In Japan, McDonald's accused of contributing to food waste

This mid-August, McDonald's is in turmoil in Japan. In an effort to retain customers from a young age, the American fast-food chain is offering children's menus that include a toy, a plastic figurine, or a small manga. Since the inclusion of Pokémon cards in this menu on August 9, the chain's approximately 3,000 restaurants in the archipelago have been stormed by some enthusiasts who are trying to obtain the cards in large quantities to resell them online. “In addition to causing stampedes and disorder in the restaurants, these customers have abandoned or thrown away meals [containing the cards],” reports public broadcaster NHK .

In Japan, this type of online reseller, who hoards all sorts of items—concert tickets, video game consoles, figurines—is frowned upon. Such behavior, coupled with the Japanese people's growing awareness of food waste, has sparked anger among social media users. Accused of not having implemented sufficient prevention measures and of encouraging food waste, McDonald's was forced to apologize on August 11. In a text published online and reprinted by the Asahi Shimbun newspaper , the company acknowledged the "insufficiency " of its measures against resellers.

According to the Nihon Keizai Shimbun newspaper , Pokémon cards are still very much present on Mercari, the main online resale platform, with “at least hundreds of offers for sale” at very high prices. In Japan, the trading card market (estimated at around $70 billion worldwide in 2023) is growing rapidly.

Although Mercari is working with McDonald's to exclude abusive resellers, the platform does not prohibit the act of reselling itself. “Buying cheap and reselling high is a fundamental principle of commerce. It is difficult to draw a clear line to determine at what level of markup over the original price a resale is considered abusive. Mercari fears that too many restrictions in this area could lead to the negation of their concept, that is, the exchange and resale of used goods,” the newspaper explains.

For its part, McDonald's launched the second part of its Pokémon campaign on August 15th by limiting the number of meals that a customer or group of customers can purchase to three. This time, the chain is offering figurines as bonuses, rather than cards, a likely sign of a change in the company's strategy.