Nearly half a century ago, Burger King released collectible glassware as part of a promotional campaign for the soon-to-be unexpected hit “Star Wars.”
As “Star Wars” grew into a multibillion-dollar franchise — acquired by Disney from Lucasfilm in 2012 — the cups have become treasured collectibles for super-fans. Now, in the run-up to “Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu,” hitting theaters Friday, Burger King is revisiting its history with the franchise by providing four souvenir cups featuring characters from the movie with the purchase of one of the themed meals.
Burger King, which has embarked on a multi-year comeback effort — the struggling chain recently updated its Whopper — has looked to tie-in programs as a way to attract families. Netflix recently jumped onto the trend, rolling out big collaborations with McDonald’s this year.
It’s the latest chapter in the decades-long love affair between Hollywood and the fast-food industry. The partnership has survived seismic shifts in how people watch movies and recovered from a high-profile temporary breakup between two of the largest players — McDonald’s and Disney — in 2006.
Burger King’s “Star Wars”-themed menu for “The Mandalorian and Grogu” includes cheddar ranch tots, left, a blue cookie shake, a BBQ Bounty Whopper, garlic chicken fries and garlic dip, and a Grogu souvenir cup.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
“It’s a symbiotic relationship between the studios and these restaurants,” said critic Matt Singer, who has reviewed tie-in menus for the film website ScreenCrush for more than a decade. “The movies get free or licensed promotion for their movie, and fans of the property are drawn to the fast-food place or the restaurant.”
In the 1970s, major fast-food chains began to target kids in response to changing demographics and the rise of dual-income households, said University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill communication professor Avi Santo, who studies how entertainment franchises expand into consumer products and other merchandise. Collaborations with popular movies and TV shows were a crucial part of that strategy.
The now-defunct restaurant chain Burger Chef is credited with the invention of the kids’ meal. The chain bundled food with items like character buttons, wooden nickels, hand puppets and drinking glasses.
McDonald’s soon followed, launching in 1979 its Happy Meal, which came with a free circus animal trinket — a lion, elephant, hippo or bear. That year, McDonald’s worked with Paramount to promote “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” another space adventure that would grow into a massive franchise, with a Happy Meal.
Burger King was among the earliest chains to feast on movie tie-ins when it promoted the original “Star Wars” in 1977. (Burger Chef also advertised the movie, running commercials with C-3PO and R2-D2 and giving out movie posters with the purchase of a 49-cent large soda.)
That “storied legacy” was why Disney tapped Burger King to promote its latest “Star Wars” movie, Lylle Breier, Disney’s executive vice president of partnerships, promotions and events, said in an emailed statement.
The menu, which was rolled out May 4 — a.k.a. Star Wars Day — marked the chain’s first collaboration with Disney in more than 20 years. Offerings include a BBQ Bounty Whopper packaged in a clamshell box shaped like the Mandalorian helmet and a blue cookie milkshake — a nod to Grogu’s favorite snack.
The goal with movie tie-ins is to “create an experience for [guests] that elevates their day … and their connection to Burger King,” said Joel Yashinsky, the fast-food chain’s chief marketing officer.
“Restaurants are a place people come together — just like a movie theater for a great film,” Breier said. “That is why, for major event films like ‘The Mandalorian and Grogu,’ when done right, a fully integrated global marketing partnership program — like our campaign with Burger King — can create enormous cultural impact.”
Asked how many food tie-in deals Disney aims to strike per year, Breier said the company focuses on quality over quantity. “We prioritize collaborations that are culturally relevant and creatively driven,” Breier said.
Garlic chicken fries from the “Bounty Bundle” at Burger King.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
The BBQ Bounty Whopper from Burger King‘s latest “Star Wars” movie tie-in.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
Commercials are an important aspect of movie tie-in deals. One Burger King ad shows Grogu (also known as Baby Yoda) and his adoptive father, the Mandalorian, walking into a cantina, where a Burger King employee is showing off a tray of food. A hungry Grogu uses the Force to steal cheddar ranch tots, garlic chicken fries, a Whopper burger and a blue milkshake.
Yashinsky said the chain, which once ran about two or three movie tie-in promos annually, had scaled back to just one annually in recent years. Since he joined the company last year, he has overhauled marketing strategy, including “firing” its King mascot in a commercial that aired during the Oscars, and moved to return to two to three campaigns per year, not counting kids meals.
The chain saw success working with Paramount Pictures on a SpongeBob menu released in December, featuring items like a Krabby Whopper with a bright yellow bun and a Patrick Star-themed strawberry shortcake pie. On a February earnings call, Joshua Kobza, chief executive of Restaurant Brands International, Burger King’s parent company, said the campaign “drove strong guest engagement and brought families back.” The menu helped beef up repeat visits at Burger King in January even after the promotion ended, Kobza said.
