McDonald’s has signed a deal with The Smiley Company, master licensee for the Rubik’s Cube, for the iconic 1980s puzzle toy to feature in McDonald’s Happy Meal offers in multiple countries.

In a deal brokered by global customer engagement agency The Marketing Store, which has worked closely with McDonald’s for many years, the multi-territory promotion will appear in McDonald’s restaurants across various European countries, the Middle East, Africa and North America.

The campaign launches in France this month (July 2018) and will then roll out across other territories from August through November 2018, including Italy, Spain, Austria, UAE and Canada, amongst many others.

It is not clear yet whether it will be running in the UK, where restrictions are in force on the use of toys and licensed characters to promote food and drink products. Promomarketing has asked McDonald’s for clarification on this point.

Unusually, the Happy Meal Box will be transformed from its traditional tented ‘house’ design into a Cube shape to mirror the Rubik’s Cube for the duration of the campaign.

Children enjoying a Happy Meal at participating McDonald’s will have a choice of four different bespoke Rubik’s Cube toys; including square 2×2 cubes and rectangular 3×2 cubes as well as rounded versions of these, with a total of 12 different toys to choose from.

The unique promotion will also feature a product mash-up between Rubik’s and a major Hollywood animation film studio’s properties appearing on the toys alongside the iconic Rubik’s Cube colours and trademark twist and turn mechanism.

Nicolas Loufrani, CEO at The Smiley Company, says: “We have worked closely with The Marketing Store and the whole team at McDonald’s and are really pleased with the innovative and high quality content of this campaign. From the robust mini Cubes and the unique Rubik’s Cube shaped Happy Meal box to the TV ads and bespoke games created for the Happy Studio app, every aspect of the promotion has been crafted to perfectly leverage the Rubik’s brand mission of encouraging children to PLAY SMART and further our goal of bringing intelligent play to kids of all ages.”

The Smiley Company will be leveraging the partnership with McDonald’s to drive the ongoing Rubik’s brand extension program and “to realise our plans to take the brand to new consumers, with particular emphasis on engaging the brand with children aged from 3-8 years old, as our brand mission continues to focus on creating new toy partnerships for this age group,” Loufrani adds.

To support the promotion’s launch in the markets where it will be appearing, there will be a 360° marketing campaign, supported by a TV advertising featuring the Happy Meal mascot ‘HAPPY’ playing with a Rubik’s Cube in a 26 and 13 second spots. There will also be series of ‘How to Solve’ short video tutorials launched on social channels to help kids solve the bespoke Happy Meal Rubik’s Cubes, and a McDonald’s Happy Studio app takeover.

Additional marketing materials will include in-store POS, branded balloons, colouring sheets, wall stickers and window decals which will help amplify the Rubik’s brand identity throughout the promotion.

The launch of the activation in France is being supported with an influencers’ campaign while other national markets will also see major marketing initiatives.

The Smiley Company is a brand licensing company which originated in France and which holds the intellectual property rights to the classic smiley face symbol face symbol in more than 100 countries (although not the United States, where the symbol originated).

In addition to the smiley symbol, it also holds licensing rights for Rubik’s Cube and related properties, and recently launched a major brand extension program for Rubik’s. This draws on Rubik’s iconicity, rich heritage and archive and the resurgence of retro gaming and geek culture, while utilising Smiley’s own industry leading design studio and world class distribution channels.

The company says global demand for Rubik’s is now at the highest levels since its launch in 1980 and a number of industry leading partners have already signed up across categories including apparel, back to school, gift, live events and attractions, partworks, promotions and publishing.

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Rollover Hot Dogs is partnering with Mission: Impossible Fallout, the sixth film in the Mission: Impossible series (in UK cinemas 25th July) with a competition to win a romantic trip for two to Paris, including a helicopter tour from Paris to Versailles.

The Rollover Hot Dog trays will feature artwork from the movie and will direct consumers to the Rollover Facebook page, where they will be able to enter the competition to win the trip to Paris. There are also Mission: Impossible movie products to be won.

The campaign aims to reach over 3 million shoppers and is being supported with extensive POS materials for retailers.

Rollover negotiated the partnership deal with the films’s UK distributor, Paramount Pictures, according to a Rollover spokesman.

