No chips at the Olympics, because McDonald's says so
In the latest bizarre sponsorship deal, McDonald's vetos chips.
By Martha Gill Published 11 July 2012 10:33
You can't have chips at the Olympics, unless they're McDonald's chips, because McDonald's now owns all the chips. As part of their sponsorship deal with LOCOG, the fast food company have apparently stipulated a chip monopoly. LOCOG have published a seemingly bona fide note to this end, saying that their catering team will only be serving chips if they fall within the fish and chips "loophole". The note ends with a plea to customers not to abuse staff.
To those protesting that the Olympics has been suffocated by sponsors, (wearing a t-shirt that features non-Olympics sponsors has recently been banned in the Olympic Park), this comes as a delicious nail in LOCOG's coffin.

Source: Reddit via @tomchivers
Latest tweets
More from New Statesman
- Online writers:
- Steven Baxter
- Rowenna Davis
- David Allen Green
- Mehdi Hasan
- Nelson Jones
- Gavin Kelly
- Helen Lewis
- Laurie Penny
- The V Spot
- Alex Hern
- Martha Gill
- Alan White
- Samira Shackle
- Alex Andreou
- Nicky Woolf in America
- Bim Adewunmi
- Glosswitch
- Kate Mossman on pop
- Ryan Gilbey on Film
- Martin Robbins
- Rafael Behr
- Eleanor Margolis
- Tools and services:
- Polls
- Predictions
- Archive
- Magazine
- PDF edition
- RSS feeds
- Advertising
- Subscribe
- Special supplements
- Stockists





















40 comments
anim3snipe
sadt3ars
animeonlye
nsf7
3solat
mnoms
magicians4all
animexyt
mexyt
delegnet
Surely it not Mc Donalds at fault here, yes it's unreasonable to ban all other vendors chips.
From a business perspective if they suggest it to make more money, I can understand. It's the comittee allowing them to get their own way that is the joke here.
my name is jacob dyer and i live in bristol. it is fantastic. i sound like barnaby bear. i like barnaby bear. one time he went to france. i went to france. but some kid burnt my neck. i didnt like it.
This is hardly in the spirit of Freedom Fries.
Effing amazing these predator socialists at this rag!!!! Mc. Donalds is the only large scale corporation in the world, arguably apart from Tesco that gives you exactly at what you want at a giveaway price, free fod with a coffee or coke. This applies from Kentish Town to the effing Star Ferry Terminal in Hong Kong. Only the government here makes it difficult for Mc. Donalds to sell even cheaper in the UK.
Your predator NS. socialist does not like them for being big and successful they also try and employ cretins if possible.
Effing amazing these predator socialists at this rag!!!! Mc. Donalds is the only large scale corporation in the world, arguably apart from Tesco that gives you exactly at what you want at a giveaway price, free fod with a coffee or coke. This applies from Kentish Town to the effing Star Ferry Terminal in Hong Kong. Only the government here makes it difficult for Mc. Donalds to sell even cheaper in the UK.
Your predator NS. socialist does not like them for being big and successful they also try and employ cretins if possible.
Effing amazing these predator socialists at this rag!!!! Mc. Donalds is the only large scale corporation in the world, arguably apart from Tesco that gives you exactly at what you want at a giveaway price, free fod with a coffee or coke. This applies from Kentish Town to the effing Star Ferry Terminal in Hong Kong. Only the government here makes it difficult for Mc. Donalds to sell even cheaper in the UK.
Your predator NS. socialist does not like them for being big and successful they also try and employ cretins if possible.
Effing amazing these predator socialists at this rag!!!! Mc. Donalds is the only large scale corporation in the world, arguably apart from Tesco that gives you exactly at what you want at a giveaway price, free fod with a coffee or coke. This applies from Kentish Town to the effing Star Ferry Terminal in Hong Kong. Only the government here makes it difficult for Mc. Donalds to sell even cheaper in the UK.
Your predator NS. socialist does not like them for being big and successful they also try and employ cretins if possible.
Effing amazing these predator socialists at this rag!!!! Mc. Donalds is the only large scale corporation in the world, arguably apart from Tesco that gives you exactly at what you want at a giveaway price, free fod with a coffee or coke. This applies from Kentish Town to the effing Star Ferry Terminal in Hong Kong. Only the government here makes it difficult for Mc. Donalds to sell even cheaper in the UK.
Your predator NS. socialist does not like them for being big and successful they also try and employ cretins if possible.
Effing amazing these predator socialists at this rag!!!! Mc. Donalds is the only large scale corporation in the world, arguably apart from Tesco that gives you exactly at what you want at a giveaway price, free fod with a coffee or coke. This applies from Kentish Town to the effing Star Ferry Terminal in Hong Kong. Only the government here makes it difficult for Mc. Donalds to sell even cheaper in the UK.
Your predator NS. socialist does not like them for being big and successful they also try and employ cretins if possible.
My family and other animals always eat at the maccas. Seriously though at least the chips will be good and clean at a reasonable price not making profits for some little grubby illegal immigrant.
First, boycott McDonalds. I will myself and mychildren willnever again visit a McDonalds anywhere. Up yours Ronald!
Second boycott all things LIMEY, no limey cars no tea and whatever, up yours Lizzy II.
