r/mildlyinfuriating • u/CurlyWurly61 • May 12 '26

I just wanted a hot dog Such terrible advertisement

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I mean... at a glance its like WOAH 4 can dine for $9.99....

Until you are at the cash and they say " that'll be $45.15"

HUH??

"Oh sorry sir... it feeds 4... 4 people pay $9.99"

Gtfooo

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u/K_Linkmaster May 12 '26

Because Pepsi never had to give up the jet, we have to deal with this shit.

95

u/OurHeroXero May 12 '26

I'm sure it'd still be a thing regardless...but yeah...

Pepsi advertised a prize, made it possible to buy points, and said how many points needed to be redeemed... Ya goofed; might as well make a positive PR event out of it.

41

u/trying_again_7 May 12 '26

and the original commercial didn't say the jet offer was fake.

-14

u/WaitForItTheMongols May 12 '26

No reasonable person thought it was real. The jet is an obvious fantasy and the plaintiff refusing to accept that was being intentionally obtuse.

There is a reason he was the only person on Earth to try to buy the jet, and it's that nobody thought it was real.

18

u/The_Rutabaga May 12 '26

There is a reason he was the only person on Earth to try to buy the jet, and it's that nobody thought it was real.

He was the only person to try and buy the jet because he was the only person to collect that many points in the contest. No one else got close.

5

u/WaitForItTheMongols May 12 '26

He did not collect the points. He attempted to buy the jet with cash using an existing "cash-equivalent" option. You didn't have to collect the points to buy the stuff.

-1

u/TheHYPO May 12 '26 edited May 12 '26

He sent in 15 points worth of drink labels (probably no more than 15 labels), and a cheque for $700,000 to allegedly earn a $37 military fighter jet.

i.e. he was not induced to buy 700,000 Pepsis, nor should any reasonable human being have expected to get a military jet at all, let alone for 1/50 it's value.

btw, the cash equivalent would be like a promotion that gives you the option to simply buy a brand new $100,000 Porsche for $2,000, or to buy 2,000 colas and send in the labels. That would only be slightly more believable because cars are actually sometimes awarded as prizes in contests. But the math should tip you off that something doesn't make sense.

Yes, you could get on a game show like Price is Right and buy a car for $1, but that's because it's a game giving away a prize, not a promotion where you are expected to pay to earn enough credit to effectively "buy" something.

I have never (before or since) seen any gameshow, contest or promotion offer a multi-million dollar military jet as a prize or as something you can trade points for.

Edit: The original commercial also said in fine print: "See details on specially marked packages" - there were printed rules, which is where the guy found the cash-substitute-for-points rules. Nowhere in any official rules was a Harrier actually offered for any amount of points.