What Happened To McDonald's Uncle O'Grimacey?

Each February and March is "Shamrock Season" at McDonald's. That's when the mega-chain rolls out one of its few and likely most famous temporary annual offerings: the Shamrock Shake, an extremely sweet, vanilla-and-mint flavored — and notably brightly green-colored — drinkable dessert. Introduced by a franchisee in 1967 and only made nationally available since 2012, the Shamrock Shake is a St.

Patrick's Day-adjacent tradition for McDonald's. Back in 1975, McDonald's added a character to its kid-targeted McDonaldland pantheon to promote and create an origin story for the Shamrock Shake. It was all thanks to Uncle O'Grimacey, relative of regular-shake-loving character Grimace, who appeared once a year around the Ireland-honoring holiday bearing his magical and minty concoction for all McDonald's customers, kids and adults.



Uncle O'Grimacey disappeared entirely for nearly 40 years, only for McDonald's to revive the character for a chain-wide charitable drive, marketing blitz, and Shamrock Shake awareness campaign. Here's a look at the origins, rise, and resurgence of the mysterious Uncle O'Grimacey. Uncle O'Grimacey is a relic of another time In 1971, McDonald's and its advertising agency unveiled McDonaldland, a fantastical, whimsical land full of fast food treats and populated by child-friendly characters that served as the setting for decades' worth of TV commercials.

Built around existing advertising mascot and burger-loving clown Ronald McDonald, McDonaldland's denizens were usually associated with particular McDonald's menu items for marketing purposes. For example: Birdie the Early Bird not-so-subtly pitched breakfast foods, Officer Big Mac was a police officer with a Big Mac for a Head, and Grimace couldn't get enough milkshakes. Into this world arrived Uncle O'Grimacey, and fairly early in the McDonaldland era, too.

After the first Shamrock Shakes were sold in 1967, the character showed up in commercials in 1975, specifically connected to the annual menu addition. Because Grimace was already linked with shakes, and because the Shamrock Shake was so associated with St. Patrick's Day, the decision was made to create an Irish relative of the pre-existing mascot.

He was once extremely Irish In the 1970s, McDonald's dipped its proverbial toe into some advertising and marketing ideas that in retrospect, might have been suspect if not more than a little offensive. Stereotyping characters according to their race or culture is just not done in the 2020s, particularly in advertising. Fifty years ago, however, McDonald's tried to sell a couple of products by connecting them to Irish-coded mascots.

McDonald's pushed its Filet-O-Fish sandwich as an option to Catholics observing the meat-restricting period of Lent. Ireland is historically Catholic and in 1976, McDonald's briefly marketed its fish sandwich with a cartoon character with an Irish sounding name, Phil A. O'Fish.

That character's momentary usage followed the 1975 debut of Uncle O'Grimacey, an explicitly and stereotypical Irish entity. Covered in green fur like the Emerald Isle, or the Shamrock Shake he was tasked with promoting, he was outfitted in Irish signifiers like a wide-brimmed green hat and a vest decorated with shamrocks, and he carried a walking stick called a shillelagh. In TV commercials, Uncle O'Grimacey spoke with a distinctively Irish brogue.

Uncle O'Grimacey was presented as so exceedingly Irish that after the character was phased out in the 1980s, it led to an urban legend that McDonald's had gotten rid of the character because the actor who portrayed the mascot had publicly made comments in support of the revolutionary group the Irish Republican Army. Uncle O'Grimacey is from a big family of Grimaces Uncle O'Grimacey wasn't just an expansion of the universe of McDonaldland characters — he represented the first time that McDonald's customers and TV commercial viewers learned about the original figure Grimace's expansive and curious family. His first appearance came in a 1975 TV commercial for the green-colored Shamrock Shake, which within the realm of McDonaldland, is made possible by the inherent magic of Uncle O'Grimacey, who can turn anything and everything green.

He's assuredly friendly and a friend of Ronald McDonald, just like Grimace, who was once a shake-stealing villain named Evil Grimace. The public acceptance of Uncle O'Grimacey and his annual appearances in the lead-up to St. Patrick's Day, Shamrock Shakes in tow, led to the introduction of more Grimace relatives.

In the home video "The Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald," it's established that Grimace's parents are named Grimabeth and Louie, his grandma is Winky, and he's the brother of Gonga, king of all Grimaces. In a '90s TV ad, Grimace interacts with his aunts Millie and Tillie. It's not clear where Uncle O'Grimacey falls in the Grimace family tree or the royal line of succession.

Uncle O'Grimacey returned in 2025 The were disused almost entirely by the early 21st century, but in the 2020s, bringing back characters like the Hamburglar and Grimace to play on nostalgia and market particular products. The purple-colored in 2023, and so in 2025, when on the chain as it does every year, Uncle O'Grimacey made his return to seasonal prominence. McDonald's only used the character in its annual Shamrock Shake promotional blitz for about 10 years, from the mid-1970s until the mid-1980s, but he's back in a big way after more than three decades away.

McDonald's worked up some lore to explain the character revival. Evidently, Grimace recently came across the original, cherished family recipe for the Shamrock Shake, and it prompted him to get back in touch with Uncle O'Grimacey, with whom he'd grown estranged. That all drove Uncle O'Grimacey to depart his home in Sham Rock, Ireland, and head to the U.

S. to promote his cherished Shamrock Shake for a good cause — the McDonald's-created charity the Ronald McDonald House, celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2025. During this Shamrock Season, 25 cents from all Shamrock Shakes sold will be donated to Ronald McDonald House Charities.

Not only is Uncle O'Grimacey appearing in ads and press materials, but he's touring, with an actor in the rebooted and simplified costume showing up at McDonald's locations around the country. Recommended.