Harvey Guillén

It's a decade of excess and ambition.

The stock market is breaking records and the malls are packed.

And the greet is good era is in full swing.

People don't just want to buy things, they want to win them.

And in the middle of it all is McDonald's.

In 1987, McDonald's is looking for a way to boost sales.

They hire an external marketing firm called Simon Marketing.

And Simon Marketing comes up with an idea so simple, it's dangerous.

Monopoly.

The game is a massive scavenger hunt built on top of the McDonald's menu.

When you buy a large fry or a soda, there are two small stickers attached to the side.

you peel them back to find properties from the Monopoly board.

Most of them are instant wins for a free burger or a Coke, but the real money is in the collect-to-win sets.

To win the million-dollar jackpot, you had to find the rare blue pieces, Park Place and Boardwalk.

McDonald's prints millions of Park Places, but...

They only release one or two boardwalks for the entire country.

Suddenly, every meal turns into a lottery ticket, making you feel like you were always just one lucky fry box away from never having to work again.

It taps into something primal, the desire to collect and to complete a set.

When the game launches, it causes a frenzy.

People dumpster dive for discarded fry boxes, they trade pieces on early internet forums, and they buy extra hash browns just for the sticker.