Skopos designed a multi-method research programme to balance in-the-moment qualitative insights with quantitative validation:
- In-restaurant interviews conducted across trial stores, engaging directly with children (with parental consent) to capture their spontaneous reactions to meal and toy combinations.
- Parallel parent interviews in-store to evaluate perceptions of nutritional value, entertainment tie-ins, and price relevance.
- Mobile app-based survey with parents to gather additional context and provide a robust dataset, allowing for statistical comparison of preferences and purchase intent.
- Observation of interaction with proposed toy/entertainment items to capture natural engagement and excitement levels among children.
- Segmentation analysis by parent profiles (e.g. health-conscious vs. convenience-driven) to identify where offerings might have the greatest traction.
The study delivered clear guidance on how to shape future Happy Meal strategies:
- Identified which food items (e.g. pineapple sticks, fruit bags) struck the right balance between child appeal and parental approval.
- Highlighted specific entertainment tie-ins (particularly major film franchises) that acted as strong purchase motivators and generated “pester power.”
- Revealed which combinations of food + toy created the highest likelihood of purchase, giving McDonald’s a prioritised innovation roadmap.
- Enabled the business to phase out lower-appeal propositions early, saving investment in underperforming options.
- Provided evidence that could be shared internally with product, marketing, and corporate responsibility teams to align on family strategy and health positioning.
Ultimately, the research gave McDonald’s a robust, consumer-driven basis for future Happy Meal launches, ensuring the proposition remained relevant, engaging, and commercially successful — while balancing child excitement with parental reassurance.
