Burger King "Whopper Detour": the campaign that sold Whoppers from inside McDonald's parking lots
In December 2018, Burger King and FCB New York launched the Whopper Detour. The Burger King app offered Whoppers for one cent — but only if you ordered them from within 600 feet of a McDonald's restaurant. The geofenced offer turned every McDonald's parking lot into a Burger King lead-generation venue for nine days. The Burger King app shot to #1 on the App Store. The campaign won the Grand Prix at the 2019 Cannes Lions and is studied as the well-known example of competitive geofence marketing.
- Story: In December 2018, Burger King and FCB New York launched the Whopper Detour. The BK app offered Whoppers for one cent — but only when ordered from within 600 feet of a McDonald's. The geofenced offer turned every McDonald's parking lot into a BK lead-gen venue for nine days.
- Why it matters: The Whopper Detour is the defining example of competitive geofence marketing. The campaign turned a technical capability (mobile geofencing) into a creative idea audiences could describe in one sentence.
- Takeaway: Competitive-mechanical campaigns require a technical capability the audience can experience directly.
- Takeaway: Creative ideas that can be described in one sentence travel better than complex multi-layered campaigns.
- Takeaway: Technical-capability availability changes over time — what worked in 2018 may not be as freely available in later years.
Whopper Detour — the four-step story
Whopper Detour at a glance
Quick facts
Where mobile-app QSR was in 2018
By late 2018, every major QSR chain had a mobile app but most app downloads were stagnant. McDonald's and Starbucks led the category. Burger King's app was a secondary download with limited utility. The challenge was acquiring app downloads at scale with a clear-enough use case that the app would actually be used after download.
FCB New York and Burger King's marketing team proposed a campaign that used geofencing creatively. The Burger King app could detect when a user was near a McDonald's location. The campaign would offer Whoppers for one cent — but only when ordered from within 600 feet of a McDonald's. The implicit suggestion: walk out of McDonald's, order a Whopper for a penny, and go pick it up at a nearby Burger King.
The execution
The Whopper Detour ran for nine days (December 4-12, 2018). The mechanic required users to:
- Download the Burger King app. If they hadn't already.
- Drive (or walk) to within 600 feet of a McDonald's. The geofence detection unlocked the offer.
- Order a Whopper for one cent in the app. The order would be routed to a nearby Burger King.
- Drive to the Burger King to pick up the Whopper. The pickup completed the experience.
The campaign targeted approximately 14,000 McDonald's locations — effectively all US McDonald's. The mobile app downloads spiked dramatically during the campaign window. The Burger King app reached #1 in the Food & Drink category on the App Store. App-downloads-and-orders data showed millions of new users acquired during the nine-day window.
What grew
The campaign produced significant earned-media coverage. Trade press, mainstream news, and late-night TV all covered the “Burger King is selling Whoppers in McDonald's parking lots” story. The app downloads and user-acquisition metrics were strong enough that Burger King continued investing in mobile-app marketing strategies in subsequent years.
The campaign won the Cannes Lions Grand Prix in both Direct and Titanium categories in 2019 along with multiple other major industry awards. It's now studied as the defining example of competitive geofence marketing and creative-mechanical brand work that achieves real commercial outcomes.
How RGM thinks about competitive-mechanical campaigns
When clients ask about competitor-targeted campaigns, the Whopper Detour case is the structural template. The conditions: a technical capability (mobile geofencing) that enables a competitive mechanic, a creative idea (selling Whoppers from McDonald's parking lots) that the audience can describe in one sentence, and a willingness to be aggressive about competitor positioning in a way most brands flinch from.
The harder lesson is about technical-capability availability. The Whopper Detour relied on mobile-app geofencing capabilities that have become more regulated in subsequent years (Apple's App Tracking Transparency in 2021 specifically limited certain location-tracking patterns). We tell clients that competitive-mechanical campaigns depend on the underlying technical capability being available at the time of execution — what worked in 2018 isn't necessarily available in 2026 in the same way.
Frequently asked questions
How did the geofencing actually work?
The Burger King app used smartphone GPS-and-location services to detect proximity to McDonald's locations (the app had geo-coordinates for approximately 14,000 US McDonald's). When a user was within 600 feet, the Whopper-for-one-cent offer activated. The user could place the order at that location; the order would route to a Burger King for fulfillment.
What did McDonald's do in response?
Largely nothing publicly. McDonald's didn't issue a major response and didn't run a counter-campaign during the Whopper Detour window. The implicit position was that engaging would amplify Burger King's message; ignoring would let the campaign run its course.
Could this work today?
Partly. The geofencing capability still exists but mobile-OS privacy controls (especially Apple's App Tracking Transparency in 2021) have made some forms of location targeting more limited. The structural creative idea is still reproducible; the specific mobile-app mechanic would need to be adapted to current regulatory and platform-policy environments.
Sources & references
- Cannes Lions 2019 archive — Grand Prix recognition in Direct and Titanium categories.
- Burger King Whopper Detour press coverage — AdWeek and broader trade-press coverage of the campaign.
- FCB Burger King — Agency portfolio reference.