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Barry Dyngles Pub to draw ticket for possibility of expected $300,000 jackpot
By ROBERT CONNELLY
AUSTINTOWN
Mahoning Valley residents await tonight’s drawing at Barry Dyngles Pub to see if someone will win the expected $300,000 jackpot. Restaurant officials expect 3,000 people at the drawing.
Someone will win the full jackpot if their ticket is pulled and they accurately pick the right card for the Queen of Hearts on a board full of cards.
The drawing will be at 8 p.m.
The game has evolved since it began at the local barbecue restaurant as the 54-card board has dwindled down to 11 spots remaining.
People can buy one ticket for $1 and write the number they think will be selected, a phone number to reach them and their name. If the person is not there, and the Queen of Hearts is pulled, that person would receive half the jackpot.
“That’s more than enough,” said Mike Morgan, 33, of Poland, who bought tickets but will not be at the drawing tonight. If he does hit a winning number, he plans to pay off student loans. This was his first week playing the game, and said he doesn’t play scratch-off tickets or the machines at Hollywood Gaming at Mahoning Valley Race Course.
“I don’t know if I feel lucky,” said Bill McCullough, 43, of Struthers. If he wins, he will “pay the bills and go to Disney.”
The Queen of Clubs remains, which, if selected, would pay out 10 percent of the jackpot. The other two queens paid out similar percentages and the two jokers, already selected, paid out 20 percent.
People came in through the Austintown restaurant throughout Tuesday, and will today, to try their luck. The amounts varied from $2 to $32 late Tuesday morning.
Taylor Jones, 18, has been a server at the restaurant for almost a year and started to sell tickets in the front of the area of the store in the last few weeks. She said the most one person has spent on tickets she has seen is $600.
“None of us could have ever imagined it would get this big,” Jones said. She said she frequently laughs as many people turn in their filled-out tickets hoping that it will be pulled.
“Before we even opened [Tuesday], there was a line out the door” for people wanting to get tickets, she said.
The effect for business at Barry Dyngles has been that food and beverage sales “have doubled, sometimes tripled on an average day,” said Doug Duganne, the restaurant’s general manager.
Duganne said the business was approached by local gaming operator Nannicola Inc., which its website said is one the largest distributors of charitable gaming and fundraising products in the United States.
“I know a couple places that did it, and the buzz was exciting so I knew it would be good for business,” he said.
The setup for tonight’s drawing began Monday. There is an outside public-address system with a tent and the business hires off-duty police officers to patrol the parking lot during the event.
Once the ticket is pulled, traffic is shut down on Raccoon Road to allow attendants to go home.
Those who come out to buy tickets park in other business lots along Raccoon Road and eat at some of those locations.
Duganne said that is the “snowball effect” the game has created.
“I know just last Wednesday alone, Subway had a line out the door,” he said. “Papa John’s couldn’t keep up.”
The restaurant will not provide a 1099 tax form for the winner.
“Our responsibility is to let the people know that they are responsible for reporting their own winnings,” Duganne said.
State taxes kick in at $600 and federal taxes begin at $1,200 and those combined are 29 percent of the total amount.