John Klages, the night auditor at a motel, was working one evening when the motel was held up. When he was unable to open the safe, one of the robbers pointed a gun at Klages’s head and pulled the trigger. However, the gun was a starter pistol and he was not seriously injured. Klages decided he needed something to protect himself against future robberies. He went to the Market Supply Company to see about using mace and was shown a leaflet distributed by General Ordnance Equipment Corporation concerning its mace weapons. 

The leaflet contained this description: Rapidly vaporizes on face of assailant effecting instantaneous incapacitation. . . . It will instantly stop and subdue entire groups . . . instantly stops assailants in their tracks . . . an attacker is subdued instantly, for a period of 15 to 20 minutes. . . . Time magazine stated that chemical mace is “for police the first, if not the final, answer to a nationwide need—a weapon that disables as effectively as a gun and yet does no permanent injury.” The effectiveness is the result of a unique, incapacitating formulation (patent pending), projected in a shotgun-like pattern of heavy liquid droplets that, upon contact with the face, cause extreme tearing, and a stunned, winded condition, often accompanied by dizziness and apathy.

On the basis of this description, Klages purchased the weapon. Several months later, some people posing as potential guests held up the motel at gunpoint and ordered Klages to open the safe. Using the cash register as a shield, Klages squirted the mace at one of the robbers, hitting him beside the nose. Klages then ducked but the robber followed him down and shot him in the head, causing Klages to lose the sight in his right eye. He then sued Market Supply Company and General Ordnance, claiming, among other things, breach of express warranty. Were the statements in the leaflet promises or affirmations of fact constituting an express warranty?