AIBU?
Husband obsessed with McDonald’s Monopoly
sickandtired300 · 18/09/2022 14:42
I just need a rant.
I dread it every year as he is always the same, but this year is particularly bad. He’s absolutely obsessed with collecting the stickers and trying to win the prizes.
He has been going several times a day (we live just round the corner) and spending stupid amounts of money on food to get the stickers. He never even eats half the food and gives it to the dog or the DC. I don’t mind them having McDonald’s but it’s meant to be a treat and he’s giving them cheeseburgers and nuggets every day for a snack ffs to get rid of them because he’s only interested in the stickers on the packaging.
I have lost it today as he has come home with 12 lots of fries!!!! We can’t fucking afford this. We’re not on the breadline and have a couple of hundred spare each month but not for fucking McDonald’s splurged. We are now just one sticker away from winning the holiday (the final sticker is extremely rare and there’s only a few of them in circulation, so out chances are still vanishingly low) and so the obsession has ramped up. We’d had our breakfast (he pissed off afterwards for his McDonald’s stickers) and so they got thrown out. We have an on and off rat problem so I’d rather not be throwing out heaps of uneaten food.
He joins fucking Ebay auctions and is always on his phone inputting the codes. He even joins online discussions on it. He really wants the cash prize. He is saying that somebody is selling 500 of the stickers for £80 and he’s considering it. I’m sure it’s a scam. He knows I will go nuclear so I’m praying he doesn’t do it but we both allow each other some treat spends each month so he may well spend it on that.
It’s all he fucking talks about. This morning he was moaning about how he saw an article saying that he saw an article about McDonald’s staff cheating and peeking at the stickers beforehand, and I snapped at him to bloody shut up. He is completely neurotypical and doesn’t typically hyperfixate on things, but this is always an issue every year.
He’s also convinced the kids we’re winning a car and a holiday ffs. When I’m cleaning I’m always having to pick up the stickers. We’ve got that many of those free meal prizes that our family of 4 will never be able to get through them before they expire. I handed most of them to homeless folk in town the other day, otherwise they wouldn’t have been used. And he whigned that he could’ve used them to buy more food to get more stickers.
It is genuinely making me resent him. I can’t wait until it ends.
BertieBotts · 18/09/2022 17:16
Definitely gambling addiction.
Would it work to put a cap on spending towards this?
Or - I think the person who said wait until this round is over has a great point. Maybe you could start tracking how much he is spending on the meals (or estimate) and add it all up over this monopoly season, so that when it's over, you can present him with the figure plus the fact he hasn't won anything, and see if he will get himself some help when it's really far until the next one so he will probably feel more detached from it.
I do remember reading that staff members basically cheated and won it for a certain number of years, so I'm not really sure that the odds are in anyone's favour. I know they aren't allowed to do that and I'm sure things have been tightened up but it definitely dampened my enthusiasm for McDonald's monopoly.
Badgirlriri · 18/09/2022 17:32
badbaduncle · 18/09/2022 16:08
I saw a documentary about homelessness and one woman said that this promotion was horrendous for them as they get 'given' loads of food by gambling addicts and if they eat it - and she was saying she get's given a ridiculous amount - they feel so ill but she has been shouted at for being ungrateful for refusing it.
That sounds like rubbish. Have you got a link?
sofap · 18/09/2022 17:32
Ask him has he ever seen/heard of anyone he knows or even on the news win the prizes? I have never seen a headline in any paper in any year that reads: 'Mcdonald's £100k claimed' or 'Mcdonald's car won'.
I'm not saying it's a scam because I'm sure they wouldn't be allowed to legally run it if it wasn't possible to win, but I am 100% sure that the Mayfair/Bond street stickers are NOT on a fries at your local McDonalds.
I feel for you OP. What a waste of money and a waste of food
sickandtired300 · 18/09/2022 17:37
I think the vast majority of winning stickers/codes in McDonald’s Monopoly and other similar competitions end up unclaimed, with the buyer never having even bothered to check. How many people bother entering codes on cereal boxes etc? The McDonald’s Monopoly is a bit easier and less effort as you just rip the sticker off but that means more competition.
MumVUnicorns · 18/09/2022 17:48
If this give any perspective on what a terrible contest this is, a group of us lunch at md's last week and I entered the tokens onto the app and surprise the surprise we are only missing the "rare" ones as list above.
The company wants you to spend lots and in doing so unleash an addiction that you perhaps you wasn't aware you had (food or gambling...)
Jammydodged · 18/09/2022 17:52
@sickandtired300 there is a documentary on how in the US the ‘winner’ was an inside job for years. I can’t think what it’s called but surely worth a watch. How many people wasted lots of money buying them for the big prize for the years it went on and had no chance of winning at all as it was an inside job on who won.
sickandtired300 · 18/09/2022 18:06
It wouldn’t be a bloody issue if it wasn’t so excessive. I took my niece out shopping the other day and she requested McDonald’s for lunch (out of a range of fast food options available, we couldn’t afford a proper restaurant) because she had been collecting the stickers and I thought nothing of it. That is normal, and perfectly acceptable.
What isn’t normal, is making 2/3 trips a day, spending at least £10 each day, on food you’re just going to bin, in order to get the stickers. It’s also not normal to whinge like a child at your wife for cleaning them up. His behaviour is genuinely worrying.
In a way it’d be EASIER, if the addiction was slot machines, as it’s more understandable and not as bloody bizarre as him being taken in by some shite corporate scammy competition as a grown man with a degree. I genuinely think the Monopoly branding must be attractive to him somehow, subconsciously.
Pilipalapal · 18/09/2022 18:07
FlipFlopsAndIceCream · 18/09/2022 17:51
Which sticker are you missing that's rare?
I only have 3! Would love to know if one is rare and I could be sitting on a fortune!
(Sorry, I know that's not helping your situation!)
There’s a list here:
www.monopolyland.com/rare-mcdonalds-monopoly-pieces/
ScotsWhaHae77 · 18/09/2022 18:07
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