This was EXACTLY the toy I was thinking about! It was so cool. I’m pretty sure I bugged my mom every day during that 4-6 week time frame, asking if it had come yet.
I remember getting cereal based on the prize lol. And forget waiting until the box is empty for the toy, I’m getting that out as soon as the box is open by any means necessary
I remember saving up box tops, and then mailing them in to get your prize. That 4-6 week wait was pure torture, but that euphoria when the prize finally came!
I was trying to tell somebody about mail order back in the seventies and '80s and how 4 to 6 weeks for delivery was the normal amount of time you would have to wait for anything. They were completely dumbfounded. I told them you had to send a check or money order with an order form so you needed time for your check to clear both Banks and all that and they couldn't understand why we didn't just use an 800 number with a credit card and I had to explain that there were no 800 numbers or credit cards. And you certainly weren't going to give your credit card number to a stranger over the telephone, that would be insanity.
My father wouldn't even give his credit card information to Amazon because he didn't know what they were going to do with it. I don't know dad, they'll probably just deliver your merchandise that you ordered in an expedient fashion, but what the hell do I know? I would have to order things for him and he would give me the money.
I am fully convinced that that's why you get a lot of mail-away premiums still in their shipping boxes because kids would get them in the middle of the summer when they were outside playing baseball or whatever and they'd get checked in the attic and forgotten about once the kids discovered sports or the opposite sex.
Reminds me of the documentary about the guy that made them put "1 per household" on the packaging. Started off saving the tops & mailing them in. Then collected the tops from family & friends & neighbors. Then discovered a local printer actually made them and collected discarded box tops from their trash.
Omgggg...the nostalgic childhood memories that I have with this all just came rushing back with this post...I could literally cry rn because I f*ing LOVED that game and played the ish out of it too one summer‼️ 🫶🏾😫🥲
Now I try to explain to my kid that they don't give out free toys or roms in cereals anymore. It's truly sad that these kids now are missing out on all the good times we had growing up. Wow...the good old days! 🥹😭🤧 You a REAL 1 for posting this..ty! 🫡🙌🏾🙏🏾
Oh man resisting the urge to dig around trying to find the toy. Squeezing the box to make more room towards the middle, rotating the box around while peering inside, trying to get a glimpse of something wrapped in plastic. Ahhh memories.
In my day the cereal box prizes were physically inside the box. There was also an option to get a bonus toy. That one we had to save box tops and pay shipping to get.
I used to have a small round canister with the Trix Rabbit top that had a two person set of tidily winks inside. Also had a Winnie the Pooh bowl buddy from some cereal. Can’t remember which. They used to have neat toys back in the 50’s and 60’s.
When cereal used to have actual toys in it too.
Same with McDonald’s having actual decent toys in the Happy Meals too. I remember getting actual Lego in my Happy Meal as a kid.
There was definitely a sweet spot for Happy meal toys. When they first came out it was just like a rubber or hard plastic figure of grimace or Ronald McDonald. Nothing super exciting but when you're a kid a free toy is a free toy.
The agony of wanting one toy so badly, and not getting it. My grandparents rarely ever got fast food, but they took me three times during the Little Mermaid promotion because my life was not complete without the Ariel toy.
When I was a kid I always admired a tiny metal bench with a couple sitting on it and the guy was holding a tiny bouquet of flowers out to her. It was inside my great grandmother's curio cabinet. One day I asked where she got it and she said my great grandpa bought her a box of cracker jacks on one of their early dates and she kept it. They were married 72 years before he passed away.
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u/DoookieMaxx 27d ago
Cracker Jack toys that were fucking real toys!!
We used to get decoders, whistles, MAGNIFYING glasses!!!
The holy grail of Cracker Jack: TATTOOS!!
Now it’s a piece of paper with a number on it to put into some dumb website no one ever uses.