In a welcome sign for a new expanded audience for the franchise, Star Trek is headed back to fast food. Back in February TrekMovie reported that one of the components of the merchandising for the new Star Trek movie would be at a major fast food outlet, noting ‘probably Burger King.’ And Burger King has just officially confirmed they will be doing a promotional tie-in for the new Trek film.
Paramount giving new Star Trek the tentpole treatment
Burger King made the Trek announcement in their quarterly investor conference call yesterday. In discussing various partner campaigns planned for next year, CEO John Chidsey stated "we believe our movie lineup with The Pink Panther, Star Trek, and Transformers will resonate with super fans and super families globally." TrekMovie has also independently confirmed the Star Trek/Burger King merchandising deal. Paramount and Burger King have worked together on a number of recent promotions, including this year’s Iron Man and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull as well as last year’s Transformers movie. However this will be the first Star Trek promotion with Burger King. Burger King has also worked with the other major studios, including Fox for the recent Star Wars prequels.
Advertising Age discussion of the importance of fast food marketing
There are no details on the campaign yet, but other recent Burger King movie campaigns involved in-store promotions, internet campaigns/games, as well as targeted TV advertising (with separate campaigns for kids and adults). In-store campaigns usually involve special meals and toys and sometimes uniquely branded food items. For example, this summer Burger King offered the ‘Indy Double Whopper.’ These tie-ins should help the new Star Trek movie achieve its goal of breaking into the mainstream audience.
BK commercial for Indy 4
BK commercial for Star Wars Episode III
Star Trek: Fast Food pioneer
Burger King is the second largest hamburger franchise and fourth largest food franchise in the world, with over 11,000 outlets in 69 countries. This kind of deal is all part of Trek’s big comeback to the mainstream. In 1979 the first ever licensed tie-in for a McDonald’s Happy Meal was for Star Trek The Motion Picture, however since then food merchandising for Trek has not usually been a major part of the marketing mix. Star Trek III: The Search For Spock in 1984 had a free glasses promotion at Taco Bell and the last Trek film, 2002’s Star Trek Nemesis, only had a coupon promotion at Del Taco, a small regional chain. This return to the big time is a welcome sign for the new Star Trek.
1979 McDonald’s commercial promoting Star Trek TMP
1984 Taco Bell commercial for Star Trek III
More food promotions coming
In our earlier preview of Trek movie merchandising it was mentioned that there may not be additional food merchandising. However, according to multiple sources, Paramount and CBS have signed up at least one other major food deal that will be bringing Star Trek movie branded products to grocery stores, at least in the US (possibly world wide). This is also a welcome sign as supermarket merchandising is a great way to reach kids (and moms) who must be part of the expanded audience Paramount is seeking for Star Trek. Trek’s previous forays into supermarket merchandising have been hit and miss, but who can forget the ‘marshmallow dispenser’ from Star Trek V?
Past Trek film food tie-ins for ‘Star Trek V’ and ‘First Contact’
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1st!! And I HAVE a marshmallow dispenser!
Hmmm Maybe the new movie will feature Kirk and Spock trying out the replicators for the first time on the Enterprise and they request a Whopper.
I think white castle would have been more fitting :)
“fries, french, hot”
Jokes aside, can I just say YUCK!
I also proudly carry my marshmallows in one of those.
Set Whoppers to stun!
I really don’t like Burger King, but I guess I’ll go to collect some Trek kid’s meal toys.
toH! Dunqu’!
I can’t wait for my Star Trek Kid’s meal. The BK across the street from my house is going to be very profitable next year.
And I hope to get an Enterprise in my breakfast cereal too!
And if it’s not too much to ask, I hope BK or the movie theaters have those collectable plastic cups. Haven’t had one of those since Generations.
#3 Why White Castle? I’ve never been-and it’s too regional.
I suppose this promotion is USA-only? I don’t think Burger King will promote Star Trek in Europe… :-(
Burger King can do what they want for this new movie, but they will never top the Kraft Marshmallow Dispenser and the Enterprise attacking the Rice Krispies! xD
White Castle…as in “Harold & Kumar Go To…”
…because of John Cho of course!
And please people: it’s Marsh Mellons!
;-)
#8 Umm i think the joke there with #3 is about “Harold and Kumar go to White Castle”… starring the new Sulu John Cho and “Harold”
wow #11 you must have posted while I was typing…
In the future, are they called Freedom Fries?
I agree with the article, it is a good sign that Star Trek is going back into the mainstream. This is needed for the next Trek film to be the blockbuster that it needs to be.
#14 – Federation Fries!
Starfleet Fries.
It’ll be really interesting to see what kind of stuff they come up with… Nothing LAME I hope! It would be kinda cool to collect little toys or drink glasses like some of that crap from way back when. I could do without the conversations wherein you’re trying to explain to the clerk that you want to buy the toy, but NOT get the whole kiddy meal, LOL.
It’s great to see this film given the blockbuster treatment.
