so I wanna win,” she said.

Mounts, who is retired, said she plays the lottery “maybe twice a week, three times at the most,” and not always the Powerball, but sometimes Pick 3 or Pick 4 games, as well.

She said she already has an idea of what she’d do if she won either of the two jackpots.

“My grandchildren would have a nice college fund ... and of course I’d spend something on myself,” Mounts said. “A vacation, for sure (in a) nice and warm place.”

Jackie Porter, general manager of Bee-Gee’s, said Thursday is typically the shop’s slowest day because of having no Powerball or Mega Millions drawings that evening, but this Thursday was “steadier than we normally are“ on that day of the week.

Customers at the shop this week primarily purchased tickets for both games, Porter said.

To handle the expected surge in business today and Saturday Bee-Gee’s Market will move to the front of the shop a terminal usually reserved for administrative functions to allow it to operate three terminals this weekend instead of two.

“(That way) we can move people through quicker,” Porter said.

Sky-high lottery jackpots brings in a lot of regulars, but also a lot of newcomers, she said.

“We’ll explain the games to them, let them know odds and how to play things and maybe educate them about some of the other games the lottery has,” Porter said. “We hope that when they come in they notice we’ve got 400 different wines and about 600 different beers ... and they come back even when when the jackpots aren’t high.”

Ohio ticket buyers spent $10 million on Powerball and Mega Millions tickets between Sunday and Wednesday this week, according to Danielle Frizzi-Babb, Ohio Lottery communications director.

“When they’re both pretty high, we start to see people who maybe are strictly Mega Millions players starting to pick up Powerball tickets and vice versa,” Frizzi-Babb said. “They actually help each other a lot when both of the jackpots are big.”

Powerball drawings are held each Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.

The Powerball jackpot was last hit in the April 19 drawing, when a ticket in Macedonia in northeast Ohio won a grand prize worth $252.6 million, she said. Since then, there hasn’t been a jackpot winner in the past 36 consecutive drawings.

Mega Millions drawings are conducted at 11 p.m. Eastern time on Tuesdays and Fridays. The last Mega Millions jackpot was won on April 18