Bergen County Tops New Jersey in Lottery Wins

Bergen County led all counties in New Jersey with more than $32.6 million in reported lottery winnings between January and April, according to a Patch analysis of state lottery data. The county’s dominance stems from ticket sales volume, not fortune.

Lyndhurst accounted for nearly $29 million. A Cash4Life ticket sold at Krauszer’s Liquor Wine & Food Store on Feb. 19 matched the top prize. Over in Ringwood, a gas station produced a $10 million winner.

The New Jersey Lottery sees more winning tickets in areas where people buy more tickets, a pattern tied to how many residents live there, said Dean Ialacci, public information assistant for the state lottery. “This can make it appear as though there are more winners in different parts of the state, but odds per ticket always remain the same,” Ialacci said, according to Patch.

Ialacci explained that millions of tickets get printed per game and distributed to more than 6,000 retailers across the state. Stores that sell tickets faster receive more inventory, which boosts their chances of selling a winner. “As always, winning tickets are completely random,” he said. “When you see trends in winner locations, it’s likely due to sales patterns.”

Rong Chen, a statistics professor at Rutgers, said players often assume patterns exist where none do. No mathematical strategy increases the chance of winning because every number combination has identical probability of being drawn.

“In theory and in practice, all combinations have equal probability of winning,” Chen said. “And there is no ‘memory.’”

What matters, Chen said, is what happens if a ticket wins. Players who pick less common number combinations may split the jackpot with fewer people, but that affects payout distribution rather than winning odds.

“A perfectly ‘rational’ person will not buy a lottery ticket, because the expected gain is always less than the price of the ticket,” Chen said. “But we are not rational.”

A liquor store in Vineland generated an $8 million payout during the same period. Smaller towns show up here and there, often tied to individual payouts that grab attention.

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