McDonald’s running Pokémon promotions with its Happy Meals is no new phenomenon. Most years, the two corporations team up to include packs of McDonald’s-marked Pokémon TCG cards in the kids’ meals, and it generally proves very popular. But recently, something else has changed: over the last year, Pokémon cards have become outlandishly popular, to the point where they remain near-impossible to buy in stores thanks to scalpers and fanatics. This mess is just as bad in Japan as it is in the U.S., and the ridiculous situation has spread to a simple Happy Meal tie-in, causing the three-day event to be abandoned early amidst chaotic scenes.
As reported by Nintendo Soup (thanks IGN), things have gotten so out of control that police were called to multiple McDonald’s locations, alongside massive numbers of Happy Meals being dumped in the streets uneaten once the cards had been removed. Things got so out-of-hand that McDonald’s Japan issued a statement declaring the whole event over after just a single day.
“We would like to inform you,” the statement begins, “that the distribution of Pokémon cards to customers who purchased Happy Meals® ‘Pokémon,’ which was scheduled for three days only from Saturday, August 9th to Monday, August 11th (national holiday), has ended at many stores due to higher-than-expected sales.” The company goes on to apologize to customers for “not being able to meet the expectations of our customers who were looking forward to the product due to the early end of distribution.” It then concludes, “Please refrain from contacting stores regarding stock availability.”
This weekend’s circumstances seem likely to have been primarily caused by a unique Pikachu card contained in the packs, featuring the little mouse-thing sitting down to a fast food meal. McDonald’s sets usually feature re-used art from previous cards, making them not all that collectible, but a bespoke Pikachu generally causes everyone to collectively lose their minds.
It seems scalpers were a large part of the problem, with individual McDonald’s stores not helping by failing to stick to a five-meals-per-person rule. Photos of people buying dozens of Happy Meals at once were posted to social media (with what looks like plenty of unpleasantly anti-Chinese sentiment to boot), as well as pictures of many meals dumped in store doorways, uneaten. The hideous waste of food seems to have driven the public backlash, even more than the lack of availability.
拡散して
大阪のマクドナルドでハッピーセットのおまけのポケカが貰えないから返品させろと要求している外国人転売ヤー
中国人だかベトナム人だか知らないが、こんな事で警察の手を煩わせるんじゃねーよ
悪質外国人は日本から出てけ
日本の子供達がポケカ貰えなくて悲しんでるだろ pic.twitter.com/aqzvEPahYt— ティトン (@bcfe70bord) August 9, 2025
渋谷だけでなく、色々な地域でマクドナルドのポイ捨てゴミは多いです。
今回のハッピーセット騒動も含め、食品を買ったら責任持って食す。
ポイ捨てせずに自分で責任持って処理。これは常識中の常識です。 pic.twitter.com/aX7B0cn19p
— スミレンジャーZ（愛称スミレちゃん、元スラウザーです） (@iijNWqUQ7i41630) August 10, 2025
Of course, this embarrassing display really sucks for the kids who just wanted a cool Pokémon pack with their Happy Meal treat. I’ve been there, taking the boy for a rare McDonald’s meal because of a recent Squishmallows tie-in, only to find the restaurant had put in some tat from a previous Disney promotion after scalpers had scooped the lot. It sucks. People ruin everything.
However, this is emblematic of a far larger issue regarding the Pokémon TCG of late, where massive price hikes for even modern cards are motivating scalpers to snatch everything up, while The Pokémon Company International–despite repeated promises–entirely fails to appropriately step up supply. Let’s hope this ridiculous bubble bursts soon.
