Happy Meals to be Pulled (Wizbang Pop!)

You can do what you want with the kids of this nation. Corporal punishment, thimble of wiskey at bed time, but when you start taking away the staples of a childs upbringing you're realy just asking for another Trench Coat Mafia.

This piece of news comes from the bloody Irish Examiner:

IN a move that has left both parents and children a little long in the face, fast food giants McDonald's and cartoon kings Disney announced yesterday that the Happy Meal is to be scrapped.
The two conglomerates confirmed the 10-year pact, which saw movie-character figurines packaged in a special box with a burger, fries and a drink will be no more after this year. The deal was said to be worth $1 billion (€0.78bn) to McDonald's and $100 million (€78m) to Disney in royalties.

The last Disney films to be made into Happy Meals will be this summer's Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and Pixar animation Cars.

UPDATE: We have determined that strictly the relationship with Disney and McDonalds is being affected. The Happy Meals will continue. Though, I stand by my initial horror at the thought of a world with out 8 cent figurines of The Little Mermaid driving a car.

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Comments (3)

This article that you've qu... (Below threshold)

1. Posted by bigby | May 10, 2006 10:21 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

bigby:

This article that you've quoted is very misleading. The Happy Meal is not being scrapped. It simply won't have Disney toys any longer. For instance, they are slated to have other non-Disney toys (Shrek, for instance, as mentioned in the article) later this year. This article is strange indeed... they say that the Happy Meal is to be scrapped, but then mention a two year deal to bring Shrek and other toys to the meals. Of course, they claim that "Disney signed a two-year worldwide marketing deal with DreamWorks Animation" to market these toys, which is also false. Dreamworks signed a deal with McDonalds...

Posted on May 10, 2006 10:21

Interesting Bigby... so you... (Below threshold)

2. Posted by Sarah-Jean | May 10, 2006 2:39 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Sarah-Jean:

Interesting Bigby... so you are saying this is false information?

I was pretty upset about it! I remember having happy meals when I was a kid. I woudln't think McDonalds would be so stupid as to stop putting Disney toys in the happy meals.

What exactly IS happening???

Posted on May 10, 2006 14:39

From what I've seen/heard/r... (Below threshold)

3. Posted by bigby | May 10, 2006 3:14 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

From what I've seen/heard/read elsewhere, parts of it are true, and parts of it are questionable and/or misleading. All I'm saying is that every other article I search for on the subject minus the Irish Examiner one just states that the "Disney toys in the Happy Meal" angle is all that is killed in this agreement. Maybe they have an inside scoop on everyone else. Dunno.

I do know that that it's safe to say that Disney certainly is not making/marketing toys for one of their main competitors. Dreamworks signed a deal to bring Shrek and Co. over from BK to McD recently. The talk at the time included providing Shrek and other characters for Happy Meal toys, but maybe something has changed there.

Posted on May 10, 2006 15:14

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