Cereal box bonuses, Happy Meals, and more

[Yanrima~]

Do you remember the CDs stuffed inside cereal boxes that contain music or games. Or a toy inside a cereal box. How about those toys you used to get in McDonald's.

I sure remember them, especially the cereal that contain a game CD on it. I also remember when McDonald's used to have these unusually high quality Hello Kitty plush toys back in the early 2000's.

What do you remember about these bonuses? And, do you have a favorite?

 

[cornimer]

Whenever there was a lineup of McDonald's toys that I liked (e.g. Beanie Babies plush, Build-a-Bear plush, Neopets plush etc.), I would make my mom go to all the different local McDonald's looking for specific toys because different locations would carry different ones. I think she managed to get all 8 of the Build-a-Bear ones for me. She was so dedicated

 

[xSuperMario64x]

omg yes I remember getting things like CD-ROMs and books from cereal boxes and kid's meals! I also remember that either McD's or Wendy's had an iDog toy when that came out, and it actually lit up which was pretty neat! I personally loved the Neopets Kacheek plushies when they were released back in 2005, and a few years ago I managed to collect all seven of them

I have a memory from when I was a kid back in 2010-11, and my friend and I would play this Petz Dogz game that came from a Wendy's Kid's Meal back in 2006. I recently got a sealed copy of the game for like $10 so that I could play it for the nostalgia. it's short but it's honestly a cute little game! I miss stuff like that.

I'm at least glad to see that McD's still has decently good quality toys (like when they released the Squishmallow plushies last year or earlier this year), but I can't say the same for Wendy's unfortunately.

 

[Kitsuragi]

i remember them but i was never allowed to keep them. if they made noise or had a screen/needed to be put into something to play, they were thrown out. if they were cute, i had to give them to my sisters. if they looked "boy" ish i had to give it to my brother. i don't recall a single one i was allowed to keep. it was so unfair.

 

[Snowesque]

I use to have tons of Barbie ones. I think the last ones I remember getting was ones for the Wizard of Oz.

 

[Nunnafinga]

Way back in the 70's,Post cereals came with some decent prizes.Post had a deal with the Ford Motor Company and used to have a plastic Mercury car from the era as a prize.I had a bunch of these cars and I wish I had kept a few because they're kind of valuable nowadays.Post also put an actual playable record on the back of their cereal boxes.You cut them out of the cereal box(preferably after the cereal had been consumed)and they would play just like any other vinyl record.The sound quality was sort hit and miss,though.I remember getting The Archies(from The Archie Show cartoon)hit song "Sugar,Sugar" from the back of a box of Alpha Bits.I also had a cereal box record from a group called The Sugar Bears.

 

[Seastar]

My favorite was probably the Neopets plushies from McDonald's in 2004 and 2005. I'm sure there were many other great ones I can't remember at the moment.
I especially can't remember the cereal box ones very well because I had less of those.

 

[rocketspruggs]

I used to collect McDonald's Happy Meal toys all the time when I was younger, especially when they released the Hello Kitty toys.

 

[SkyKnight03]

I remember the idea of getting toys but I can't remember any of them specifically. More than likely I took them home and lost them right away.

Also when I was growing up they had already dumbed down the toys, so nothing fun like games or anything.

At some point I realized I'd rather just have a bigger meal at the sacrifice of not getting my toy anyways. So I stopped getting the kids meals.

 

[Reginald Fairfield]

This isn't me in the video. I think this was one of the last freebies I got from a cereal box, short of a plastic glow in the dark Avatar spoon.

 

[Flyffel]

Okay can we please talk about Spy Fox?? This game (CD ROM) was included in a cereal box and I LOVED it.

I just saw on Wikipedia that it has been released on Switch?!

Unfortunately the sequels have not been released on Switch, I might have bought them...

I also remember some other gift CD games that I enjoyed as a kid, but this one was my favourite.

 

[aericell]

i forgot which cereal box it came from but i remember getting a lightsaber spoon that lit up! we might even still have it in storage somewhere. i also remember my mom collecting the 101 dalmatians from mcdonald's, but she left it with someone when we moved overseas and they lost all of it

my favorite are these hello kitty and dear daniel plushies dressed in the mcdonald's uniform! they must've been from when i was a baby but my mom found them at our old house when we went to visit so we took them home with us and now i have them (back). we had soo many cool things from the happy meals

 

[AccfSally]

I still have these, I collected them back when they were released. I remember it being hard to get them all because I use to live in the countryside around that time too (meaning no McDonald's for miles). My mom was the only way for me to almost get the whole set (I'm missing two and I don't want to go near eBay.).
(The same with those other Dalmatian toys McDonald's had. But I wasn't as lucky as I'm with these)

(Not toys but) these posters too, I use to collect them, I believe it was about 5 of them in total. This was also something McDonald's was doing.

Picture not mines.

As you can tell, I was quite a big fan back in the day.

 

[Dim]

I had know idea they stuffed CDs in cereal boxes...

I don't recall ever getting toys from cereal boxes...unless I got hot wheels or something and don't remember it. I remember getting The Simpsons watches from McDonald's, but that was it really.

 

[moonbyu]

cereal with a free cd stuffed inside?? that makes me soo jealous! i would have loved those the only cereal box bonus i remember from my childhood that weren't raffles or something were these spoon straw that came in the kelloggs cereals for a while. you could eat the cereal and drink the milk w/ it!!

as for happy meals, i never got them often so i don't remember getting many happy meals. but the two happy meal toys i had and LOVED were the twinkle toes keychains and the sanrio watches!! i especially loved the sanrio watches! i had a hello kitty watch that i'd wear to school to match my hello kitty boots i couldn't even tell time, i just really liked the watch LMAO.

 

[Bluelady]

My favorite has to be a Carmen San Diego game that came from a Kellog’s cereal box. I remember being super excited because my computer was a bit outdated for the PC games sold at the store.

Second would have to be the ESPN mini virtual games line at McDonald’s. I remember playing this Tony Hawks game for a long time.