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In case this link goes bad, here is the text from the www.sptimes.com website:

Dream car is a ‘toy Yoda’

A Hooters waitress says a promised
Toyota prize turned out to be a green
subcompact - Yoda.

Jodee Berry won a drawing at the Hooters in Panama City
Beach, where she used to work. She says she was
blindfolded and led to the parking lot. When the blindfold
came off, she was looking at Yoda.

©Associated Press

© St. Petersburg Times,
published July 28, 2001

PANAMA CITY, Fla. -- Oh, what a feeling. Toy Yoda!

A former Hooters waitress has sued the restaurant where
she worked, saying she was promised a new Toyota for
winning a beer sales contest.

Instead she won a new toy Yoda -- the little green Jedi
master from Star Wars.

Jodee Berry, 26, then a waitress at the Hooters in Panama
City Beach, won a contest to see who could sell the most
beer in April.

Manager Jared Blair told waitresses that the contest was a
regional promotion, according to the lawsuit, and that the
top 10 waitresses from each restaurant would be entered in
a drawing. The person whose name was drawn would win a
"new Toyota automobile," the lawsuit says Blair told them.

In early May, Berry said, Blair told her she had won.

"I couldn't believe that out of all the girls who were entered,
I was the winner," Berry said.

She was blindfolded and led to the restaurant parking lot.
When the blindfold was removed, Berry wasn't looking at a
new car, but a Yoda doll.

Berry said she looked beyond the $40 toy, hoping to see the
car driving around the corner. Blair, she said, was inside the
restaurant laughing. But she wasn't.

"A corporation can't lead their employees on like that,"
Berry said. "It's not good business ethics. They can't do that
to people."

Berry quit the restaurant a week later.

She sued Gulf Coast Wings, owners of the restaurant,
alleging breach of contract and fraudulent misrepresentation.
She is seeking as compensation, the cost of a new Toyota --
the car.

Her lawyer, Stephen West of Pensacola, said he was also
looking at false advertising statutes.

West said one other Hooters waitress verified Berry's story.

Berry said Blair knowingly misled them through the course
of the contest by telling the employees he didn't know what
kind of Toyota it would be -- whether a car, truck or van.
The suit contends that he also told them the winner would be
responsible for the tax on the new automobile.

West said those statements would go a long way toward
defeating any defense argument that Berry misunderstood
Blair.

The restaurant regularly had contests where management
would come through with the promised prize, said Berry,
who worked at Hooters for about a year before quitting.

Stuart Houston, a spokesman for the company, said it had
not been served with the lawsuit yet and he would not
comment. "

In the Hollywood version of the story, the waitress would have been on a half-dozen casting couches, invested her tips and inheritance from her mother in a flop film, been made to "star" in a few nude pornos, and then been given the doll.

If corporations--or individuals for that matter--insist on treating people like merchandise and fucking them at every opportunity, then I say sock it to them! I hope she gets a top-of-the-line Landcruiser and enough in punitive damages to retire!

End of screed.

In summary: Bravo Hooters! I love your wings (6 mile island if I'm feeling brave), and I love your waitresses!

------------------
The man with the magic hands.

The radio station didn't say that there would be a car for the winner, only a "Toy-Yoda" Even if they said, "2000 Toy-Yoda", they still didn't say, "car".

On the other hand, Hooters DID say, "car" or "automobile". They took the girl out to the parking lot, which is a place you would expect to find a car. They even bolstered the claim by saying that this was a regional promotion, in which many people would participate. Most people understand the concept that you can't get something for nothing, but when you throw in the "regional" thing you are tricking people into dropping their guard. Everybody knows that sales contests are really a gimmick to make money for the company. One could reasonably expect that the money to pay for the car would come out of the profits from the contest. To top it all off, the manager said that the winner would be responsible for paying the taxes. Again, there's another thing that a reasonable person might expect to happen when you win a contest. It's a standard disclaimer that's plastered all over the end credits of every game show on TV... "Winner is responsible for any and all taxes on prizes won." Again, they even said, "...taxes on the automobile."

Maybe the girl could have checked out the story first. Often these kind of promotions are published in the company's newsletter. My company actually DOES have a contest where the winner gets a car. It's plastered all over the fron pages of our company's newsletters. However, Hooters used multiple tricks to make people let down their guard.

Okay, so I buy in to the Hooters "dumb blonde" stereotypes. Why else do you think guys go there? For the food? Even somebody who ISN'T your stereotypical Hooters waitress (and, yes, there are many) might be easily tricked into thinking that there was a real Toyota CAR involved.

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