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Lotto behind the scenes: Aussie winners' best responses

Matt Hart from The Lott reveals the funniest responses and the surprising item winners love to buy.

Video transcript

MATT HART: Hi, I'm Matt. I'm from the Lott, the official home of Australia's lotteries. Part of my job is reaching out to division one winners and letting them know they have won big. So maybe I'll be giving you a call one day soon. The most wholesome wins, certainly ones involving families.

Because I remember one time, I called a family. They're in Sydney. And they were sitting around the breakfast table. They had won a couple of million dollars. And I could tell in the background, the young son, who I think was about eight, had already sort of earmarked that he wanted a Ferrari. Not sure that was going to happen, but you can just sort of tell how life changing it's going to be for some families.

But one of the most touching wins I've had was someone who won Super 66. And when I rang them, they were actually in Darwin on holidays. And she revealed that she'd actually just been recovering from cancer. And so because she'd had this win, she decided she was going to take the whole family on a Darwin helicopter pub crawl, which I didn't know existed, but was certainly one of the best ways to celebrate.

We get a lot of responses from-- lots of different types of reponses with division one wins. And I think the funniest ones for me are always when they have a really physical reaction to the news. So it's people who didn't know they'd won. I ring them up, and they have this really physical reaction. So one woman completely dropped the phone. And the phone went dead, so I wasn't sure what was happening on the end of the line there.

Another one, people tell us they have to go sit down because their legs are shaking, or their hands are shaking, or their heart's racing. But perhaps the strangest, there was a gentleman earlier this year. We told him he'd won division one, and he admitted he did throw up a little bit.

One what really sticks in my mind, there was a gentleman from Sydney who won $20 million in Powerball. And I broke the news to him. He did propose to me jokingly, but I did accept seriously now that he's $20 million richer. But he also shared that he wanted to grin like a giraffe. So he said he played a bit of sport when he was young, so his teeth weren't the greatest. And he'd always wanted to fix up his teeth and grin like a giraffe.

We get lots of really interesting things. So generally, people do go for the three H's. They want a house. They want to help family and friends and go on a holiday. But I'm always stunned how often Dyson vacuum cleaners come up. Because if you've won $20, $60 million, you could probably buy a few Dyson vacuum cleaners.

It's just funny, Dyson vacuum cleaners. Someone wanted to returf the front lawn, roofs, getting roofs fixed, definitely taking family on holidays. Those types of things. A dishwasher, someone wanted to get. Someone never wanted to iron a shirt ever again or mow the lawn.

So it's usually the really what we'd think of small things that are quite quirky. And I think it shows that people-- yes, some of these things would have been within their reach, but I they could never quite justify spending the cash on that. But now that they've had a massive windfall, yes, you can get that Dyson vacuum cleaner.

I spoke to one winner, and I was just joking about how a lot of winners tell us they're going to get a Dyson vacuum cleaner. I mean, other vacuum cleaner brands are available. But and then she laughs, saying, well, I've just bought three Dyson vacuum cleaners. So I can just imagine that's how you know you're a division one winner if there's a Dyson vacuum in every room.