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Both cases in the article are about false advertising in contractual offers.
The "Hooters" case, the company misled the winner into thinking the prize was a Toyota car. Instead the magnitude of the prize giving ceremony resulted in the anticlimax of the winner receiving a "Toy Yoda", a fluffy toy instead of a Toyota car. The gravity of the promotion warranted the winning of a car rather than a fluffy toy.
There is merit in the case for the prize winner believing the prize was a car because "Toy Yoda" could be read as the founder of the Toyota car manufacturing company Mr Iichiro Toyoda was the owner of the Toyoda Manufacturing Company.
Hence the winner could be misled into thinking that the prize was a Toyoda not a Toy Yoda.
It would have saved the restaurant trouble and money if the offer was for a Yoda Toy.
https://apnews.com/article/6f88d96871f3292f506e2679cf012597
In contrast, in Leonard v Pepsico legitimized mere puffery in advertising meaning the offer was not genuine by the extraordinary value of the advertised price of the aeroplane of US $700 million price for US $750k in cash and Pepsi coupons.
In this case the plaintiff lost.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_v._Pepsico
We can go earlier to the case of Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball. The company's offer was that if their product, a smoke ball of carbolic acid did not cure the consumer of the flu, a £100 prize would be issued.
The defendant lost because the prize offer was not genuine. It was puffery.
The court ruled that the £100 prize was a term of the contract.
The lesson is don't offer an extraordinarily significant prize if you cannot and/or would not be able to furnish the supply of the prize on offer. It causes problems for either party.
One doesn't know what the outcome in court will be because the outcome may be in favour of the plaintiff or the defendant. Carlill was in the plaintiff's case while Leonard was in the defendant's favour.
Don't assume that the Restaurant Code as in the Leonard v Pepsi case or some other industry code will protect the defendant such as Pepsi from liability in honouring the contract.
Other lesson. Who can forget the issue in Sydney in the 1980s where a newspaper printed too many winning "bingo" cards?
Thank you
Anthony, the law is indeed grey and be safe not to make extraorinary offers as prizes, Belfield, in the land of the Wangal and Darug Peoples of the Eora Nation