MrBeast Sued for $100 Million by Company Behind His Virtual Burger Restaurant Chain

Elizabeth Wagmeister, reporting for Variety:

The biggest YouTube star in the world — Jimmy Donaldson, aka MrBeast — is being sued by Virtual Dining Concepts, the ghost kitchen company that operates his virtual restaurant chain, MrBeast Burger. [...]

In Donaldson’s original lawsuit against VDC, he blamed the company for poor food quality and said that the majority of MrBeast Burger virtual restaurants have negative culinary reviews from fans who are “deeply disappointed by the fact that MrBeast would put his name on this product.” The lawsuit said that VDC “has caused material, irreparable harm to the MrBeast brand and MrBeast’s reputation,” and claimed that while the business has made millions of dollars, he has “not received a dime.” In response, last week, VDC asserted that the YouTube star’s brand grew “exponentially” in part “because of the MrBeast Burger brand itself.”

The argument that Donaldson’s brand grew because of the burger brand seems specious. But perhaps I’m out of touch with the latest trends in fast food — I’d never heard of MrBeast Burger until recently, but it turns out they have “ghost kitchens” all over the place, including here in Philadelphia.

★ Wednesday, 9 August 2023