What fantasy world was created for McDonald's advertising in the early 1970s?

McDonaldland was the fantasy world created for McDonald's advertising in the early 1970s.

The setting gave McDonald's a shared fictional backdrop for commercials, restaurant promotions, playgrounds, and merchandise. It included imaginative locations such as the Filet-O-Fish Lake and characters including Ronald McDonald, the Hamburglar, Grimace, Mayor McCheese, and Birdie.

McDonaldland was designed to make the restaurant brand especially appealing to children. Its characters were not merely isolated mascots; they belonged to an interconnected advertising world that made McDonald's products part of a continuing story.

The concept is sometimes confused with a children's television show, but McDonaldland was primarily an advertising and promotional universe. Several characters were introduced or revised over time, and the setting became less prominent in McDonald's marketing from the 1980s onward.