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Snap announced today that it’s partnering with McDonald’s to bring back McDonaldland through a series of geo-specific lenses and mini games. Readers of a certain age may remember the concept at McDonald’s locations throughout the 1970s and 80s.
Now it’s back in virtualized form as Snap transforms 14,000 McDonald’s in the U.S. into interactive gateways. To that end, the experience is geo-fenced so it can be discovered in the Snapchat Lens Carousel and unlocked whenever a user physically enters a McDonald’s.
Once the experience is activated, Snap’s World Mesh technology goes to work in localizing a user’s device. This involves quickly scanning the environment – combined with what Snap already knows about each location’s geometry – to dimensionally dress up walls, tables, and floors.
Beyond augmenting the physical space itself, a McDonaldland Map offers deeper branded experiences. This is a 3D interactive map where a user’s Bitmoji navigates and launches various lenses that are each themed to a McDonaldland character or place.
Lore & Location
For example, Grimace Island Dash lets users visit Grimace Island and navigate a boat down the McDonaldland River. They can swipe left and right to collect Floating Mt. McDonaldland Shakes, while the whole thing is gamified with a leaderboard to make it stickier.
Meanwhile, Fry Frenzy lets users scan their physical space to then watch it transform into a Whack-A-Mole game with the Fry Friends. Using the same World Mesh tech noted earlier, holes appear in the table in front of you, where characters pop up and can be tapped/whacked down.
Birdie’s Dream Flight is another game where users can fly over McDonaldland as Birdie. This uses the phone’s gyroscope for inertial input controls that let users tilt their phones to avoid obstacles, guide the winged protagonist through rings, collect hotcakes, and score points.
Lastly, Mayor’s Magic Glasses lets users interact with items in their McDonaldland meal. Specifically, meals come with collectible postcards. By scanning these with the Snapchat Camera, users can see AR histories of McDonaldland locales, narrated by Mayor McCheese.
“Over the past few years, we’ve seen how fans flock to our characters, everyone from Grimace to the Hamburglar,” said McDonald’s VP of U.S. Marketing Jennifer Healan. “But many, especially the new generation, don’t know that’s just the tip of the iceberg. There’s an entire magical world of McDonaldland filled with characters, places, and lore.”
Gravitational Pull
In addition to the campaign’s main components – augmented interiors and the McDonaldland Map mini-games – McDonald’s is getting the ball rolling with other activations. These include Snapchat AR Mirrors at select locations that let users step into an Apple Pie Orchard.
There are also menu items launching alongside the AR elements, such as a McDonaldland meal and Mt. McDonaldland Shake. Altogether, this strategy carries a key tactic often found in our AR Marketing case studies: AR does best when situated within multichannel campaigns.
This is simply because AR is powerful in its depth of engagement, but it’s still unestablished and challenged to get users into the experience. So, stimulating those first steps through more established media can prop up AR campaigns to do their thing and make their mark.
Altogether, this campaign is well devised and taps into AR’s strengths, while bringing back some 70’s and 80’s nostalgia. You can think of it as this era’s version of the physical McDonald’s playgrounds that some of us grew up with. Like those, it could have a gravitational pull.
“For the first time in decades, we are taking fans on a trip to McDonaldland with an immersive experience that taps into the past to create the future,” said Healan. “It’s a chance for us to give fans a new, modern way to experience this magical world.”
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