Vintage McDonald’s Ads That Will Make You Do A Double-Take

McDonald’s is the chain we’ve all come to know (and maybe love, even if we love it in secret, shhh). Its golden arches have long been a symbol of fast food, capitalism, and global expansion, and its cheap meals have become an American staple in fast food.

McDonald’s, for better or worse, is a fixture of American culture, with the franchise dominating the global food landscape. Kids love it. Parents probably love it, too. And no matter where you go on this earth, you’re probably going to find something that reminds you of home at the store — even if McDonald’s has had their share of scandals. 

Of course, McDonald’s didn’t just accidentally become so ubiquitous. It pummeled potential buyers with crazy advertisements and designed huge playgrounds for kids to flock to — in the hopes that their parents would buy them a Happy Meal. McDonald’s is smart, targeted, and (as you’ll see) sort of wacky in their marketing strategy.

McDonald’s hasn’t always been a monolith, though. It started off as a one-location, homegrown BBQ joint in 1940.

Before McDonald’s was McDonald’s, it was “McDonald’s Bar-B-Q,” which opened in 1940 in California by two brothers — Dick and Maurice (whose nickname was Mac) McDonald. Mickey Dee’s actually shut down and reopened in 1948… before it caught the eye of someone named Ray Kroc, a milkshake mixer salesperson, who turned it into the franchise we know and love today.

The man who bought McDonald’s from its original owners was a genius. He asked for (and got!) exclusive rights to the franchise.

Once the rights to McDonald’s BBQ were sold, it simply became known as McDonald’s.

According to Business Insider, Kroc first found out about the restaurant because he sold his shake mixers to the brothers. After receiving an order for more mixers in the early 1950s, Kroc popped in and “was stunned by the effectiveness of their operation.” According to McDonald’s, Kroc bought the exclusive rights to the McDonald’s name and operating system.” The rest is history!

The chain grew super popular, super quickly.

As Kroc said, “I was an overnight success alright, but 30 years is a long, long night.” In its first iteration, McDonald’s only served nine items, including 15 cent hamburgers and 19 cent cheeseburgers. Can you imagine that? Today, a burger costs around $2.49, while a cheeseburger costs about $2.79. That’s a 1560% and a 1368.42% increase, respectively.

By just 1958, McDonald’s served up its 100 millionth hamburger. That’s… a lot of hamburgers.

Kroc’s goal? To serve up burgers, fries, and drinks that you could get your hands on anywhere with food that tasted the same wherever you were. He wanted to create a brand that you could rely upon for consistency. That means that no matter which state your in, or which store you go to, their burgers and fries should always taste the same.

Kroc created an actual burger empire.

To do that, he inspired people to open franchises everywhere by sharing his philosophy: “In business for yourself, but not by yourself.” He wanted people to feel autonomous, but to have the support of McDonald’s behind them. And that’s why there’s a Mickey Dee’s literally ANYWHERE you go. Like, even in communist Yugoslavia in the 1980s.

Today, McDonald’s is the most ubiquitous brand in the world — and it barely even needs advertising!

Today, there are about 38,000 locations in 120 countries and territories globally. That’s pretty insane if you think about the fact that the first location just served up nine menu items. We wonder what this could possibly mean for human health, though. Thankfully, the franchise is getting better about using healthier ingredients.

Just FYI — this is the man you can thank whenever you’ve ordered a Happy Meal just to get the toy:

Let’s take a stroll down memory lane by looking at some of Mickey Dee’s retro ads:

It seems crazy to think that McDonald’s would even need advertising, but McDonald’s has put a lot of time and effort into their marketing approach over time. In many ways, the golden arches  — the global symbol of McDonald’s — does a lot of advertising work for them. No matter where are you, you can spot them lording over a city.

In this black-and-white ad, we see that their cheeseburgers are only 19 cents!

This super retro, 1950s advertisement for Mickey Dee’s is certainly not the most unappetizing thing we’ve ever seen, but it gets the point across while using fun colloquialisms like, ‘Try ’em” to get people connected to the brand. Plus, at 19 cents, it’s a steal. Just imagine what would happen if we saw an affordable ad like that today!

This filet o’ fish ad is even more unappealing, though…

…because it just features a drippy, gross-looking sandwich before a dull grey-green background.

Smart food photography just wasn’t a “thing” back then, it seems. Today, there are very few of us who want to see a sandwich sitting on top of crumpled packaging with thick, sloppily-oozing sauces. This wouldn’t compel us to run into our local McDonald’s, but people still ate the stuff, period.

There’s also this brilliant ad that shows a two-compartment container:

To keep the “lettuce cool and the Quarter Pounder of beef hot.”

