
Leonard v. Pepsico (The Harrier Jet Ad): Offers and the Power of Acceptance
Yale law professor Ian Ayres walks through Leonard v. Pepsico, the case built around a college student's attempt to redeem Pepsi Points for a Harrier jet featured in a satirical television ad. Part of Ayres' American Contract Law course, originally produced for Coursera, this segment sits within a unit on the bargain relationship and specifically how offers create a power of acceptance. Ayres breaks down why the court found the commercial was not a genuine offer, examining the objective theory of contract interpretation, the role of a reasonable person standard, and how advertisements generally function as invitations rather than binding proposals. The lecture uses the case's near-absurd premise, a fighter jet supposedly available for 7,000,000 Pepsi Points, to illustrate a serious doctrinal point about when commercial communications cross the line into enforceable offers.