Popeyes banks on bad spelling to take the wind out of McDonald's Crispy Chicken Sandwich drop

As the Golden Arches rolls out its own sandwich, competitor bets on bad spellers

Published On
Feb 18, 2021

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Today at noon EST, McDonald’s gave a preview of its upcoming Crispy Chicken Sandwich like it was debuting an exclusive new sneaker—via a limited-edition drop, on a special website https://chkndrop.com/

Consumers who went to the site and paid $5 were promised an early taste of the new menu item, along with a custom hoodie and vinyl featuring a sandwich soundtrack by producer Tay Keith. Not surprisingly, the offer sold out quickly.

Popeyes, however, jumped at the chance to promote its own famous chicken sandwich by banking on consumers’ spelling mistakes. The fast feeder bought up 50 different URLs that were most likely to result from clumsy typing of McDonald’s early access link, and for the first 10,000 consumers to land on them, Popeyes is giving a code for a free chicken sandwich of its own.