McDonald's: There are the most popular Happy Meal toys of all time, including one worth $450

McDonald’s Happy Meals have been an iconic part of the restaurant’s history since the brand introduced it back in 1979. Happy Meals are geared towards children and contain some of their most-liked food items packaged for kids. But when it came out, it was the accompanying toys inside which became the star component that fast managed to make McDonald’s Happy Meal set such a hit with kids.

Over time, McDonalds has becomes one of the largest food franchises in the world and collaborated with numerous TV shows, movies, cartoons and games in order to bring a variety of Happy Meal toys.

Most of these toys are available only for a limited time, and the increase in their nostalgic value over time means that many of these limited-edition Happy Meal toys set are today collector’s items that cost crazy amount of money on eBay.

McDonald’s has capitalised on the nostalgic pull of Happy Meal toys by releasing a limited-edition items like Happy Meal toy for adults with Cactus Plant Flea Market, earlier this year. It was such a huge success that the Cactus Plant Flea Market set have been found to be listed on eBay for as high as $300,000.

Here are some of the most popular Happy Meal toys over the years.

Teenie Beanies

Beanie Babies were all the rage once upon a time, even leading to a collector’s frenzy. As per Mashed, McDonald’s too collaborated with this iconic toy of the 90s and sold McDonald's Happy Meal Teenie Beanies toy in 1997.

Post-90s, the popularity of the Beanie Babies is not like it used it be, but this Happy Meal toy set with stuffed animals in bright colours is one of its most relevent toy launches ever since it came to exemplify what 90s collector culture was like.

According to Wealthy Gorilla, this Happy Meal Toy could be worth $450, making it the most expensive toy of all time.

Power Rangers

Power Rangers were extremely popular in the 90s. As per Restaurant Clicks, for the release of the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers Movie in 1995, McDonald’s Happy Meal was used as a promotional vehicle. Thus, Power Rangers Happy Meal Toys were sold with with full set of Red, White, Pink, and Yellow Ranger toy figurines along with their Megazords.

McNugget Buddies

Chicken McNuggets are one of the most popular menu items from McDonalds ever since it was made available as a Happy Meal option in 1983. So when McDonald’s sold exciting new McNugget Buddies toys that looked like a Chicken McNuggets with colourful costume and happy face, it became one of their best known toys.

My Little Pony

My Little Pony is a children’s franchises famous world-wide for producing everything from series, clothes, games and toys. So, it is no surprise that My Little Pony collaborated with a company like McDonald’s on a number of occasions to produce My Little Pony Happy Meal Toys which just perfectly combined the best of both world for kids.

Hot Wheels

Hot Wheels are very popular model cars with some of their vintage model cars being collector’s items in themselves. Back in 1988, McDonald’s and Hot Wheels brought out 15 exclusive Happy Meal toys. These were very popular and in fact, today the complete set of Hot Wheel Happy Meals figurines can cost some serious money in the toy collector’s market and on sites like eBay.

Potato Head Kids

Mr Potato Head has been an enduringly popular kid’s figure, which comes from an animated series made in 1986. McDonald’s teamed up with Playskool to create some super cool Potato Head Kids Happy Meal toys. This set look just like Mr. Potato Head with inter-changeable parts just like in the original character.

Some other cool Happy Meal toys

Here are some other hit Happy Meal toys worth mentioning. As per Quality Logo Blogs, in December, 1979, McDonald’s famously partnered with Star Trek: The Motion Picture and sold figurines that looked like characters from the movie. Again, from March to December 1997, Disney and McDonald's collaborated heavily, with Happy Meal toys made for several of Disney’s hit films. Post 90s too, McDonald's continue to work with Disney on various other projects.

There were also Happy Meal toys based on characters like Snoopy as well as Ronald McDonald Cloth Doll created after the image of McDonald’s star mascot, which is worth a lot and can cost a pretty penny as a collector’s item. Just remember that new toys in sealed box are always valued more than ones that have been opened.

Sources used:

Eat This, Not That!: ‘McDonald's Biggest Success This Year Was Also Its Biggest Failure’

Metro: 'Super Mario Bros. Movie Happy Meal toys leak reveals Luma – is Rosalina next?'

Restaurant Clicks: ‘34 Famous McDonald’s Happy Meal Toys’

Mashed: '7 Best And 7 Worst Happy Meal Toys'

Quality Logo Products: 'The History of McDonald's Toys: A Timeline of McDonald's Toy and Merch'

Wealthy Gorilla: 'The 15 Most Expensive Happy Meal Toys from McDonald’s'