The Forgotten Fast Food Giant That Inspired Happy Meal Toys

Cactus Plant Flea Market Boxes, better known as Adult Happy Meals, have been a massive win for McDonald’s in 2022. The return of McDonald’s Halloween Boo Buckets has sent the internet into a frenzy for several years in a row. And nostalgic customers were won over by the return of McNugget Buddies in 2023.

It’s fair to say that McDonald’s knows how to attract customers with Happy Meal toy souvenirs. The chain’s marketing strategy is something I’ve probably praised too often, but long before the Golden Arches figured out its secret formula for instant campaign success – a combination of celebrity and nostalgia – there was Burger Chief.

Burger Chef was a fast food chain founded in the mid-1950s that ran its course until the early 1980s, when it was sold to Hardee’s and eventually closed its doors. Long before this sale, Burger Chef had offered the Fun Meal. The Fun Meal was first introduced in 1973 and consisted of a hamburger, a dessert and a toy. The toys included items like yo-yos, and the Fun Meal also resulted in the creation of characters, like a magician named Burgerini and a vampire named Count Fangburger. For millennials like me, fast food-themed cartoon characters can seem a lot like ripoffs of the classic McDonaldland characters we know and love. But alas, it’s Burger Chef’s creations that are the real OG.

Read more: The many ingredients contained in McDonald’s fries

Burger Chef started it all

Burger Chef Location – Burger Chef/Facebook

When you dig deeper into the history of fast food, the Burger Chef’s Fun Meal predates McDonald’s iconic Happy Meal by six years. Although the Fun Meal was the first to combine food with a children’s toy, the main difference was that it did not come in a specially branded box like the Happy Meal later did.

In 2022, CNN spoke with Happy Meal inventor Bob Bernstein, who noted that he actually had to convince McDonald’s to adopt his Happy Meal idea. Company offices wanted to do extensive testing of the meals, and franchisees were concerned that assembling the toys and boxes would disrupt their operations.

Although Bernstein and his team were able to convince McDonald’s to test the Happy Meal in several locations in 1977, it was not released nationally until 1979. Similar to the Burger Chef’s Fun Meal, it contained a hamburger, fries, cookies, a soda. , and a surprise toy, as well as various interactive designs outside the box to keep children entertained.

The McDonald’s Happy Meal is still here

McDonald's Happy Meal with toy

McDonald’s Happy Meal with toy – David Paul Morris (Getty Images)

At the time McDonald’s was rolling out the Happy Meal across the country, Burger Chef had 1,200 locations in the United States and McDonald’s had 1,600 locations, putting the chef just behind Ronald McDonald in terms of footprint. Burger Chef has been hot on McDonald’s heels for a while, but as with any major chain, its whole story isn’t fries and smiles.

In 1978, the mysterious and still unsolved murders of four employees took place at a Burger Chef restaurant in Indiana, the chain’s home state. A few years later, in 1981, Burger Chef’s parent company, General Foods, opted to sell the chain to Hardee’s, which eventually dismantled and rebranded the restaurants. The rest is fast food toy history. Even though the chain ultimately collapsed as a whole, it’s best to remember that the Burger Chef Fun Meal worked so that McDonald’s Happy Meal could work.

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