Back in 1986 if you went to eat at Burger King you might have been in for a treat as during 1986, the King had a tie-in promotion with the Thunder Cats cartoon.
What got me down this rabbit hole was finding an employee’s promotion badge from that time on eBay.
This, obviously, posed the question: what did these kid meal packs (Burger King’s equivalent to Macca’s Happy Meal) have in them?
I was going to find out.
This 1986 run occurred during the classic “Burger King Kids Pack” era. Burger King hadn’t yet invented the famous Burger King Kids Club yet (which didn’t launch until late 1989).
There were four different toys to collect, in four different art-covered boxes.
The Box Art
Even though the toy is what the kids wanted (which I will get to), I have to mention the art on these boxes!
The art is just fantastic.
Whoever did the box art knew their craft well. And you have to remember this was before AI and computers creating images on demand – someone hand draw all these!
Now, on to the toys.
The Toys
As mentioned previously, there were four different toys you could collect – a new one each week, just to keep you coming back.
The toys – sorry, treasures – were: a cup, a Snarf straw holder, a ring, and a light switch decoration.
I was originally thinking the ring would be the one to get, but I am digging the light switch decoration the more I think about it. I mean, being reminded how cool you were each time you switched the light on and off, would be dope.
There are some more images of the cup over at Action Figure Adventures.
Grab Snark and stick a straw in him over at eBay.
Okay, hold the phone, I just realised this isn’t a straw holder, but a pencil topper. What a goof I am! Please excuse my ignorance.
The best thing about the ring is that it had a secret compartment. Although I am not sure how much you could fit in there. But a brand new one can be yours from eBay.
I do love how the ring has Thunder Cats Ho! written on the inside.
You can still get a new one of the switch decoration as well from eBay, but I am not sure how well it will stick – that thing is 40 years old!
Hold the phone! I was just researching this light switch decoration and it seems to glow in the dark! Unless there were two to collect, but I am not sure they would do that.
You would think that they would have mentioned that it was glow in the dark in the ad. Glow in the dark was all the rage in the 80s.
You can get all four of these toys over on eBay.
Commercial
Of course, this promotion was heavily marketed to kids during morning cartoons and evening TV via ads. You can see the commercial that aired in 1986 below.
Over to You
What were your memories of the Thunder Cats meal deal at Burger King? Or any of the other tie-ins Burger King had.