Fries with that
TIM DAVIES: … it's national fry-day. F-R-Y get it?
SARAH ABO: Ahhh, very good, very good …
- Today, Nine Network, 11 July 2025
Yes, television's most seasoned news professionals turning a forensic eye to the real dilemma facing Australians—where to for hot chips?
SARAH ABO: Those Guzman ones are the best …
- Today, Nine Network, 11 July 2025
Karl though, ever the company man, knew right from the start on which side Today was buttered.
Or is that battered?
SARAH ABO: … Trust me I know my chips. I know my fries.
KARL STEFANOVIC: But do you know how big a sponsor McDonald's is of our show?
- Today, Nine Network, 11 July 2025
And there was something of a theme during Karl's blind taste test, see if you can pick it?
KARL STEFANOVIC: It's a bigger chip, um, so it's not McDonald's …
KARL STEFANOVIC: McDonald's …
SARAH ABO: I bet he'll say McDonald's for this one as well …
TIM DAVIES: There you go, yeah it's great, there you go …
KARL STEFANOVIC: … no, that's McDonald's.
- Today, Nine Network, 11 July 2025
Karl Stefanovic, wasted on the small screen.
And don't fret, his hungry crew weren't overlooked either with salt and sugar and fat for all.
In the biz, they call this colour and movement.
And for better or worse the red and canary yellow is something of a perennial on Today, because just a week earlier:
JAYNE AZZOPARDI: Dicky! Busted!
KARL STEFANOVIC: … we do have a bit of Macca's in front of us right now, which is very distracting …
- Today, Nine Network, 3 July 2025
Karl Stefanovic and Jayne Azzopardi could barely rouse themselves from the joy of the moment to conduct the very serious business of television news, crossing live to none other than the new boss of McDonald's whose company had just lost a landmark industrial relations ruling:
JOE CHICZEWSKI: … we'll reflect on that and make some reactions and decisions shortly.
KARL STEFANOVIC: When will you do that?
JOE CHICZEWSKI: Um you know, over the coming weeks …
- Today, Nine Network, 3 July 2025
Golden arches on his lapel the chief executive was then offered a chance to wax lyrical on a menu price freeze before deftly batting away a question from Jayne on whether healthy items might see a price drop too.
Then with that out of the way, it was on to the business at hand:
KARL STEFANOVIC: … for me, I'm just going the regular, the Big Mac, and I put the fries in the middle of it …
JOE CHICZEWSKI: … I'm the same way, Karl …
KARL STEFANOVIC: I'm with you, brother …
JOE CHICZEWSKI: I recommend trying the new McWings, they're fantastic.
KARL STEFANOVIC: Ah, I love 'em!
JAYNE AZZOPARDI: You know, I saw an ad for that, McDonald's doing chicken wings.
KARL STEFANOVIC: You know what, McDonald's does it better than the Dirty Bird.
- Today, Nine Network, 3 July 2025
In 2020, Media Watch pulled up Nine's breakfast news show for eerily similar programming:
ALLISON LANGDON: I've organised a little bit of a peace offering for you guys …
ALLISON LANGDON: It's as easy as that I tell you.
KARL STEFANOVIC: I'm getting emotional …
KARL STEFANOVIC: I gotta tell ya, this is the best burger I've ever had. That is a great burger.
- Today, Nine Network, 14 October 2020
The Australian Communications and Media Authority subsequently found Nine had breached the Commercial Television Industry Code of Practice for failing to tell its viewers that it had disguised as genuine editorial what was of course a paid-up ad.
Last week, we asked Nine whether Today or anyone on the show had any kind of commercial arrangement with McDonald's at the time these recent segments went to air.
A spokesperson told us:
There is no commercial arrangement between the Today show, its hosts and McDonald's, and McDonald's is not a sponsor of the program. Nine takes its compliance obligations very seriously, and there is no breach of the Code of Practice.
- Email, Nine Spokesperson, 14 July 2025
Which means of course Today has been happily subsidising the marketing budget of one of the world's largest fast-food chains for months and months:
KARL STEFANOVIC: Do you mean a McDonald's cheeseburger? Because they're wonderful …
SARAH ABO: … and some nuggets please …
DANIKA MASON: … a little hashbrown in the morning …
- Today Nine Network 1 July 2025
KARL STEFANOVIC: That'll go well with my Macca's run, arriving in about five minutes …
- Today, Nine Network, 14 April 2025
JAYNE AZZOPARDI: … good morning, and congratulations on this big achievement.
- Today, Nine Network, 9 April 2025
SARAH ABO: Talk me through this new Happy Meal collaboration with the AFL, it's my favourite meal by the way.
- Today, Nine Network, 26 February 2025
Even piling up the Big Macs on-set when the segment is about another burger altogether.
Last week, I sent a few of these clips to Today's inaugural host Steve Liebmann, who fronted the program for almost 20 years, and asked him what he thought:
How times have changed!
- Text message, Steve Liebmann, Former Today Host, 11 July 2025
Indeed.
Because these days what are viewers to make of Karl's jokey declaration of a McDonald's sponsorship but Nine's insistence it receives not a nickel in return for Today's routine and generous treatment of the junk food brand?
It's hard to judge what's worse, actually integrating ads into your editorial programming and being caught out by the regulator, or failing to realise you may as well cash-in on what looks to the rest of us like promos galore.
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