McDonald's executive reveals how the brand handled the 'absurd' Grimace shake trend

The internet's obsession with McDonald's Grimace shake continues – and now an executive has spoken out about the TikTok trend.

For those who still don't understand what's going on but have seen the phrase everywhere, McDonald's dropped a new limited-edition purple milkshake to celebrate the 52nd birthday of the famous character's birthday.

TikTok users were immediately hooked on the drink before turning it into a bizarre trend. It sees people creating content showing them drinking the shake and pretending to be poisoned to death with a decorative crime scene around them.

While the trend is bizarre, the hashtag #grimaceshake has racked up a staggering 142 million views on the platform and continues to grow.

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Now, McDonald's marketing director Guillaume Huin has stepped into the chat, crediting the original TikTok creator Austin Frazier for his upload.

In a Linkedin post, Huin said the company were initially not going to speak about the trend, but after "hours of watching, reading the comments, trying to learn and genuinely understand helped us see what this was about," he saw the "brilliant creativity, unfiltered fun, peak absurdist gen z humor, just the way a new generation of creators and consumers play with brands."

He said that some of the content had even left him "smile silently in admiration and wonder."

Huin then shared how behind the scenes, the team "discussed what was the right thing to do about the trend."

He continued, "saying nothing felt disconnected, encouraging it felt self-serving, so we just decided to show our fans that we see them and their creativity in a sweet, candid and genuine way, as grimace would."

The Grimace shake will be available to buy in the US until 29 July.

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