A reporter's quest for rare 'Sonny cup' in Mexico
A limited edition Son Heung-min cup sits on a display shelf at a McDonald's store in Guadalajara, Mexico, Saturday. Korea Times photo by Park Joo-hee
In Mexico, commemorative cup featuring Korea captain Son Heung-min more popular than Beckham edition
Son Heung-min’s popularity has surpassed that of David Beckham, at least in the World Cup host city of Guadalajara, Mexico. The proof was not found in a poll or a marketing report, but on McDonald’s shelves. Among the collectible cups featuring some of football’s biggest names, the Korean national team captain’s edition was the one that kept selling out.
At 11 a.m. Saturday, I headed to a McDonald’s near where I was staying with one goal in mind. I wanted to secure a "Sonny cup." My motives were not exactly noble. I had heard that the Son edition had not been released in Korea, which made it seem worth collecting and reselling before I had even seen one.
I quickly did the math. If I could buy one in Mexico and resell it on secondhand marketplace app Karrot Market, it might help with household finances. As a father of two young children, I allowed myself to call it household budgeting.
The cup's absence in Korea appeared to stem from local advertising arrangements. Son is the commercial face of Domino’s Pizza in Korea, which likely made it difficult for McDonald’s, a rival food brand, to use his image in domestic marketing.
A poster featuring various football players for the McDonald's World Cup promotional meal in Guadalajara, Mexico, Saturday / Korea Times photo by Park Joo-hee
The lineup was impressive. Beckham, Ronaldinho, Thierry Henry and Lamine Yamal were part of a broader group of nine global stars, with seven versions available in Mexico. Seeing Son placed alongside some of football’s biggest legends made me feel a touch of national pride. It also gave me false confidence. Compared with those timeless icons, the Son edition would be surely easier to buy.
That assumption fell apart at the first burger shop. Every cup seemed available except Son’s. Even the edition for Mexico striker Santiago Gimenez sat in stock, but the Sonny cup had already sold out.
I opened Google Maps. Guadalajara had 18 McDonald’s branches. I called an Uber and traveled 8.8 kilometers to another store, and it was the same story. No Sonny cup.
A display case shows inventory of the collectible cup lineup at a McDonald's branch in Guadalajara, Mexico, Saturday, revealing that the Son Heung-min edition is completely sold out. Korea Times photo by Park Joo-hee
I checked the map again and found another branch 5 kilometers away. Since I was already moving by Uber, the extra distance felt manageable. For a moment, I wondered whether the company would reimburse this kind of trip. Could I expense a cup hunt? Then I thought again of my household budgeting and climbed into the car.
The third attempt also failed. Roads had been blocked for a pride parade that day, forcing me to walk nearly 30 minutes through rainy streets. That branch had no Son cup either. A 23-year-old employee named Alicia seemed to understand my disappointment.
“The Son Heung-min cup is the most popular,” she said, flashing a Korean finger-heart gesture as if to tell me to take pride in being Korean.
By then, stubbornness had taken over. I decided to try a larger store 7 kilometers away. I called another Uber, but crowds had gathered in a square to watch Brazil play, making the route nearly impossible by car. Before long, I got out and walked the rest of the way, pushing through the humid air toward yet another McDonald’s.
A poster shows a World Cup meal at a McDonald's store in Guadalajara, Mexico, Saturday / Korea Times photo by Park Joo-hee
When I entered, a boy was standing there with a Sonny cup in his hands, smiling brightly. A terrible thought hit me. What if he had taken the last one? I hurried to the counter and asked whether any remained. The wait while an employee checked the stock felt longer than the two hours I had once spent outside the U.S. Embassy trying to get a World Cup reporting visa.
At last, the employee returned with a kind smile and a Son Heung-min cup. I paid 229 pesos ($13.33). The meal came with a Big Mac, fries, a Coke and the cup. Relief quickly gave way to embarrassment. I felt ashamed of the suspicion I had directed at the boy moments earlier. To make up for it, if only to myself, I took a photo for Mateo, 10, before sitting down with my meal.
A step counting application displays the time and distance a reporter covered through the streets of Guadalajara, Mexico, during a citywide search for the Son Heung-min cup. Korea Times photo by Park Joo-hee
During lunch, I opened my step-counting app. In two hours, I had walked 9 kilometers. That was more than the distances Son and Lee Jae-sung covered against the Czech Republic — 7.3 kilometers each — and more than Lee Tae-seok’s 7.7 kilometers. Of course, they had run and I had walked. But for an ordinary person with no altitude training, 9 kilometers at 1,560 meters above sea level was enough to leave me spent.
After that exhausting search, the Son cup in my hands felt precious. Watching Mateo beam over his own cup, I abandoned the Karrot Market plan and decided to give mine to my son.
This article from the Hankook Ilbo, the sister publication of The Korea Times, is translated by a generative AI system and edited by The Korea Times.