Third, watch Big Band Theory instead of Olympics.
First, boycott McDonalds. I will myself and mychildren willnever again visit a McDonalds anywhere. Up yours Ronald!
Second boycott all things LIMEY, no limey cars no tea and whatever, up yours Lizzy II.
Third, watch Big Band Theory instead of Olympics.
patrick you little queer, ever come to England and i'll tear you a new ar*ehole. we don't have a car industry thanks to the fat greedy yanks. its all american companies ruining what should be a wonderful point in British history. suck a toenail covered turd from my the most rancid regions of my rectum you retard.
Are you really allowed to be so abusive on a the page of such a veritable organ as the NS? I am appalled by your use of language, your debasing of an ideological argument to an personal, and homophobic attack, and, furthermore, saddened by the fact that you seem to so anti-american yet at the same time use an "americanism" yourself in promising patrick that you are going to "tear him a new bumhole"; since when has this been common parlance in the uk?
I would suggest that you are yourself an odious little turd.
I totally second this opinion.
You have July the Fourth, your Independence Day. We have July the Fifth. Thank God For That Day.
Here's a hearty English DO ONE to you ungrateful yanks who wouldn't even be here without ancestors from around the globe, and especially those from a tiny little island across the Atlantic, that once owned half the world.
Our day will come again. NWO ftw.
Ooooh our day will come again... Come on let's not be a sour puss about this and give someone else a chance.
Talk about living in the past
This summer is really about Carlsberg vs. Heineken and Mars vs. Cadbury rather than athlete vs.athlete at Euro 2012 or the Olympics.
Its too late to do anything about the Olympics promoting poor health. Isn't it time we told the FA that is was bringing the game into disrepute by being sponsored by Mars and Carlberg.
(For my photostudy of how England and the last World Cup let themselves be used to flog unhealthy junk go to http://www.sexanddrugsandrockandhealth.com/page30.htm )
I hope someone violates it.
It's about time chips vs fries was tested in court
LOCOG, not LOGOC.
All this just serves to make me wonder why *anyone* would want to go to the Olympics, when instead we can watch all the events wearing whatever we want, eating/drinking whatever we want (and not feeling ripped off as a result), and have a much better 'experience'.
Or is this all part of Boris' plan to make people not want to go to the actual venue?
apple sues google for swiping its screen
intellectual property is stifling the scene.
the creative solution, when your chips are down,
is to send some sinister clown to london town
to monopolise the freedom fries
What. The. F**k?
Where does this leave vegetarians/vegans who do not eat fish??
To be honest, I'm surprised they're leaving chips on the menu at all....the only reason I can imagine is because it is so quintessentially British that they just couldn't block the sale of it and re-direct foreign fans to generic McD Freedom Fries ™.
What to expect from Olympic Bodies ? (Unhealthy) McDonald's sponsoring a sports event itself is such a paradox!! When they stood so firm in allowing Dow Chemicals, whose subsidiary Union Carbide is responsible one of THE Biggest Industrial mishap (may be only next to Chernobyl ), the gas leak in Bhopal, India, which kill thousand of people back in 1980, and as a after affect 100's still die today.
Olympic has nothing but become a Circus .
Never mind Dow's subsidiary (well, actually you're right, do mind, mind very much) killing and maiming thousands, it was the good people of Dow themselves that brought us such spirit lifting products as the ever popular Napalm. So I suppose they do have a history of encouraging athleticism: Running away as fast as you can.
This is Britain, isn't it? Or have we become another state of the good ol' U.S. of A.?
Let's do the full job and replace the Olympic symbol with the big M.
Pedant alert: It's LOCOG, not LOGOC.
didn't they mean " this will only LEAD us to removing fish and chips completely"?
Oh no! Now what am I supposed to put on my shoulder when I get there?
Hah - so much for the freedom and choice of the market!
Maybe it's time to re-defne what is a chip? It's a fresh potato cut into substantial lengths then deep fried. It is not extruded potato mash (and god knows what else), deep fried and coated in salt (and god knomws what else).
I haven't willingly eaten in McDonalds in years, or other places that adulterate their french fries, and this is just another reason to stay away.
But McDonalds don't even sell chips! Those pathetic limp rags of potato they serve with their burgers are listed on their menu as "fries"...
Just to the east of London there is a new state - Cocadonaldsville. So authoritarian is the regime within it that its rulers dictate exactly what can be eaten, drunk or worn within its boundaries. In the interests of human rights and peace the United Nation should take an active interventionist role in the overthrow of this illegitimate and harsh government. Would they not, at least, consider a 'no-fly' zone as a first step towards freeing the innocent victims of this heartless dictatorship?
Surely you mean 'no-fry' zone?
Yes, would have been better with you suggestion!
I tried the flied lice... it was rubbery.
Are they serving chips to the public at this point? The Olympics aren't for two weeks, yet this uses the present tense. My guess is that this is about catering for staff. Doesn't make it any better.
They should get in a load of whitebait and serve one sad, solitary little fish, free with every order of chips.
Luckily I shall be boycotting the olympics for the pointless waste of time it is and only eat chips twice a year anyway :) [and never McDonalds']
I advise every caterer at the Olympics to just call chips, chips. They need to be militant on this issue and fight the big boy McDonald’s.