“HONK HONK”: IT’S THE PRIZE PATROL WITH $1 MILLION

Usually when the PCH Prize Patrol arrives at a winner’s home we ring the doorbell or rap “knock knock” on the door.  But when we got to the home of John Kutz, one of two new PCH millionaires surprised within 48 hours of each other last week, we had to “honk honk” with our van’s horn.  You see, while John’s residence was in heavily populated Miami, FL, it was in a remote area devoted to tree-farming — with fences all around and a closed gate far away from the house and its front door.  Hector, a man who lives on John’s property, heard us honking and emerged to see what was going on.  Not being familiar with Publishers Clearing House, Hector became nervous and needed a lot of persuading.  Finally convinced that the roses, balloons, video camera and Big Check were “OK,” he opened the gate and announced he’d do his best to get John and wife Lucy home from shopping.  “Great” we said.  But our optimism promptly turned to alarm when Hector got Lucy on the phone and started wailing with pain pretending there had been a terrible accident and crying “You’ve GOT to come home. PLEASE HURRY, HURRY, HURRY!”

Not surprisingly John and Lucy arrived very quickly fully expecting to see an ambulance or fire truck on site.  Instead they found Hector laughing as we stood by with a Big Check declaring that John was the winner of a Million Dollar SuperPrize.  Phew!  There was back-slapping relief, and everything turned out all right – in fact wonderfully.  John could not have been happier.  He is retired, spends much of his time tending a large tropical garden, and says he’ll put the prize money to good use paying bills and fixing up the house, which he hasn’t been able to do for 20 years.

People always ask me, “What does the Prize Patrol do if the winner isn’t home?”  Well, most of the time the winner is home and the surprise presentation proceeds smoothly and joyfully.  If that doesn’t happen we turn to neighbors to help us locate the winner  and orchestrate the “winning moment” wherever we can — perhaps at a workplace, a market, a school, or even a hospital.

Blog readers: Rest assured that if the Prize Patrol arrives at your door and has to ask relatives or friends to summon you home, we will insist that they indicate it’s good news, not bad, so the winner doesn’t race home panic-stricken.

But first things first:  You can’t win if you don’t enter. John Kutz won $1 Million from a Publishers Clearing House mailing promoting a 48 Hour Instant Millionaire prize. This is an ongoing promotion and we’re still looking daily for even more new millionaires, so keep on entering!

Congratulations John!  And to the rest of you: the best of luck.

Dave Sayer
Prize Patrol Ambassador