I don't know if this is a question or what, exactly... Basically, I am proposing that my local (or possibly all) 7-11 stores have less winners than other places with scratchers.
Seems unlikely, right? Well I've suspected it for a while, and last night/today made me decide to never buy scratchers from 7-11 again.. Could be bad luck, but here's what happened:
I typically buy my scratchers from a liquor store near my house. I'm cool with the owner, so I like to give him business (vs the 7-11 across the street). I always go for the newest tickets, since they usually have the most prizes still available. Scratchers don't have great odds, so spending 5 or 10$ and not winning anything isn't that big of a deal to me. Typically I buy a few 1$ tickets, or one 5$ one, or a combo of all the newer ones, depending on what I have to spare.
At the liquor store, if I buy five 1$ tickets, I'm pretty confident that I'll win at least 1$ back. Doesn't always work out, but with odds of 1:4.77 for any prize (the 1$ "Lucky 13" ticket is what I'm using as my example), I'd say the odds are pretty accurate. If I have extra to spare, say 20$ total, I'll get a combo of tickets. For example, I'll get two 5$ tickets, one 2$, one 3$, and five 1$ ones. I am shocked if I don't win at least 1$ back with the 20$ investment.
Yesterday I went to my liquor store, bought a 1$ ticket (Lucky 13), won 2$. Later on, I cashed it in for two more Lucky 13s. Lost one, and won 13$ on the other. Lucky, right? Go back later on, cash it in, and I buy one 5$ ticket (Jumbo Bucks), one 3$ (5x Crossword), one 2$ (All the Money), and 3 more Lucky 13s.
Lost two Lucky 13s, won 3$ on the last one.
Then I won 5$ from All the Money, 4$ from 5x Crossword, and won 100 on Jumbo Bucks! Lucky again, right? I may have bought a couple more tickets earlier in the day, but out of the 9 tickets I remember buying for sure, I won over half of them (I usually am pretty lucky with smaller prizes but this is great!). I decided to call it a night seeing as I got a big winner.
So this morning, I head to 7-11 to cash in my big winner. I brought it there because I figured a liquor store would be less likely to have 100$ cash at 9AM (who knows though, there are a lot of alcoholics out there lol). Its kinda busy so I cash in my smaller tickets first to pay for my soda. My turn comes around again, and my big winner gets cashed. I spend 30$ on more scratchers, I bought 4 Jumbo Bucks, two of All the Money (the 2$ ones), and six Lucky 13s.
I don't expect to win over half of the tickets I bought again, but what happened when I scratched them was a little irritating. Out of all the tickets I just bought, I won ONE free 5$ ticket. Nothing else. I can't say without a doubt, but I would wager that if I bought the same exact thing at the liquor store instead, I would have walked away with at least one Jumbo Bucks winner and one Lucky 13 winner.
My explanation doesn't do this thing justice, but I know for a fact that I have a higher percentage of winners from the liquor store. Random should be random, and maybe it is, but the odds seem MUCH better at the liquor store.
Only thing I can think of is that the CA Lotto sells rolls with less winners for a discount. It'd turn a profit for 7-11 and the lotto, while being a fairly foolproof way to rob people. Sounds scandalous to me, but out of literally THOUSANDS of scratchers I've played in my life, I've never had one winner exceeding 20$ from any 7-11. More than a few liquor stores I've won multiple, as well as a few different Circle Ks. I've had more than a few streaks at different stores, where I started by buying ONE ticket and played 10+ in a row, just winning a couple bucks at first and working my way from 1$ tickets to the 5$ ones. Never 7-11 though.
Can someone explain this? Is there such thing as a "hot roll" of scratchers? I seem to find rolls of certain tickets certain stores that I win most of the time... I do buy a lot of tickets overall, but I literally turn a profit buying them at the liquor store most of the time. But 7-11 I can spend 20-40$ on tickets and lose them all. What's the deal, really?