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McDonald‘s in Japan has sparked a craze for “double layered beef burger beauty” and stirred up the dark history of “Blue Road” advertising
Cute publicity team leader appears
Recently, McDonald’s Japan launched a limited time promotional team leader to promote the “Double Beef Jisburger” promotion – “Eat Double Beef Jisburger Beauty Now”.
The cute image of this new character quickly sparked discussions on social media, prompting netizens to create her second creation illustrations and add various background settings to her. Her image and advertising style evoke memories of the “Blue Road” McDonald’s Uncle series advertisements that were popular in Japan in the 2000s.
The Charm Trend of “Double Beef Giesburg Beauty”
On October 22nd, this new publicity team leader appeared in the advertisement with her unique name and style, especially her rhythmic dance performance, which left a deep impression on the audience.
Once the advertisement was aired, it attracted a lot of attention from netizens. Many people identified “Double Beef Jisburger Mei” as McDonald’s uncle’s “daughter” and began to post secondary illustrations online, depicting her interaction with McDonald’s uncle.
This series of interactions and creations made “Double Beef Giesburg Beauty” overnight popular, even becoming a hot topic at one point.
The Return and Controversy of the Blue Road
Looking back at the 2000s, ‘Blue Road’, as the core line of McDonald’s advertising series, was once popular with its highly recognizable dance and performance style.
However, ‘Blue Blue Road’ gradually became synonymous with campus bullying.
Many netizens who used to be elementary school students recalled that “Blue Blue Road” was misunderstood by some children at that time as meaning “to die, to die, to disappear”, which led to many students being scolded by teachers for using this term.
In the end, due to this negative association, “Blue Blue Road” was strictly banned in Japanese elementary schools and gradually withdrew from McDonald’s advertising slogans, becoming an awkward black history.
Ban on ‘Blue Roads’ on Campus
The reason why ‘Blue Blue Road’ has become a campus taboo is because it is used as a bullying term within a certain scope. Many netizens who were still students at the time shared their experiences of being scolded by teachers for saying ‘Blue Road’.
Some students have even been labeled as bad because they unintentionally imitated the tone in the advertisement. In addition, some parents have also discussed the negative impact of this term on the internet, expressing concerns about its spread in schools. Due to the increasing controversy surrounding ‘Blue Road’, McDonald’s had to abandon the advertising slogan to avoid further damaging the brand image.
Is it popular in schools to use the phrase ‘blue road’ to represent ‘go die, die, disappear’? My daughter’s school (National Elementary School) doesn’t have this phrase, but I heard from my neighbor’s mother that her child’s school has a popular use of this phrase, which has become a bullying problem. But I can’t find any relevant information online. If there really is such a bad bullying usage, I really hope it can be banned
The craze for “double layered beef burger beauty” on social media
Although the dark history of “Blue Road” is regrettable, the emergence of “Double Beef Giesburg Beauty” has brought a new trend. Netizens use the hashtag “# いまだけプチナ美” on social media to share various secondary creative graphic works, making this new character a hot topic in Japanese online culture.
This also shows that even for the same brand, changes in promotional methods can inject new vitality and topicality into the brand.
Brand memory under the changing times
The popularity of “Double Beef Giesburg Beauty” undoubtedly demonstrates the brand’s continuous innovation in the changing times. But it also makes people realize that a once popular advertising element may undergo unexpected changes and influences in social culture for various reasons.