By now you’ve probably heard of the viral drama surrounding something people are calling the RM460 burger.
If you haven’t, let me do my best to really, really sum up the story.
Basically, there are several players here, and a party.
There’s Mr Chia, a supposedly wealthy bachelor who ends up going to the birthday bash of a lady named Carmay whom he allegedly likes.
It’s hosted by a friend of Carmay’s named Liddy and held at Banyan Tree Kuala Lumpur. At the end of the party, the bill costs a whopping RM3,679.
The group agrees to split it evenly, with each person paying RM460. He’d only ordered a RM88 burger (Angus beef, if you must know) and a glass of water for himself.
But he pays his RM460 share anyway, and thinks it’s over.
However, there would be drama coming his way soon. You can read the full story here.
In a nutshell, netizens went bonkers over the fact that he even agreed to pay RM460 for what was a RM88 burger and plain water meal.
Now, multiple well-known brands in Malaysia turning the drama into a meme and leveraging on the RM460 burger for a piece of virality themselves.
As they’ve caught the eye of netizens and ours too, we’d say it worked.
1. Banyan Tree Kuala Lumpur
Yes, the venue of the birthday bash itself caught wind of the drama, and decided to take this opportunity to further market their RM88 Angus beef burger.
They were already partially the talk of the town thanks to Mr Chia, Carmay and Liddy, so why not?
2. Bata Malaysia
This brand is perhaps the most iconic shoe brand to me, as for almost all of my schooling years, I’d wear its white shoes and use its shoe whiteners (remember that chalky white liquid?).
While shoes and a burger are far from being the same thing, Bata Malaysia jumped on the trend anyway and got over 300 likes in about 4 hours.
Quite a jump from their usual <100 or 100+ likes on other posts. I’ve never considered Bata Malaysia to be a particularly trendy brand that adapts to memes, but I’ve been surprised by its marketing team this time.
If only it had put in a little more effort to actually modify the picture to adapt to the meme itself.
3. Big Bath
Big Bath, a one-stop kitchen and bathroom specialist store did pretty well in adapting this meme for its product.
I’d give the Photoshop job a solid A- as well, it could’ve looked much better but you could tell a level of effort was put into it.
Much like Bata Malaysia, a toilet and a burger aren’t two things I’d put together (unless you’d had a particularly bad burger), but it works.
I’d bet Mr Chia would have preferred to buy the RM288 toilet (a steal as its NP is RM950!) over paying RM460 for a RM88 burger any day. I would.
4. Care Condoms
They didn’t utilise their best copywriter, but still got their message across in a few words.
A pack of 3 condoms from Care Condoms would cost you RM11.90. For RM460, that’s about 38 packs of condoms, and 114 individual condoms.
Make your choice.
5. DurianManSS2
This popular durian stall in SS2 (pretty self-explanatory, I suppose) gave its customers 2 choices: buy 10 boxes of Musang King durian for RM460, or 1 box of Musang King durian for RM46.
The power of choice lies with the consumer. Unless you want a burger, of course, which you wouldn’t find here.
6. Golden Screen Cinemas
Perhaps one of the undisputed meme champion brands in Malaysia this year, GSC once again went viral, though this time not for anything “Hello. Cannot” related.
Now they’re dangling the opportunity to book an entire hall at a cost that’s not RM460, but lower, in front of our faces.
We’re not sure who would bite, seeing as the movie selection seems rather… unexciting, but then again, there are people out here with RM460 and more to spare, even in this economy.
If you book the hall and are wondering whether you can sit wherever you want then, here’s what GSC’s admin has to say:
7. KyoChon Malaysia
KyoChon, popular for its KFC (Korean fried chicken, not Kentuckian), didn’t put in much effort for their visuals, but they used another meme to capitalise on this meme.
Is this next-level? You decide.
8. Le Méridien Kuala Lumpur
Le Méridien’s contending with fellow hotel Banyan Tree, especially since they capitalised on the meme by marketing their own Angus beef burger at RM50, inclusive of a glass of Carlsberg draught.
Can someone review both Angus burgers and write up a comparison article for me? Thank you.
9. Llaollao Malaysia
I’m slightly irritated by the lack of a “to” somewhere in the in-picture caption, but I’ll let it pass because Llaollao Malaysia said nothing but the truth.
With RM460, you could feed at least 30 people froyo. That’s a whole family and more.
10. myBurgerLab
Whenever something goes viral, you can expect myBurgerLab to be one of the quickest to adapt it to their own advantage.
For this, they’ve decided to market their burgers via a “Birthday Offer”.
Not only are they enticing consumers to spend RM88 on 4 sets of burgers (buy 3, get 1 free), but it’s a smart way to get more users on their app as well, since the deal is only available there.
11. MyeongDong Topokki
RM22.90 for a burger, drink and fries ain’t a bad deal. However, it would’ve been better if it was a beef burger, and not chicken.
But I forgive them, if only for the clarification in the visual stating, “Price Included SST—Won’t Message For Extra Payment”.
12. Top Glove
For something rather fitting in this climate, Top Glove is requesting that Malaysians wear our cast polyethylene (CPE) disposable gloves as we eat expensive burgers.
In the name of sustainability, they’re also asking us to go vegetarian instead, and we’ll add on: don’t forget to recycle your gloves once you’re done!
13. VCR
VCR, an establishment popular for its specialty coffee, posted their own take on the meme as an Instastory.
They’re offering a 24-hour flash deal for their own burger, and I estimate that we safely have until tomorrow afternoon at least to catch it.
Not the cheapest burger at RM28 (excluding drinks), but still a steal when compared to the RM460 burger.
14. Viewnet Computer System Sdn Bhd
Viewnet grew from a single store in 1999 to a hyperstore providing Malaysians with a one-stop solution IT hub, and today it’s further grown into a brand that knows how to capitalise on memes.
Its marketing team took the opportunity to highlight an ASUS EX-B460 motherboard they’re selling, and slapped on a promo price of RM46.
With a pretty decent accompanying visual, it apparently worked, as commenters shared screenshots of them placing the product into their carts.
Based on some other comments, it seems like the product is now no longer available, and one could assume that it’s been sold out.
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At the end of the day, this meme has no doubt gotten many netizens giggling, and brands are just thriving off their own virality after adapting it.
However, I can’t help but feel sorry for Mr Chia.
Whose story is true? Who should we be siding with?
I don’t know this for sure, but I do know a tried and true method of not getting into drama over food bills: just go Dutch.
- You can read more viral stories we’ve covered here.
Featured Image Credit: Llaollao Malaysia / GSC
