Sometimes in life, you follow a sign that says “luckiest store in Michigan,” and instead of getting a clever marketing gimmick, you end up walking out with a ticket worth a million dollars. This is exactly what happened to one Michigan man who, in a moment of casual optimism, stepped into a liquor store and stepped out with a financial plot twist.
The winner — who’s staying anonymous, probably to avoid sudden long-lost cousins — already knew about the Michigan Lottery’s Super Raffle. The odds spoke to him. The big prizes spoke to him. And apparently, the universe spoke to him too.
He had been telling everyone he knew that the Super Raffle had the best odds ever to win $6 million. He was practically a walking advertisement — minus the commission. And while he was out near Party World on Alpine Avenue, a place proudly known as the “luckiest store in Michigan,” he figured he might as well lean into the myth.
He bought a ticket. A $50 shot at possibility.
Then came the day of the drawing. His wife called him in tears — the kind of call that makes your stomach drop before your brain catches up. He thought something terrible had happened. Instead, she was crying because he had just won $1 million.
He didn’t believe her. Of course he didn’t. So she sent a picture. And he checked. And then checked again.
When the reality hit him — that his ticket, number 049686, was one of only two drawn for the $1 million second-tier prize — his heart started pounding. The surreal kind of pounding you get when the future suddenly looks different.
His plan? Take the one-time lump sum of roughly $693,000 and invest most of it. Not a shopping spree. Not a sudden move to a beach somewhere warm. Just a long-term play for something bigger: generational wealth.
The Michigan Lottery loved the story almost as much as Party World did. This wasn’t their first trip around the jackpot block. In 2008, they sold a $57 million Mega Millions winner. Since then, they’ve served up more than a dozen prizes over $10,000, including several six-figure wins. If luck is a pattern — or if belief in luck becomes one — Party World has been riding that wave for more than a decade.
The Lottery Commissioner even gave them a nod, noting that while you can’t predict lightning, some places just seem to get struck more often.
And in this case, lightning came in the form of a $50 ticket and a million-dollar ending — all because one man decided to trust a sign that said the luckiest store in Michigan. Sometimes life rewards a little boldness. Sometimes it rewards curiosity. And sometimes, apparently, it rewards good advertising.