20 May is the country’s “I Love You” Day created by Chinese internet culture due to “520” sounding like “wo ai ni” (我爱你) in certain dialects. This is an additional day on China’s calendar for couples, falling between the widely known Valentine’s Day and the “Chinese Valentine’s Day”, or Qixi (七夕). KFC, long recognised for its innovative marketing that resonates with the internet, especially meme culture in China, of course, leveraged the special occasion this 520.
For the “I Love You” Day 2025, KFC launched a “Crazy 520 Confession Meal” (疯狂520告白套餐). It may sound like something related to a police interrogation or a Catholic confessional, but “告白” (gaobai, lit. to confession) here means to “Confess” or “profess” your love for someone. The meal includes KFC’s iconic Original Chicken and Pastel de Nata custard tart pastry. More importantly, the 45 RMB (6.24 USD) meal includes a set of two “couple rings” made in the image of a fry and a burger.
The pair of rings comes in a bucket-shaped box that plays KFC’s “Crazy Thursday” sales events theme tune. The box can also project one of the two taglines for this year’s 520 campaign, which are of course, a punny play on words in Chinese. One is “只想‘堡’护你” (just want to protect you, with 保 from 保护, protection, changed to 堡 from 汉堡, hamburger, both pronounced bao). The other is “你‘薯’我的‘堡’” (you’re my precious, with 是 shi, is, replaced by 薯 shu, potato, and 宝 bao, precious, swapped for 堡 bao of burger again).
Once again, KFC has tapped into the “crazy” mood around its marketing and created something romantic. With“KFC toy” (#肯德基玩具#) at number 42 on Weibo’s Hot Search list with 150 million accumulated views, the meme-tic internet culture remains one of the most effective ways to reach younger consumers in China.