The Delaware Lottery takes pride in their privacy policy, only publishing winner names with their consent.
To make the point, while still showing a real winner behind the story, the lottery takes the winners' pictures, but has each winner hold up a mask over their face.
With a busy month of August, including sixteen people winning prizes of $10,000 or more, the Delaware Lottery has a lot of anonymous pictures to take. The result is a collage that could make even the stodgiest of us chuckle.
Fourteen of those winners have recently claimed their Powerball prizes from the Delaware Lottery Office in Dover, including a $200,000 winner from the August 15th, 2007 drawing and a $30,000 winner from the August 25th, 2007 drawing.
Two $10,000 prizes remain unclaimed as the Powerball jackpot continues to grow.
Leading up to the jackpot of $314.3 million, the winning ticket for which was sold in Richmond, Ind. on August 25th, the excitement in Delaware could be felt in the air. Because of the Delaware Lottery's anonymity policy, and the numerous winners already claiming prizes in the run-up to the jackpot, there was a steady flow ticket sales throughout the month.
"We're thrilled to see so many winners in Delaware," said Delaware Lottery Director Wayne Lemons. "Each of them has an exciting story to tell and we're happy to be a part of their experience."
All of the $10,000-plus winners, most of whom wished to remain anonymous, used the Quick Pick feature, in which the computer terminal randomly generates the numbers. Winners represented a wide range of players, including retirees, a teacher, a nursing student, a body shop manager, and a group of postal workers who split their winnings 77 ways.
Three representatives from the group of postal workers claimed the prize on August 21, 2007 after finding out they had won by watching the numbers on TV. "We started off with six or seven of us chipping in to buy tickets," said one of the winners. "But over the years the group of players just kept growing to the 77 we have now."
During the month of August, overall Powerball drawings yielded 181,138 winners, with prizes totaling $1.35 Million. The Delaware Lottery reminds players that prizes must be claimed within one year from the date of the drawing.
Since the start of operations in 1975, the Delaware Lottery has contributed more than $2.5 billion to the state's General Fund to help finance needed state services that benefit everyone in Delaware.
(Click to display full-size in gallery)
They look like people licking really big lollipops!
This is one of the dumbest lottery ideas I've seen in a while.
Hey, I recognize that shirt!
Aw c'mon, it's at least worth a smile! I think it's hilarious that they got nine people to stand up there holding those things to start with!
PSYKOMO has LICKED a lotta of THING's,.............................BUTT,
never<<<<<<<POWERBALL
LOL^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
What a way to find out my in-laws have been holding out on me.
Keeping in mind I live here and see this smiley image about every day - My first visual thought was - bizaare and definitely a negative. I keep thinking about the sign on retail doors that says you must remove any - hat - sunglasses - masks - anything which clearly impedes your face from identification. I can understand how they talked these blokes into doing this - they just utilized those first few minutes of human pliability once we've been handed a bunch of money - the brain is engaged in how we are going to spend it and not thinking too clearly.
Now that my brain has had time to get the visual blocked out, I'm really disturbed. The fact is the Bunky's of the lottery world make a lottery director drool. They drum interest, sell tickets.... Can't you just hear the disappointment routinely falling in the back office at lottery HQ when another big winner comes in and doesn't want a press call? The only reason some months DE has any thing to report about winners personally is for those occasional promotional things the lottery does that require involvement of the winner in the press release.
So this means that someone involved with the DE lottery grew a brain and figured out how to turn the negative into a positive by putting the spotlight on anonymity. And this has been a full out statewide press with billboards, radio, TV, magazine, newspapers, the works, as another LP member pointed out a while back. Because I think the DE lottery administration is hopelessly tired (how long has the Lemons been there?), I must relent and admit this advertising strategy is a really good idea. I hope it does not turn out that they hired some outside consulting firm for a gazillion dollars to come up with the idea.
I can guess what's coming next - television ads featuring interviews with these smiley faces.
That's clever. I like it.
The start of the Lottery Jackpot Winner's Protection Program!
Would prefer no picture at all...