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Japan, McDonald’s is running short on French fries in January

The fast food chain will stop offering medium and large fries for a month from January 9

Lim Chee Wah
Written by
Lim Chee Wah
Editor-in-Chief, Time Out Tokyo
McDonald's, french fries
Photo: Mak/Unsplash
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[Update, January 7 2022] McDonald's French fries made a triumphant comeback in medium and large sizes for the New Year, but it seems their return will be short-lived. The fast food giant has announced another potato supply problem, meaning all stores across Japan will be limited to selling small-sized serves of chips from Sunday January 9. Currently, the company says the shortage will last for about a month, with no specific end date given.

The only piece of good news is that we've still got time before the rationing starts to grab one last big box of fries and just eat our feelings.

***

[December 22 2021] Would you like fries with that? You can have them – as long as it’s a small. According to a report by Bloomberg published on The Japan Times, McDonald’s Japan is running low on French fries. There’s been a disruption in one of the fast food brand’s main supply chains due to the pandemic as well as the flood at a Vancouver port.

As such, McDonald’s across Japan is forced to ration its fries by only selling them in small sizes. The medium- and large-sized fries will not be available from Friday December 24 until Thursday December 30. The company is working on getting the supply issue sorted before New Year’s Eve.

Let’s hope this doesn’t escalate into a full-blown French fry drought. We do like our fries after a few rounds of drinks over the weekend.

Luckily, we can still celebrate Christmas the Japanese way with buckets of KFC chicken.

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