In 1977, popular disc producer Michael Schechter Associates, produced a 216-piece disc set for the Burger Chef restaurant chain. They came in 9-disc team sets on a cardboard fun meal tray.
The disks were unnumbered and were only licensed by the Players Association so they had to have logos airbrushed out. That means everyone got either a solid black or white hat.
This Nolan Ryan would be my favorite from the Angels team set.
This Ryan card is the most valuable in the whole 216-piece set, making the complete Angels tray the most valuable of the team sets. Gotta go find me the complete Angels tray now.
The backs of the disks featured different Burger Chef characters.
And some pretty goofy ones at that. I'm unfamiliar with Burger Chef so I have no idea if these guys were from a TV cartoon or strictly characters for the fast food chain.
Since the others are all just too weird for me (maybe that's my age talking) I'd have to give Jeff the nod as my favorite character of the group (kinda looks like my brother Jeff as well). Works out great too that Jeff is on the back of Joe Rudi's card. Growing up a buddy and I wanted to be Joe Rudi so we'd often practice his diving catches out on the front lawn. Lots of fun.
Here's an example from my collection of a tray that these discs came on. This Red Sox tray is folded up, but the tray would unfold to create a little baseball diamond game with a stadium backdrop. There are 9 cards to a team set, so the other 4 cards are on the other side of the box. The cards are perforated so that they could be punched out. Oh and look, 4 more goofy characters that served as game pieces.
WE had some Burger Chef stores here in MD (DC area). The characters were strictly for the chain's promo like the Characters from McDonalds. They were used in the TV commercials for the chain and on most of the kids stuff. The Burger Chef "Fun Meal" was their equivalent to the Mickey D's "Happy Meal" except I think the Fun Meal came first. Back in the day I had gotten a few of these and fortunately saved the discs, unfortunately I didn't save the Fun Meal boxes as I was a kid at the time and used the boxes to play the game like you were supposed to. A few years ago I got an Orioles complete funmeal box from Ebay I forget how much but it was cheaper than they usually are because I refuse to pay too much for anything including these things which some sellers start at over $20 to begin with no matter what team. Some sellers even start the complete trays at $100 or more typical ridiculous over pricing.
ReplyDeleteI picked up the A's and Yankees trays a few months ago at the flea market for a couple of bucks each. I've seen him a couple of times and each time he has less and less, so other collectors out there are buying them up. Unfortunately when I went back, I looked for a few trays (Angels, Phillies, and Tigers) but he didn't have any of those left.
ReplyDeleteI have a handful of them , and looking for info or offers.
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