Save the McDonald's Pokémon Cards Coming Nov. 10 for the Kids

The McDonald's Pokémon Happy Meal promotion starts in the U.S. on Tuesday, Nov. 10 and runs through Dec. 14, PokeBeach reported Tuesday after talking to multiple stores. Canada gets it a week earlier on Nov. 3, while Australia starts Nov. 5. Neither McDonald's nor The Pokémon Company has announced it yet.

Each Happy Meal comes with one of 15 Pokémon toys shaped like a mini Happy Meal box, plus two random cards from a 15-card set. The back of the toy works as a frame for a card. The cards are reprints with McDonald's numbering, including Metagross from Temporal Forces, Palafin from Obsidian Flames, and Hawlucha from Scarlet & Violet.

When McDonald's ran its 25th anniversary Pokémon promotion in February 2021, resellers bought Happy Meals in bulk and one eBay listing offered four packs for $900 plus $30 shipping. Cases of 150 packs went up for more than $1,000. McDonald's ended up asking restaurants to set a reasonable limit on Happy Meals per customer because it wanted "to offer the full Happy Meal experience to as many families as possible."

Five years later, a PSA 10 of that set's holo Pikachu sold for $349 on eBay this month. These cards are for kids to rip at the kitchen table, even though I know plenty of grown adults will be waiting in line on Nov. 10. If you're too old for a Happy Meal, you're too old to be scalping McDonald's Pokémon cards.