Burger King’s partnership with Disney for “The Mandalorian and Grogu” was “mutually beneficial,” Yashinsky said, and did not involve royalties or other direct payments. Breier declined to comment on Disney’s financial arrangement with Burger King.
Fast-food partnerships endure as Hollywood evolves
Hollywood has undergone a dramatic transformation over the last few decades. Despite the rise of streaming, the industry’s appetite for fast-food partnerships remains unchanged.
Even Netflix, the world’s largest streaming service, sees old-school fast-food tie-ins as a way to reach a wider audience and deliver a stronger message.
“[McDonald’s has] their own following, their own place and culture, their own ability to speak to audiences in their own voice,” said Magno Herran, Netflix‘s vice president of global brand marketing and partnerships. “When you marry that with Netflix and our fandoms and our ability, that’s just a multiplier to what we can do.”
The streaming behemoth, which has already worked with Kentucky Fried Chicken in the U.S. and Burger King across Latin America, earlier this month launched its largest-ever fast-food collaboration in terms of global reach with McDonald’s: a Happy Meal to promote “Tales From ’85,” the “Stranger Things” animated spinoff, Herran said.
Following the explosive success of the Oscar-winning animated film “KPop Demon Hunters,” many brands reached out to Netflix in the hopes of getting in on the action.
“We were really cautious about who we brought into that fold, because we wanted to maintain that authenticity for the fans,” Herran said.
He said the decision to work with McDonald’s on “KPop Demon Hunters” meals boiled down to the chain’s massive following, cultural influence and willingness to co-develop creative elements, including commercials voiced by the original actors.
The “KPop Demon Hunters” collaboration with McDonald’s, released in late March, featured two “dueling” adult meals that each came with a collectible card. In a play on the rivalry between the two K-pop groups in the movie, fans “voted” for their favorite by buying one of two meals. The first was a Saja Boys-themed breakfast featuring a spicy sandwich. The other was a Huntr/x meal featuring ramyeon-flavored fries and themed sauces, including a purple-hued mustard inspired by demon patterns.
Netflix and McDonald’s collaborated on “KPop Demon Hunters” meals that included ramyeon-flavored fries.
(Netflix)
Jennifer Healan, vice president of U.S. marketing, brand, content and culture for McDonald’s, said in a statement that its partnerships with brands and popular IP are aimed at “honoring the fandom.”
“Sharing the pen with our partners from start to finish allows us to build something that feels true to the story and is genuinely exciting for our customers,” Healan said. “It’s how we bring together passionate fan bases and two cultural engines to create experiences fans want to be a part of — at a scale that only McDonald’s can deliver.”
McDonald’s declined to share specific details about its partnership with Netflix.
The rise of streaming services has upended the traditional business model for movie marketing, Santo said.
Throughout the 1980s and ‘90s, licensing deals were usually finalized 18 months to two years before a film hit theaters, he said. Promotional campaigns were typically rolled out about six weeks ahead of the release to build anticipation. Netflix has broken the theatrical window, giving studios more flexibility in scheduling promotions.
At the same time, audience attention spans have shortened, Santo said. Licensing approvals and manufacturing can take months, so movie merch often arrives long after audiences have moved on, increasing the risk of overproduction.
Burger King is also offering a blue cookie milkshake served in a Grogu-branded cup.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
The food itself has also evolved. Singer, who has eaten dozens of movie and TV meals at many chains, began reviewing them in 2015, starting with Denny’s entire “Fantastic Four” menu, which included four entrees, a smoothie and a Dr. Doom lava cake. Over the last decade, he has noticed that tie-in foods have become increasingly outlandish.
At Burger King, he has consumed many Whoppers with colorful buns, including purple for “The Addams Family” and red for “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.” At IHOP, he has eaten purple goo-coated pancakes, a promotion for “Wonka,” and sugary highlighter-green pancakes for “The Grinch.”
Singer believes social media is the culprit.
“If it’s weird and attention-grabbing and will get shared, it almost is irrelevant whether or not the food is edible or delicious,” he said. “As long as people are going, ‘Have you seen this?’ and sharing it, it’s raising awareness of both the restaurant and the movie or the television show, [and] it’s done its job.”
Yashinsky disagreed. While Burger King may occasionally add some “pizzazz” to its menu items to make the movie meals appear more “interesting and Instagrammable,” the company’s priority is to serve “great-tasting food,” he said.
He insists that includes the blue cookie milkshake.