Tony Owen, Sales and Marketing Director for Rollover Ltd, says: “This movie, starring Tom Cruise, is set to be one of the biggest releases of the summer and we’re extremely thrilled to renew our partnership with a film that our consumers will really love. It’s a fantastic promotion to make shoppers aware of the Hot Food To Go category and specifically Hot Dogs, which remain in huge growth due to the continued trend around Street Food.”

Owen adds: “Mission: Impossible’s core demographic of 16-30 year olds matches our brand personality: young, lively, and fun. We expect a lot of engagement with our fans on this promotion and it will encourage new discussions at the point of purchase.”

The Mission: Impossible campaign started on July 9th and runs for eight weeks.

Rollover Hot Dogs, which is part of Kerry Foods Group, is the UK’s largest hot dog brand, selling over 25 million a year. It supplies preparation equipment and marketing collateral (steamers and POS) free to stockists and sells them the consumable items (sausages and buns). Customers include sports venues such as Old Trafford, theme parks, cinemas, universities and contract caterers. It regularly runs partnership campaigns with hit movies.

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Every Sub made in Subway stores across the UK today (November 3^rd 2017) will trigger a 5p donation to a the Fare Share food bank charity, to help feed people in need.

The promotion marks World Sandwich Day and the fast food chain will also be handing out free Six Inch Subs to people who downloaded and registered the Subcard app by October 30^th. Anyone who did hit the deadline was rewarded with 500 points – the value of a Subway Sub – to spend today in store. If the points aren’t spent by midnight today, they will disappear.

FareShare has 20 regional centres in the UK focusing on providing nutritious meals to vulnerable people. Donations to the charity will be triggered both by purchases of Six-inch Subs and also by redemptions of the free sub offer both on World Sandwich Day and the day before.

All Subway Stores accepting Subcard are participating in the promotion.

Subway is the world’s largest submarine sandwich franchise, with more than 44,800 locations in more than 113 countries. It is a committed partner to the UK Government’s Public Health Responsibility Deal and is the only QSR to have endorsed eight of the nutrition-related pledges. The Subway brand has reduced salt, eliminated trans fats, displays energy information on menu boards, cut KJ/Kcal across the product range and increased access to fruit and vegetables as part of a balanced diet and reduced saturated fat.

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Burger King UK is to give away free Whopper sandwiches to the first 500 customers who turn up at its Leicester Square branch in Central London this Saturday night dressed as a clown, in a pre-Halloween stunt.

BK says the Scary Clown Night stunt is to mark the fact that clowns are the third most sought after Halloween costume of 2017. The promotion will run between 7.00pm and 3.00am on the evening of Saturday October 28^th and morning of Sunday October 29^th. Halloween falls on October 31^st.

The campaign will launch on social media and will include a ‘very scary’ video, directed by award-winning filmmaker Rodrigo Cortés – known for movies like `Buried´ starring Ryan Reynolds and `Red Lights´ starring Robert De Niro and Cillian Murphy. The creative agency behind the campaign is LOLA MullenLowe, Madrid.

Renato Rossi, Head of Marketing for Burger King UK, says: “The Burger King brand is known for welcoming all customers and putting the crown on everyone’s head. This Halloween, come like a clown to eat like a king!”

The Scary Clown Night video can be viewed here.

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Burger King has launched a new ‘Mystery Burger’ promotion in France, which offers consumers the chance to get a random product from the fast food chain’s 10 burgers for a flat €2 cost.

Created by Paris-based agency Buzzman, the offer has launched in all 160 Burger King restaurants across France.

The burgers are hidden inside an unbranded white box with a large question mark on, to indicate that there is no way to know which burger is inside until the box is opened. An integrated campaign includes a video ad showing a pregnant French woman and her husband at an ultrasound scan – but they’re using the scan to find out what’s in their mystery Burger King box. The campaign is running on TV, online, OOH and in-store.

Meanwhile, in America Burger King is offering free burgers to anyone who publicly admits to having been fired. The creative idea is that BK uses fire to grill its burgers, so getting fired can be a good thing…

The ‘Own your fire!’ campaign asks people to go to LinkedIn and post the following public message: “I got fired. I want a free Whopper. #WhopperSeverance.” Those who post will receive a personalized link to get registered and receive a Whopper Severance package in the mail complete with a Burger King restaurant gift card.

Burger King has also partnered with career satisfaction experts, The Muse, to offer 30-minute one-on-one Q+A sessions to the first 100 participants who post and register.

Burger King points out that it has created over 50,000 new jobs globally over the past three years, the brand has. It also stresses that LinkedIn is not involved with the activation.

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