David Phillips (entrepreneur)
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

David Phillips is an American civil engineer best known for accumulating
frequent flyer miles A frequent-flyer program (American English) or frequent-flyer programme (British English) is a loyalty program offered by an airline. Many airlines have frequent-flyer programs designed to encourage airline customers enrolled in the program ...
by taking advantage of a promotion by
Healthy Choice Healthy Choice is the name of a brand of refrigerated and frozen foods owned by ConAgra Foods. According to ConAgra's official corporate history, it came into being after then-ConAgra CEO Charles "Mike" Harper suffered a heart attack in 1985. Fo ...
Foods in 1999. Phillips, who works as the Associate Vice President of Energy and Sustainability at University of California Office of the President, calculated while grocery shopping that the value of a mail-in promotion for frequent flyer miles exceeded the cost of the pudding on which it was offered. In May 1999, Phillips received 1,253,000 frequent flyer miles.


Process

Healthy Choice Healthy Choice is the name of a brand of refrigerated and frozen foods owned by ConAgra Foods. According to ConAgra's official corporate history, it came into being after then-ConAgra CEO Charles "Mike" Harper suffered a heart attack in 1985. Fo ...
was running a promotion offering 500 miles for each pack of 10 Healthy Choice bar codes ( UPC) mailed in as proof of purchase. Valuing each mile at 2 cents, Phillips calculated that the return per UPC ($1) was worth a significant part of the price of a frozen meal (which were selling for $2), but while shopping he also found Healthy Choice soup cans for only $0.90. He later discovered the same promotion also included individual pudding packages at 25 cents each, while shopping at a nearby
Grocery Outlet Grocery Outlet Holding Corp. is an American discount closeout retailer consisting exclusively of supermarket locations that offer deeply discounted, overstocked, and closeout products from name brand and private label suppliers. The company h ...
. He subsequently visited ten Grocery Outlet stores in the Sacramento area, buying every case of pudding available, totaling 12,150 individual servings of pudding, for $3,140. He also had the Grocery Outlet manager order additional cases. In order to divert attention, he claimed he was stocking up for
Y2K The year 2000 problem, also known as the Y2K problem, Y2K scare, millennium bug, Y2K bug, Y2K glitch, Y2K error, or simply Y2K refers to potential computer errors related to the formatting and storage of calendar data for dates in and after ...
. Clerks started calling him "Pudding Guy". The promotion included an early-bird bonus if the packages were mailed during May 1999 (the mileage earned would double from 500 miles to 1,000 miles for every 10 UPCs submitted). Phillips, unable to remove all the UPCs himself in such a short time, recruited members of a local
Salvation Army Salvation (from Latin: ''salvatio'', from ''salva'', 'safe, saved') is the state of being saved or protected from harm or a dire situation. In religion and theology, ''salvation'' generally refers to the deliverance of the soul from sin and its c ...
branch to cut the UPC codes off the cardboard wrapped around the pudding containers; in exchange, Phillips donated the individual puddings. This donation allowed him to receive $815 in tax write-offs further increasing his return on investment.


Outcome

Phillips submitted proof of mailing the certificates and Healthy Choice Foods awarded him 1,253,000 frequent flyer miles. He would apply some of the miles to his United, Delta, and Northwest frequent flyer accounts, and the majority (over 1 million miles) to his
AAdvantage AAdvantage is the frequent-flyer program of American Airlines. Launched May 1, 1981, it was the second such loyalty program in the world (after the first at Texas International Airlines in 1979) and remains the largest, with more than 67 millio ...
account, in the process earning him lifetime Gold status. It is also speculated that neither
ConAgra Conagra Brands, Inc. (formerly ConAgra Foods) is an American consumer packaged goods holding company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Conagra makes and sells products under various brand names that are available in supermarkets, restaurants, ...
, the owners of the Healthy Choice brand, nor the airlines were seriously disadvantaged by the outcome, due to the small price paid by ConAgra to the airlines and the resultant publicity gained. Since 2000, Phillips continues to take advantage of frequent flyer promotions, and is earning points five times faster than he is spending them, now having reached lifetime Platinum status on his AAdvantage account. Phillips' pudding story received international attention from news outlets such as ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' and ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
''. The story was the inspiration for a
sub-plot In fiction, a subplot is a secondary strand of the plot that is a supporting side story for any story or for the main plot. Subplots may connect to main plots, in either time and place or thematic significance. Subplots often involve supporting cha ...
in the 2002
Paul Thomas Anderson Paul Thomas Anderson (born June 26, 1970), also known by his initials PTA, is an American filmmaker. He made his feature-film debut with ''Hard Eight (film), Hard Eight'' (1996). He found critical and commercial success with ''Boogie Nights'' ( ...
feature film ''
Punch-Drunk Love ''Punch-Drunk Love'' is a 2002 American Absurdist fiction, absurdist Romance film, romantic comedy-drama film written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, and starring Adam Sandler, Emily Watson, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Luis Guzmán, and Mary Lyn ...
''.


See also

*
Hoover free flights promotion The Hoover free flights promotion was a marketing promotion run by the British division of the Hoover Company in late 1992. The promotion, aiming to boost sales during the global recession of the early 1990s, offered two complimentary round-trip p ...
in Britain in the early 1990s, whereby flights to the United States were offered for purchasing lower-priced appliances.


References


External links


David Phillips
on the Davis Wiki {{DEFAULTSORT:Phillips, David 1964 births Living people American civil engineers Engineers from California University of California, Davis faculty Place of birth missing (living people)