SW & ESB "Everybody Wins" Cards (Burger King/Coca-Cola, 1980)

Burger King had two promotions for THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK.  The first ran for a month and a half that summer, and was called the "Everybody Wins Game," because you received a scratch-off card with purchase, and, as the name implied, you would win something.  The most common prize was the best one, in the long run:  a strip of Star Wars trading cards!

A set of 36 cards was made, in strips of 3 cards, which were perforated.  Six strips featured images from Star Wars, and six featured the new film, which added up to 18 cards from each movie.  Ironically, the game-piece card is probably the "rarest" card associated with the set, because over 21 million strips of trading cards were given out, but lots of people didn't think to keep the game piece, which was the size of a trading card, and featured art of an X-Wing.  It was also the entry blank for mailing in your entry, so many probably were used for that purpose as well.

As you can see above, the backs of the cards were generic, and unnumbered.  The only change between cards was the logo, showing you which film the card was from, as if you needed to know.

Here are the twelve strips of trading cards.  I had a pile of these as a kid, but was lucky enough to acquire an intact set from a dealer many years ago:

Hershey's Empire Strikes Back Card Set (Hershey Foods, 1980)

Boba Fett (Reese's Peanut Butter Cups)

To promote THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK in 1980, you could get a free, one-sided, 4x6" trading card on the bottom of the cardboard holder from 6-packs of Hershey's candy bars.  There were five in the set, and they were broken up over different products, including Krackle, Hershey's with Almonds, Rolo, Mr. Goodbar, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, and also Crunchy Reese's (which I think they don't make anymore?).

You can tell that the two cards on Orange cardboard were from the two Reese's varieties, and I've tried to point out where the others were from, below.  It looks like that some cards were available on two different candy bars.

C-3PO and R2-D2 (regular Hershey's)

Chewbacca (Hershey's with Almonds; I don't think they use this color scheme any longer for this candy bar)

Darth Vader (Crunchy Reese's, but also available on Mr. Goodbar, with Yellow backing, and Whatchamacalit with White backing)

Luke On A Tauntaun (Rolo, but also available on Krackle, with Red backing)

I wish more food companies would do things like this today.  It's a simple and low-cost way to promote a product, and it always works on customers like me!

Star Wars Big "G" Cereals Premium Card Set (American Premium Corp., 1977) Part Two

Continuing from where we left off Friday, here is the second half of the Big "G" card set:

And finally, here is the wallet that you had to mail away for.  It unfolds so that you can view all of the cards:

Star Wars Big "G" Cereals Premium Card Set (American Premium Corp., 1977) Part One

This set, about twice the size of a regular trading card, was printed on thick glossy paper, rather than cardstock.  As you can see from the card backs, they were available in Cocoa Puffs, Crazy Cow (remember that?), Frankenberry, Boo-Berry, and Count Chocula. There are 18 in all, plus a special mail-away wallet that we will see in Part Two.  Here are cards 1-9: