McDonald’s Corporation (MCD) develops, operates, franchises and services a worldwide system of restaurants that prepare, assemble, package and sell a limited menu of value-priced foods. The company operates primarily in the quick-service hamburger restaurant business. All restaurants are operated by the company or, under the terms of franchise arrangements, by franchisees who are independent third parties, or by affiliates operating under joint-venture agreements between the company and local business people.
In what happens to be one of the strangest cases in recent times of a PR promotional effort going awry, this weekend saw fast food giant McDonald’s botch a promotional tie-in with the animated show “Rick and Morty” from the Cartoon Network.
Or did they?
For the uninitiated, “Rick and Morty” features the sci-fi adventures of an elderly scientific genius and his sad sack of a grandson as well as the rest of his family. They two main characters resemble “Doc” and “Marty” from the movie “Back to the Future” but with far more inter-dimensional travel–and drug use.
In an episode this season, Rick was held hostage by a race of ant aliens and tortured for a piece of his knowledge. As he led his alien abuser on a wild goose chase, one detail focused on Rick’s affinity for a special McDonald’s McNugget sauce that featured Asian flavors. This Szechuan sauce was a real-world item, and was last manufactured in the 1990s as part of promo for the Disney film “Mulan.”
Here is where things got weird(er). In an effort to take advantage of the free publicity provided by the show and its shout out for the long-lost dipping suace, McDonald’s set up a special promotion this past weekend where stores would once again roll out the Szechuan sauce mentioned on “Rick and Morty.” But, they did this without any clearance or coordination with the “Rick and Morty” creators, their network, or—most importantly–their lawyers.
