Pepsi, Where's My Jet? - First Season

Wow.

We're gonna make you do the Pepsi-Coke challenge.

Okay. Do I have something to cleanse my palate in between--

Yeah. Every person--

No, I'm joke… I'm j…

I'm not… I'm not like a serious soda taster here. I think I can do this.

Okay, Phyllis. Here's all you need to do.

-You're gonna try both of these. -Okay.

Take a sip of each one.

And then pull the one you like better out.

Oh no, this is terrible.

Okay, wait.

Let's just… smell them a little bit.

This might bring back some bad memories.

I prefer this one.

-I like this one. -I choose this one.

I pick that one.

Oh, man!

-They both taste like shit. Horrible. - You're not gonna do it?

Can't stand that stuff.

You're gonna be the outlier.

You wanna know which one tastes better?

Which shit tastes better, this shit or that shit?

I don't know. It's shit to me. They both taste like shit.

All right. Now what?

KISW, Seattle's best rock.

I'm Joe Bryant. And I've got a very special guest in the studio today.

His story has not been told for many years,

but in the mid '90s, everyone was talking about it.

If he's right, he has a real jet fighter in the can.

I guess it is time

to hear the story of John Leonard versus PepsiCo.

Oh, yeah!

- What's up? -What's up?

The '90s had some of the greatest commercials in the history of advertising.

Proper.

The style of advertising in the '90s was building brands in the most intense way.

Yo quiero Taco Bell.

It was crazy.

No, no.

But Pepsi was famous in its own right.

Coke was the market leader, because it was the original cola.

So Pepsi was the underdog since its inception.

But its strongest weapon was the advertising.

Pepsi. Pepsi.

Take the Pepsi challenge.

-Tell me which one you chose. -Pepsi!

Madonna, Michael Jackson, Marlon Brando, Britney Spears.

I'm not trying to name-drop, but I am absolutely name-dropping.

These were the people I worked with.

You felt like, "Yeah, this is a cool club to be in."

You have to have a different kind of brain

to come up with the bears dancing to the Village People.

People would have cut off a limb to work on the Pepsi business.

We were launching the most famous work in the history of advertising.

All because we needed to win the Cola Wars.

And then, I remember Brian calling me

and saying, "Hey, we have this crazy idea

to put Coke on the defensive."

And the idea was, you know, by its nature, pretty simple.

Drink Pepsi, get stuff.

The more Pepsi you bought, you'd get Pepsi Points,

and you could cash those points in for Pepsi paraphernalia.

All these things that kids like.

T-shirts, hats.

Leather jacket, jean jacket, cool sunglasses.

But the launch of the campaign was the commercial.

It was not the sexiest assignment in the world.

Buy our stuff and then advertise it for us.

The commercial had to make people laugh.

Get them interested, get them talking.

We needed to make people remember the ad and remember the program.

So we took every penny that we had for that summer

and put it behind this commercial and this idea.

And then the shit hit the fan.

Introducing the new Pepsi Stuff catalog.

Now, the more Pepsi you drink, the more great stuff you're going to get.

Sure beats the bus.

Play that again.

Sure beats the bus.

I looked at it, and I was completely dumbstruck.

No fine print.

That is a legit offer. I don't care what anybody else says.

I'm gonna get that jet.

I was like, "Oh, fuck."

Sure beats the bus.

It just went out and nobody flagged it.

The bottom of that video was very clear.

Here it is, the Harrier jet. Seven million points.

It's clearly a joke.

People don't offer military hardware as prizes.

They put this shit up there on the air? Live by your word.

You say it, you do it.

Hundreds of millions of people saw the ad,

and there's one guy who says this was a serious offer?

That was ridiculous.

Whoo!

You know, it's in my head now.

I think some would say Pepsi was my 15 minutes,

and those 15 minutes are up.

That was 25 years ago.

Different world then.

Different John.

I was 20 years old,

going to a small community college outside Seattle.

Definitely not Harvard.

I had big dreams, big aspirations.

But the things I liked to do most, were be out in the mountains.

I had been up climbing in Alaska,

climbing in South America.

I was trying to figure out my way to climb the highest mountains in the world.

See different places, experience different cultures.

But trying to match it up with my reality of no checkbook.

To me, money was freedom.

It allowed for more adventures, more fun.

I'd worked in small businesses. My parents had a small business.

Oh, no!

Who would have thought?

Um, hi and… Pepsi. We're here to talk about Pepsi, right?

Tell us about John at 20 years old. What was John like?

He was a go-getter.

I mean, he always had a job.

He…

Just ad lib in your own words.

Why can't you say these things?

-It's… It's good for you. -Okay, all right.

His first job was a paperboy.

- Bike shop. -Oh yeah, you worked at the bike shop.

Then he delivered teriyaki.

And delivered teriyaki to the locals.

- He washed windows. -Oh, he was a window washer.

You cut glass at that glass company.

He sold magazines.

- - Then he was a climbing guide.

Climbing guide.

Climbing guide.

Now, if he was only Harry Styles, I'd like it even better.

Can you… No, I'm sorry.

I'm a Harry Styles fan.

Mom, you're perfect.

-I'm trying to ad lib and I can't. -You're doing great. Sit down.

Pepsi was a big deal.

Pepsi, Coke, the Cola Wars. That was all front and center at the time.

They were trying to come towards the Pepsi generation.

That was their whole thing. That was where I was at.

Their association with, like, MTV.

Cool athletes.

I mean, they had Shaq.

Don't even think about it.

They had Cindy Crawford.

Coke had the polar bear.

My grandparents thought that was real cool.

If it was cool, Pepsi had it.

If you're young and cool at any age, really,

then Pepsi's the one for you.

It was your generation.

I prefer this one.

- Someone's gonna be very happy. -Yeah, see? There you go.

- -In '92, I was 24.

I got asked by my agent to do a Pepsi commercial for the Super Bowl.

The casting, the music, the writing, like, everything worked.

I mean, that commercial is so iconic.

Every Halloween, on Instagram,

I see at least 30 people that go as me from that Pepsi commercial.

Pepsi is like this international, iconic brand,

but then, the advertising made it relatable for everybody.

Notice anything kind of different about the girls this semester?

Yeah, now that you mention it. They're all wearing that Pepsi stuff.

It worked for me,

and, frankly, their great advertising not only got me to drink their product,

it got me to take a swing at the fences, right?