Melody came and Melody left.
On 6 Dec, McDonald’s in Singapore finally launched their highly coveted, limited edition My Melody holders in the wee hours of the morning at 4am. By 11.30am, they were officially sold out islandwide.
The My Melody drinks and fried holder shot to fame in Japan about a month ago. Following their insane popularity, McDonald’s Singapore announced that it was bringing the collectible here.
It should come as no surprise that the desirability of an item greatly increases when it’s limited-edition – the same holds true for this plastic food holder with a Sanrio character on it.
Singaporeans were clamouring to get their hands on the adorable bunny food holders, so queues started forming at McDonald’s outlets well before 4am both with walk-in customers and at Drive-Thrus – a manifestation of Singaporean kiasu-ness.
First, people started sharing photos of ridiculously long queues that started to form even before the sun came up.
Soon after followed photos of people with their loot of My Melody holders, from just 1 to an entire collection of 10.
And eventually, there came a slew of posts from angry and disappointed customers who were informed that the My Melody holders were sold out and they had been queuing for hours in vain, with the only alternative now is buying from scalpers online.
According to the notice put up by McDonald’s, each customer is entitled to purchase a maximum of five my melody holders at S$6.9 per holder with any purchase off the menu. Clearly, many people took advantage of that. Given the fact that these holders are ‘limited edition’, it’s no surprise then that many shrewd business-minded customers bought as many My Melody holders as they could just to resell them at a profit online.
On the local online marketplace, Carousell, these My Melody Holders have already been listed for up to four times its original price at around S$30 per item.
It’s uncertain if the same thing happened when this item was released in Japan but there are a few listings for them on eBay being sold at a premium as well:
If you’re a fan of My Melody or Sanrio in general, you might understand the frantic scramble to get one of these. It’s almost a status symbol – being able to tell people that you own a limited edition My Melody food holder can give you more social points. But still, waiting in line for hours in the early morning for a what is essentially a plastic bucket with a face on sounds like more trouble than its worth.