According to Little Things, who wants to bring genius contraption back, “The McDLT was pretty brilliant. It was a deconstructed quarter-pound burger with the lettuce, tomato, and mayo all served in separate parts of a double-sided polystyrene container…. That way you could avoid hot lettuce and tomato oiled down by burger grease and mayo.”

It was discontinued in the ’90s. Probably because who wants to carry such a weird, lopsided container? Just a guess.

McDonald’s was also very invested in meeting our protein needs. Clearly.

And then there’s this gem, which boasts a “higher level of vitamins and nutrients” than other meals…

Today, we’d be hard-pressed to let McDonald’s talk to us about nutrition — literally EVER — but back then, this wasn’t a joke. The chain wanted families to know that they could serve up some serious protein. And while maybe this isn’t the best form of protein out there, it certainly was delicious. So it was advertised to make people feel better about themselves while eating McDonald’s food.

Then again, McDonald’s did start the green juice trend!

Just kidding. They absolutely did not. But they did sell “Shamrock Shakes.”

Everyone drinks green juice today. It’s the epitome of all things healthy — and yet McDonald’s did the green drink first. And by “green,” we mean a food dye-filled green shake to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. This 1983 ad somehow managed to include both elves and harps — and we admire (or stand confounded by) the… er, creativity. 

McDonald’s also mastered the art of advertising breakfast:

Because how could you say no to this ad?

A man wakes up to enjoy a breakfast tray of pancakes, eggs, and sausage — which, for the record, is actually awful, but for some reason tastes super, duper delicious — along with a cup of coffee. Even for the most health-conscious among us, we’re not opposed to popping into Mickey Dee’s for a breakfast now and again. Plus, it’s affordable!

Oh, and Mickey Dee’s clearly had no problem with psychedelic advertising.

Their ’70s ads are extremely colorful and sort of hypnotizing… in an “everyone’s on acid” sort of way…

In fact, McDonald’s is so damn trippy that there is a McDonald’s museum in North Hollywood dedicated to everything psychedelic about the franchise. It’s inspired largely by the many weird TV commercials that aired in the 1970s, like this one, which features singing trees jamming out in McDonald Land, where hamburgers are talking heads. Acid much?

By the ’80s, McDonald’s let go of the psychedelia and instead embraced… razors.

Because when you think of razors, you think of lunch. At McDonald’s.

The most genius aspect of this 1986 ad is that not just that the man in the ad slowly loses his beard, but that he’s holding a razor. It’s as if they’re trying to make us want to vomit. Between the idea of beard hair and sharp razors, there’s a good chance we’d never walk into a McDonald’s again. But hey, good job with the brand partnership?

McDonald’s also tried to advertise to young people on date night.

Which is brilliant, since young people probably had very little money for a fancy dinner.

In this ad, you see two people holding hands. There’s a social and racial undertone to this ad as well, as it is geared to young people who want to feel safe, comfortable, and welcome — but who can’t spend tons of money on an expensive dinner. McDonald’s always did target their advertising, and this is an example of that. We can’t imagine this sort of ad out there today, though.

And they also used hand-drawn illustrations in their advertisements.

Just look at that extremely well-drawn witch (#sarcasm).

Despite the ad’s silly drawings, the entire idea of a brand giving away free food is solid. McDonald’s has always driven sales by giving free food away. Just consider their Monopoly game — you buy more to get more. This is a business that thinks outside the box (and on the broomstick!).

They also scored with the kids by selling McDonald’s playsets.

In collaboration with Fisher-Price, kids could work at their very own McDonald’s.

In a world where we know more about nutrition and wellness, and where companies are forced to remove added sugars from just about everything, it’s surprising to think that many families would be okay with their kids worshipping the McDonald’s brand. But hey, we don’t judge! Sometimes you just have to treat your kid to a Happy Meal!

Kids were also treated to wild and wacky McDonald’s Playground advertising…

Because the Playgrounds got kids’ parents to pay up for food.

Do you remember McDonald’s Playgrounds? Yeah, us too. #RIP. These funky places were perfectly described by blogger Andrew Blumetti as, “a barbarous marriage of the trippy universe of Willy Wonka and the happy-go-lucky freak show that was the advertising campaign of the Golden Arches… This madness was such a blast, it’d require multiple requests from exhausted parents to finally drag their surly kids to finally leave for home.”

Today, we sort of miss the weird ads and wacky brand partnerships!

It was a simpler (and weirder) time, wasn’t it? For more incredible retro Mickey Dee ads, visit Pinterest, where you will fall into a verifiable abyss of nostalgia. Also recommended: McDonald’s 50th anniversary Big Mac advertisements, which are all designed to look and feel like very ridiculous retro ads.

You are so welcome.

Is there a McDonald’s ad that you can’t get out of your head?