Keep It: Car Giveaway Website Controversy… Again

For the second time, a person with close ties to the organiser has won a major car giveaway from Keep it Reet – and punters are angry.

Almost a year after Keep it Reet came under fire after a Nissan S13 Silvia was won by the girlfriend of the car’s previous owner, yet another associate has been announced as the winner of a big prize.

A Nissan R34 Skyline GT-R worth more than $200,000 has been given away to Daniel Ridley, said to be a long-time friend of the owner of Keep it Reet, Jason Ferron.

“Now, I know a Daniel Ridley, so that’ll be interesting – if it is the Dan ‘Radley’... ‘cause, um, it might be a ‘null and void’ – but we’ll find out very soon,” Mr Ferron said at the prize draw.

Adding suspicion to the controversy was the fact that Keep it Reet allegedly deleted several comments showing the relationship between Mr Ridley and Mr Ferron.

In the days following, Keep it Reet posted a video of the handover, admitting the winner was “controversial” and confirming the two men know each other.

However, according to the terms and conditions on the Keep it Reet website, only staff and family are ineligible for memberships.

Unlike lotteries and raffles which are bound by strict rules set by state authorities, Keep it Reet offers memberships and ‘trade promotions’, which falls into a loophole allowing organisers to sidestep gambling laws and government oversight.

The structure of the giveaway was popularised by Adrian Portelli and his ‘rewards club’ known as LMCT+. Mr Portelli is currently facing nine counts of assisting in the conduct of an unlawful lottery in South Australia.

Mr Ridley said he spent $300 on entries for the GT-R, making him eligible for a 5x boost.

While this publication is not accusing Keep it Reet, Mr Ferron, or Mr Ridley of any wrongdoing, many of the organisation’s members have publicly questioned the way the process was handled.

In April 2024, Keep it Reet came under fire after Kristy Mudaliar won a modified Nissan S13 Silvia – with Ms Mudaliar being the partner of Daniel Gounder, who had recently sold the vehicle to Keep it Reet for the giveaway.

“A part of [the sale] contract is that the seller cannot enter the giveaway, unfortunately this didn’t mention immediate family and/or partners. (This will be added for all future giveaways),” Keep it Reet said in a statement posted to social media at the time.

“It would be a pretty dumb play for us to rig something and give it to the previous owners [sic] partner, our draws are 100 per cent at random and it was luck of the draw that Kristy was drawn,” the organisation added in a separate statement.