I Claim My Prize!

image source

I've just finished watching "Pepsi, where's my jet?" on Netflix. It's a story about how Pepsi Cola rang a promotion whereby you could collect points to be redeemed for things like tee shirts, baseball caps, and sunglasses; you get the idea. They ran a TV ad (I remember it as well) where a kid turns up to school with a harrier jump jet, the inference being that he bought it with 7,000,000 points earned from buying Pepsi. I don't want to spoil it for anyone who doesn't know the story, but basically, John Leonard worked out, along with his friend Todd Hoffman that there was, in fact, a way he could gain enough points to earn the jet which I hasten to add, at the time, was worth $32 Million. As you can imagine, Pepsi does everything in its power to get out of supplying the Harrier; they stick to the story that it was all a big joke and was never a genuine offer. Michael Patti, who at the time was an account executive for the advertising firm BBDO Worldwide, an advertising agency and heavily involved in the creation of the advert, probably gives the best explanation of what went wrong "Originally it was 7,000,000,000 points, but someone from Pepsi said there were too many zeros on the screen. 🤦‍♂️

image source

This reminded me of the Hoover (Vacuum cleaner) free flights promotion in 1992. Hoover offered two round-trip aeroplane tickets to America, worth around £600 at the time. All you had to do was purchase any Hoover product for at least £100. They thought that customers would spend well over the £100 minimum for starters, but to make sure, they made the claims process complicated. Thousands bought £100 vacuums and completed the claim forms, but Hoover (UK) refused to pay out. Somebody had got it seriously wrong at Hoover; having never recovered from the losses incurred, Hoover (UK) was sold to Candy.

My Grandmother had one of those Satellite hoovers. It rode on a cushion of air pumped out of the base. I remember it being heaps of fun to fling around, although the skirting boards and furniture didn't appreciate it. 🤣

image source

Back in the early 90s' I worked for a recruitment company; in fact, I was a branch manager, and part of my role was to place adverts weekly in the local newspapers. One week I ran an advert past my area manager:

"Want to get to America? Australia? Or the Bahamas? Working for us could get you there!"

My area manager looked at me like I had gone insane. "Pete, seriously, you don't want to run that advert." horrified that my brilliant idea was being rejected out of hand, I stuck to my guns and insisted that he let me run it. I could see it now in the internal company magazine:

"Cannon is firing on all cylinders again as he recruits most of the town with his latest recruitment campaign!"

(I'd been in the magazine once before for helping another branch out by hiring coaches at a really low price and bussing workers over to their contract. I suspect Cannon fires on all cylinders was a pisstake, but I can't be sure? 🤔)

I placed the advert, and the following day OMG! The phone was ringing its arse off, and there was a queue from our office front door down the street and around the corner! "ABOUT THESE JOBS IN AMERICA?" screamed a guy down the phone line. Aye? There are no jobs in America? "That's not what your advert says." Aye? It says want to get to America. It says nothing about a job there. "But you're a recruitment company, and you're talking about going to America!" yes, if you worked for us, you could save enough money to get you there!"

Two weeks. It took over two weeks for that mess to fizzle out. I learned a valuable lesson. Don't try and entice people; they'll probably come! 🤦‍♂️

Image created by irisworld

My actual name is Pete. Here is why I have the username dickturpin.

---

You can also find me on Social Media

	https://mastodon.org.uk/@dick_turpin
	https://castlecannon.house/profile/srednivashtar
	https://twitter.com/dick_turpin
	https://www.facebook.com/peter.cannon3

---

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

License explained: Examples
Create your license: Choose

<sup>Podcaster. FOSS, Linux & Creative Commons Advocate.

"Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."</sup>