• by Tanya Gazdik , March 4, 2026

McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski’s taste-testing one of the fast food giant's new burgers has gone viral and is getting roasted by competitors. 

The hilarity started when Kempczinski posted a video of himself last month eating the new Big Arch burger on social media.

"That’s a big bite for a big arch!” Kempczinski said, holding up the burger with a small bite mark.

“The video went viral for the apparent discrepancy,” according to NBC News. “Social media users also started questioning if Kempczinski finished the burger for lunch as he said he would in the video.”

“What was a seemingly mundane and playful video and a look into what the CEO does in his free time became a massive internet meme, with social media users mocking Kempczinski and claiming he doesn’t look like he’s actually enjoying it,” according to Fortune. “People said it felt inauthentic because he referred to the burger as a ‘product.’”

Competitors also got in on the action.

“Chains including Burger King, Wendy’s and A&W Restaurants in recent days trotted out executives to Instagram their own burger binges,” according to AdAge. “For rivals, the posts offer a chance to insert themselves into a viral moment—and siphon off some of the attention McDonald’s had stumbled into for the Big Arch.”

Even non-food brands had some fun at Kempczinski’s expense, including Aldi, Sixt and Mini USA. 

“Gonna start test driving our cars 1 metre at a time,’” Mini commented, which has been liked more than 105,000 times. 

In the end, it might be Kempczinski and McDonald’s laughing all the way to the bank.

“The original clip of Chris Kempczinski tasting the Big Arch has already been viewed more than 4.5 million times, with parody videos and commentary pushing the wider trend well into the tens of millions,” according to Forbes. “A product that might otherwise have slipped quietly onto the menu has suddenly become a point of cultural conversation, debated not only for its flavor and size but even, somewhat obsessively, for the mathematics of a single bite. From a marketing perspective, that level of attention is not easily engineered.”