KFC China’s ‘blind boxes’ promo slammed for ‘causing food waste’, overspending
The promotional boxes have sold out, partly due to scalpers reselling the toys for higher prices.
A Chinese consumer rights group urged the public to boycott KFC’s latest meal promotion, arguing that the fast food chain’s limited-edition toys resulted in excessive food waste and compulsive overspending.
KFC teamed up with Chinese toy maker Pop Mart, known for its mystery boxes or “blind boxes” to offer collectable versions of Dimoo toys with certain meals, in celebration of the brand’s 35th anniversary of its first restaurant in the country.
Acquiring a complete six-figure set required customers to buy at least six meals, but the remote odds of getting all of them even prompted one person to spend 10,494 yuan (US$1,650) on 106 meals to collect the set, the China Consumer Association revealed in its criticism, adding others have even hired people to buy the 99-yuan meals, with the food often being thrown away.
“This can easily lead consumers to spend impulsively just to procure the limited-edition, blind-box toys, thus buying excessive food and causing food waste,” it said in a statement.
Speaking to The South China Morning Post, a customer service representative at KFC said the promotion ended early because the blind boxes had sold out.
Various reports also indicate that some consumers online have complained that all of the meals had been snatched up by scalpers, and that full sets of the toys were being sold for hundreds of yuan online.