Oh boy! My son is about to turn 1 and I can’t wait unti he asks his dad for Federation Fries and a Saucer Section Whooper! :-) Live long, and have it your way!
I still have those McDonald STMP Happy Meal boxes stored away …
BK wouldn’t be so bad if my local BK wasn’t ghetto-fantabulous… I guess I’ll have to drive to a “clean” BK to get my Star Trek lovin’
Re: #22, Brad; Yea, I have that problem too… It sure ain’t the ‘ghetto’ Elvis sang about. *sigh* ‘Gangbang with yo fries?’ NO, thanks!
Awesome.
Kirk opens up a hatch a lot of whoppers fall out.
I am glad that Burger King is doing the promotion, because at least I like their food. I also like the quality of their promotional products – they are typically of higher quality and have more of a “wow” factor than McDonald’s stuff.
But the most important question is, is it canon? I thought they outlawed fast food in Star Trek’s vision of the future. Bet it’s the Borg’s fault.
26 – That was in the Novels. The Novels aren’t officially Canon ;-)
My god, that McDonalds ad for TMP is so, so bad, its like a bad Bruce Lee movie where hes dressed as a klingon with the english dubbed over it. I’ve never seen it before and I can’t stop laughing!
It’ll be like Iron Man last year, Kirk escapes the ice planet, gets back to the ship and tells Bones the first thing he wants is a real federation cheeseburger, in fact he’ll have two. Then he’ll take it out of the food synthesizer and turn around, take a massive bite out of it in slow motion while the camera lingers on the BK wrapper and the look of utter contenment on Kirk’s face…
I’m hoping they do drinking glasses like the ones they did for Shrek the Third in addition to the kids toys. Maybe they could do little mini Trek themed Barbies for the girls toy premium too!
I think this new Burger King announcement deserves another Woo-Hoo!
Things are coming together folks, it’s lookin’ good!
Romulan Warburger
Big E w/ cheese
Starfleet Command combo meal
Warp Whopper
Chekov chicken sandwich
Federation fries (OK, I stole that from cd)
Star Trek strawberry shake
…….and I’m out.
Of course, there’s always this gem. Great lookalikes!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZBTDlvShYg
Scotty’s Fish Sandwich.
What’s… Wrong… ? No…. Rom…. Rings….!
One of my first jobs was as a stock boy at my local grocery store back in 1989… I distinctly remember opening up a brand-new box of STAR TREK V marsh-mellon dispensers and thinking, “Oh, sh*t.”
Sure enough, other co-workers spotted them and teased me mercilessly, as I was the only TREK fan they seemed to know. “What the f*ck is this?! A STAR TREK ‘marshmellow dispenser???’ Hahahaha! Guess who’s gonna be buying these!”
Oh, the humanity…
James T Kirk’s Chicken Sandwich (He ordered a Chicken Sandwich in Tribbles).
This means this movie is SO going to rock!!!
#31: I don’t know about those other names, but the Big E with cheese isn’t such a bad idea :)
I’d like an Uhura with a coke please.
All hamburgers should now be referred to as “Targburgers.”
Maybe it’d be fun for a few stuffed “tribble” dolls to be added to all trays that include a chicken sandwich.
How about like a salad or an apple or something? Something about a 700 calorie dead animal on a starchy delivery device doesn’t scream ‘the best of mankind’.
:(
If I recall correctly, Taco Bell also did plastic cups for Generations and DS9.
Set Whoppers to stun … make that kill.*
Those Trek III glasses with the double rings that emulated the bar glasses in the movie were nice.
* 64 grams (2 1/4 actual ounces) of total fat. Of those, 30 are saturated fat and 2.5 are trans fats.
#42
An apple? At Burger King?
Is it any consolation that the cows died of natural causes and donated their bodies to the fast food industry for dietary research?
Maybe they will have a special Brightly Colored Mystery Food Cubes meal.
And a cup of coffee to go with that chicken sandwich.
I’m a little bit concerned about marketing with Burger King. Usually McDonalds and Burger King promotions are aimed as much (if not more) at kids then adults and since we know that this film will have some Orion sexual tension of some type in it, I’m a bit worried it might be inappropriate to be advertising towards kids. At least, I can’t imagine that Abrams has the Orion chicks less sexual then Enterprise had them on television, and there is no way that I’d have let my kids watch the “clean” tv version.
I’m all for advertising but I am concerned about seeing it aimed at kids unless it’s truly a kid safe movie which so far hasn’t been the impression.
#46 – Brightly Colored Mystery Food Cubes meal…LMAO :D
They should also throw in a “Romulan Ale” beverage, a.k.a. Mountain Dew Voltage!
Del Taco is the best! Incidentally, it’s primarily located in Calfornia. I personally like it better than Taco Bell. Incidentally, it was through Del Taco that I actually first heard anything about Nemesis. Perhaps I should have taken that as something of an omen.
3.
Yeah, White Castle had some great Trek ads back in the day. The one I recall best was the Enterprise orbiting the K7 space station to pick up it’s supply of “castles” (AKA gutbombs).