Powerball: Texas Store Owner to Receive $1 Million for Selling Winning Ticket
The store gets $1 million for selling a winning ticket, lottery officials said.
— -- The owner of Appletree Food Mart in Princeton, Texas, opened his store today unaware it had sold one of three winning tickets in Wednesday's $564 million Powerball drawing. His store will receive $1 million for selling a winning ticket.
Owner Chandra Siwakoti was surprised by media at his convenience store early this morning.
"I still can't believe," he said, according to ABC affiliate WFAA-TV in Dallas. "So, wow, it's exciting for me."
He wasn't sure what he was going to do with the $1 million, but he immediately called his wife after finding out, he added.
Siwakoti said he wasn't sure who won the winning ticket yet.
Siwakoti is from Nepal and has been running the Valero gas station's convenience store for 10 years, he said. The store once sold a winning $50,000 scratch lottery ticket, Siwakoti added.
The jackpot, which has a cash value of $381 million, marks the fifth largest prize in U.S. history. The jackpot has been growing for the past two months, gradually increasing since starting at $40 million.
Experts estimated the odds of winning at 175 million to one.
The stores where two other winning tickets were sold in North Carolina and Puerto Rico were not known this morning.