Millionaire car dealer stepped in to help student who needed $700,000 in Pepsi Points to win a $32,000,000 fighter jet

A Florida student once fought hard to win a $32 million fighter jet by collecting enough Pepsi Points.

Unfortunately for him, his fight wasn’t getting very far. That’s when a millionaire car dealer stepped in to help.

It remains one of the most bizarre stories in recent cultural history.

And every single part of it is absolutely true.

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Florida student tries to use Pepsi Points for a fighter jet

Back in the 1990s, Pepsi and Coca-Cola were in the middle of a heated rivalry.

The soda giants engaged in a prolonged battle for the hearts and minds (and fridges) of America.

Pepsi decided the best way to take it to Coca-Cola was to start appealing to a younger market.

March 1996 saw the unveiling of the Pepsi Stuff campaign, and its scale was massive.

To put it simply, each Pepsi purchase gave people Pepsi Points.

These points could be redeemed for various items, such as leather jackets and baseball caps.

Of course, simply advertising clothing items wouldn’t be enough.

So Pepsi really went all in and advertised a McDonnell-Douglas AV8 Harrier II fighter jet, telling people they could win it if they built up enough points.

But that’s where things took a turn.

Millionaire car dealer helped bankroll the effort

Naturally, most people saw the advert for the airplane – and proceeded to laugh it off.

One business student, however, took it literally, and saw it as a challenge.

John Leonard, the person at the star of the story, was 21 years old in 1995.

Using his business acumen, Leonard worked out that he could buy Pepsi points for 10 cents each.

Therefore, in theory, Leonard could get the required 7,000,000 Pepsi points for $700,000.

This is where the story starts to go from interesting to downright fascinating.

Of course, the 21 year-old Leonard couldn’t possibly afford the $700,000 on his own.

So, John Leonard and sought out investors.

The Florida native got five investors together and told them of the plan.

One of the investors was millionaire car dealer Todd Hoffman.

Todd Hoffman and the others agreed to help bankroll Leonard’s efforts.

Once he’d gathered enough points, he attempted to redeem the fighter jet.

As you can probably guess, Pepsi refused to honor the redemption, claiming that the commercial was a joke.

Florida native Leonard, in turn, decided to file a lawsuit in Miami accusing PepsiCo of breach of contract, fraud, deceptive and unfair trade practices, and misleading advertising.

Judge Kimba Wood ultimately threw out the lawsuit, ruling that nobody could realistically have taken the offer seriously.

The case was appealed to the US Court of Appeals, but the court upheld Judge Wood’s verdict for the exact same reasons.

And that is the story of how a millionaire car dealer almost helped a student buy a multi-million dollar fighter jet with Pepsi Points.