Pepsi, Where's My Jet follows what is arguably one of the wildest legal cases out there, as it follows one man's quest to try and get a Harrier fighter jet from Pepsi as a reward, following a misleading commercial.
When John Leonard, a 20-year-old student from Seattle, saw a 90's commercial about "Pepsi Points" featuring a fighter jet at the end, claiming that you'd need 7 million points to earn one, he saw an opportunity. Especially since an all-important disclaimer was missing from the bottom of the advertisement.
This case has been explored in a new four-part Netflix documentary series, directed by Andrew Renzi, who spoke about telling the story in an interview with The Independent.
He said: "The biggest thing that I was looking to — not necessarily debunk, but to illustrate, was that I really developed an opinion of John where I believed him, and I believed in him.
"This is just a young man who really wanted to try to reach for the stars. He wanted an adventure and it was really an uncynical, kind of slightly naive pathway to what he perceived as success. He wasn’t an ambulance chaser. I believed him, and I believed in that spirit, and I loved that spirit."
But what was the outcome of the case? Did John Leonard actually come to own a jet? Here's everything you need to know...
Is Pepsi, Where's My Jet a true story?
Yes, amazingly John Leonard's story about taking the soft drink company to court really is true and this four-part documentary reveals the legal battle he went through to try and get his hands on a military plane.
What is the infamous Pepsi Points commercial?
The Pepsi Points loyalty program was launched in the mid-nineties, where the soft drinks company Pepsico was offering customers the chance to get some Pepsi-branded swag like a T-Shirt (75 points), a leather jacket (1450 points), sunglasses (175 points), and various other everyday items.
However, Pepsi ended their commercial with a joke, claiming you could fly a Harrier Jet to school if you could earn 7 million Pepsi Points. But they didn't add a disclaimer to their initial advertising campaign, which John picked up on, and decided to see what would happen if he managed to earn enough.
How did John Leonard get all those Pepsi Points?
7 million Pepsi Points might seem like a stretch at first, but John was absolutely committed to obtaining all of them before the competition window was up. The way he went about doing this is one of the most interesting parts of the case!
No, he didn't somehow manage to drink millions of cans of Pepsi, he found a much more clever way to get the necessary points together, something that Pepsico certainly wasn't expecting.
There was a loophole in the loyalty programme because Pepsi only required participants to submit 15 points they’d collected from cans and bottles, and the rest could be bought for 10 cents each by mailing in a check to the company.
So, John enlisted the help of his mountaineering buddy Todd Hoffman and some other investors, and they managed to raise enough money to send a certified check for $700,008.50 as permitted by the contest rules.
To break it down further, John had accumulated 15 existing points, paid $0.10 a point for the remaining 6,999,985 points, and a $10 shipping and handling fee, so technically he was within the competition rules.
Who won the case? Did anyone get the Pepsi Harrier Jet?
No! Nobody involved in Leonard v. Pepsico, Inc obtained a fighter jet, and since Pepsi had never been giving one away in the first place, they didn't own one either. So if you're here expecting to see someone posing with a super fast Pepsi-branded jet, you'll be disappointed.
The court ultimately ruled in favor of Pepsico and there are lots of reasons for this ruling if you want to get into the legality of it all, which we'll explore below.
For a start, the court ruled that it was unreasonable to believe that they were willing to give away a jet worth roughly $37.4 million for a mere $700,000, which was the total cost of purchasing 7 million Pepsi Points.
Harrier jump jets have been used in the United States Marine Corps, Royal Air Force, Spanish Navy, and Italian Navy over the years so they're not just giving them out to anyone, especially not in their original state.
At the time, The Pentagon stated that the jet would not be sold to civilians without "demilitarization", which would have included stripping the Harrier of its ability to land and take off vertically.
To get into more specific rulings, the case notes go into even more detail about why the jet, flown by your average high schooler, was clearly intended as a joke and not to be taken seriously. They said:
- "The callow youth featured in the commercial is a highly improbable pilot, one who could barely be trusted with the keys to his parents' car, much less the prize aircraft of the United States Marine Corps"
- "The teenager's comment that flying a Harrier Jet to school 'sure beats the bus' evinces an improbably insouciant attitude toward the relative difficulty and danger of piloting a fighter plane in a residential area"
- "No school would provide landing space for a student's fighter jet, or condone the disruption the jet's use would cause."
However, Pepsico did amend the advertisement and updated the cost of the Harrier Jet to 700 million Pepsi Points instead of 7 million, as well as adding a clarifying "Just Kidding" disclaimer.
Did John Leonard get anything from Pepsi?
No, John walked away empty-handed following the trial. He was originally offered settlement fees of nearly $1 million but refused it as he wanted the jet instead.
Where is John Leonard now?
John Leonard is now 48 years old and lives in Talkeetna, Alaska with his wife, Dottie, and their two children. And no, he doesn't own a jet!
He is still close friends with Todd Hoffman and the pair recently took on the challenge of climbing Mount Vinson, so the events of the case haven't affected their friendship either.
In an interview with The Guardian, John Leonard revealed there were people who believed he only challenged Pepsi for the attention it would bring, even those he considers himself to be close to.
He said: "Over the years I’ve been sensitive to it, because even close people have said: ‘Well, you’re an opportunist'. Lawsuits like this end up being compared to the McDonald’s hot coffee case, the kind of ambulance-chaser thing.
"And that hit me wrong. Looking back on it, it was opportunistic. Absolutely. But that’s not always a negative thing. And back then I wholeheartedly thought that we were going to get the jet.”
However, he now releases the error of his original assumption and said: "What I struggle with today is how can I have really thought that I was going to get the jet? I’m 48 years old now, and I’m now looking back on it like: ‘what kind of dips**t were you, man?"
Pepsi, Where's My Jet is streaming exclusively on Netflix now.
