It seems a fast food chain had a bit of a mishap when it placed an ad for its Crispy burger in the United Kingdom.
This McDonald’s restaurant in Britain was heavily criticized for not adhering to the maxim that “it’s location, location, location.”
The media outlet CornwallLive noted that a recent advertisement at a bus stop touting the McCrispy chicken sandwich had the unfortunate mischance of being only a few feet from a road sign reading “crematorium.”
The signs were near the city of Truro.
One woman whose mother-in-law was cremated at the crematorium last year told the outlet:
“Although I can see the funny side [of the advertisement], it is tasteless, and I’m sure some grieving family members won’t like to see it when visiting Penmount for the funeral and cremation of a loved one.”
In a statement, a representative of the Chicago-headquartered McDonald’s chain said the company was not aware that the McCrispy bus stop ad in question was so close to a crematorium road sign.
“In light of the concerns raised by Cornwall Live, we have asked for our advertisement to be removed,” the rep’s statement added.
Some online users found the ad’s placement to be darkly comical. One wrote on Facebook saying: “My parents are in this crematorium. My old man had a brilliant sense of humour, so I’m sure he would have chuckled at this!”
Someone else wrote, “Well it got them plenty of more notice didn’t it! Bad placement without thinking humm I don’t think so! I only recently lost 2 loved ones & to be honest if I’d seen that sign near the crematorium I would have smiled. I don’t find it offensive at all.”
Meanwhile, another user said: “Thank God [it] wasn’t advertising Burger King and being ‘flame grilled.’
It wasn’t immediately clear how long the sign had been up and when it would be removed.
Well, this isn’t the first time that McDonald’s has been subjected to backlash over an ad. In 2017, McDonald’s apologized after an ad showed a boy asking his mother about his dead father.
As the mother in the ad described to the child what his father was like, the boy appeared visibly sad over the apparent lack of similarities between him and his dad. However, the day is saved when the mother and son stopped at a McDonald’s restaurant where he orders a Filet-O-Fish sandwich and she says: “That was your dad’s favourite, too.”
Psychotherapists and parents condemned the ad, arguing that it “exploited child bereavement”.
Watch the video below for more details:
Sources: WesternJournal, WCYY-TV, CornwallLive, DailyMail
