Thirty new Teenie Beanie Babies to celebrate Happy Meal Anniversary

July 28, 11:51 PMChildren's Toys ExaminerAnna M. Lewis

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This month we celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Happy Meal. In 1979, the first Happy Meal went national in McDonald Restaurants. Created by Dick Brams and called ‘McDonaldland Fun-to-Go’, the first Happy Meal was sold in a Circus Wagon Train box. The ‘special’ prizes in the first Happy Meal were: McDoodler stencil, puzzle lock, McWrist Wallet, ID bracelet, spinning top, and an assortment of McDonaldland character erasers.
Now, 30 years later, McDonald’s is the world’s largest toy distributor with over 1.5 billion toys sold. Much of the Happy Meal’s success came from the movie tie-in toys, which started in 1979 with a Star Trek promotion, but McDonald’s best promotion was with Ty Teenie Beanie Babies. Before the first Happy Meal campaign, McDonald’s was averaging 10 million Happy Meals per week. For the 10-day period after the Ty Teenie Beanie Babies were launched in April 1997, over 100 million Happy Meals were sold. And, the second Ty Teenie Beanie Baby promotion in 1998 sold even more (250 million) Happy Meals.

Popular Happy Meal promotions have been:

• Ty Beanie Babies
• Star Wars
• Hot Wheels
• Rescue Pets
• Neopets
• Barbie – over 15 different promotions
• My Little Pony Figurines
• Sonic the Hedgehog electronic mini games
• Yu-Gi-Oh!
• Pokémon
• Digimon
• Hello Kitty
• Hummers
• Power Rangers
• Lego

My favorite McDonald Happy Meal toy was the Madame Alexander miniature Doll Collection. In 2002, the first collection featured Little Red Riding Hood, 100 Year Anniversary Teddy Bear Doll, Cool Cathy, Peter Pan, Caucasian Bride & Groom & the extremely rare African American Bride & Groom.

In 2003, the second collection featured Rapunzel, Pink Fairy, Hannah Pepper, Hannah Pepper’s Friend, Lady Bug Girl, It’s Raining Doll, Halloween Pumpkin, Halloween Leopard, Flower Girl, and Ring Carrier. The 2007 and 2008 Collections were dolls from The Wizard of Oz.

The special Ty Teenie Beanie Baby anniversary collection is unbelievably cute!
The 30th Birthday Collection includes a variety of the original Beanie Babies 2.0 plush characters: Chill™ the Penguin, and Pico™ the Dog, and McDonald’s exclusive characters, including Ronald McDonald® and Grimace®.

Each Teenie Beanie Babies plush toy features a Ty red heart logo® hang tag with its name, poem and secret code that unlocks a fun play online experience within Beanieland™, Ty’s virtual world at www.ty.com. As an added bonus, kids and collectors will also be able unlock an exclusive 30th Birthday experience at McWorld®, a McDonald’s virtual world at www.happymeal.com. For a limited time, Beanie Babies 2.0 at www.ty.com will include an appearance by Ronald McDonald®.

Social media for this promotion includes a Facebook Fan Page and Happy Meal web site.

Now, remember, this special McDonald’s collection of super cute Teenie Beanie Babies will only last from July 17th through August 13th. Gotta go and get a Happy Meal!

ABC's Good Morning America taped a segment titled Happy 30th Birthday, Happy Meal! It's a great overview of the McDonald's Happy Meal. Check it out!
Part of the segment includes a great interview with Denise Wilson, the senior director of quality assurance for McDonald's USA. Denise was my quality and safety person for Mattel Preschool. So cool to see Denise on this Good Morning America segment!