Fast food restaurant McDonald's pulled a hilarious bait and switch trick in China by pretending to launch a new 5G smartphone. The announcement is one of several inventive marketing ploys to have been used by fast food companies, like Wendy's playing Animal Crossing and getting into Twitter beef.
Twitter was awash with speculation this week when McDonald's began to hype up a press conference promoting some sort of 5G product. Images showed curved, metal edges and what looked like a smartphone camera. While many wondered if McDonald's could be launching its own 5G-ready smartphone, the announcement turned out to be for a new fried chicken meal.
The McCrispy Chicken is a fried chicken meal seasoned with spices and available with sauce. The 5G reveal was a play on words as the sound of the "G" in "5G" sounds like "ji" which is the Mandarin word for chicken. The five Gs of the McCrispy Chicken also mean taste, freshness, juiciness, crispiness, and that it uses different parts of chicken such as the breast, wing, and leg. Some customers may not have been very happy with the 5G teaser but the chicken could get more people into McDonald's locations for a reason other than trying to get a Happy Meal toy.
Marketing campaigns like this do seem to be gaining popularity with fast food chains. McDonald's rival KFC launched a dating sim and several restaurants have sponsored streamers as they try to get more people in their restaurants. Launching a real 5G phone would do that but fast food fans probably shouldn't expect a real McDonald's smartphone to be announced.
Image source: © BrokenSphere / Wikimedia Commons Creative Commons