Walk through any grocery store and you’ll find thousands of products vying for your attention. Yet somewhere in the darkest corners of the internet, collectors are paying hundreds or even thousands of dollars for items that haven’t graced store shelves in decades. These aren’t vintage toys or rare collectibles in the traditional sense. These are expired snacks, discontinued sodas, and forgotten fast-food memorabilia that have transformed into digital gold mines on eBay.
McDonald’s Szechuan Sauce – The Holy Grail Worth Thousands
Perhaps no discontinued fast-food item has captured the internet’s imagination quite like McDonald’s Szechuan sauce. If you happen to have a pack of McDonald’s Szechuan Sauce from the restaurant’s 1998 promotion of the Disney movie “Mulan,” you could be looking at a five-figure payday. Reports indicate that packets of the sauce have sold on eBay for thousands of dollars. The sauce became legendary after appearing prominently in the animated series Rick and Morty, which sparked an obsessive fanbase demanding its return.
Some winners of the rare sauce have reportedly sold bottles on eBay for significant sums. The astronomical prices reflect more than just scarcity. They represent a cultural moment where nostalgia, pop culture, and collector psychology collided into a perfect storm of consumer demand.
Crystal Pepsi – The Clear Cola That Refuses to Die
Crystal Pepsi fans can find both full containers and empty cans on eBay, with prices commensurate to their contents. One seller is looking for $500 for three unopened 2-liter bottles of the soda, which was a caffeine-free soda PepsiCo sold in the early 1990s. Despite a flashy marketing campaign that included a Super Bowl ad, the soda fizzled, leading Pepsi to squash the drink after less than a year on the market.
This is one of the strange things that came out of the 90s snack and junk food reality and people sometimes sell this clear version of Pepsi on eBay for rather ridiculous amounts of money. The clear cola represented the 1990s obsession with transparency and purity, though it ultimately confused consumers who couldn’t reconcile the familiar taste with the unfamiliar appearance.
Lunchly Snacks – From Controversy to Collectible
Sometimes controversy creates value faster than nostalgia ever could. They have been discontinued and are extremely hard to find. They are being sold as a collectible and I would not recommend consuming them. The three varieties of Lunchly snacks – Fiesta Nachos, “The Pizza,” and Turkey Stack ‘Ems – became instant collectibles after their brief and controversial run in the market.
What makes these items particularly fascinating is how quickly they transitioned from failed products to coveted collectibles. Unlike other discontinued items that gained value over decades, Lunchly achieved collectible status almost immediately after discontinuation, suggesting that modern internet culture can accelerate the nostalgia cycle dramatically.
Vintage Fast-Food Matchbooks – The Unexpected Goldmine
Dedicated collectors, known as phillumenists, sometimes pay a high price to build their matchbook collections. In fact, matchbooks from fast food restaurants can be particularly collectible in the 2020s. These small promotional items from the era when smoking was commonplace have become surprisingly valuable artifacts of fast-food history.
A KFC “Colonel Sanders” matchbook comes in several renditions and tends to command a wide range of prices based on various factors (like whether or not the matches have been struck). The price of a single matchbook often falls between $3 and $14, though older KFC matches (or those with unique or unusual packaging) might go for $100 or more. The appeal lies not just in rarity but in their representation of a bygone era of restaurant culture.
McJordan Barbecue Sauce – The Celebrity Collaboration That Paid Off
According to CBS News, one man became nearly $10,000 richer in 2012 after selling a rare, discontinued condiment on eBay from a saucy, pre-Y2K collab between McDonald’s and NBA superstar Michael Jordan. The 20-year-old sauce was from when the basketball player teamed up with Mickey D’s for the short-lived McJordan Special, which was sold at more than 800 restaurants in Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina, and South Carolina, and the Chicago area from 1991 to 1992.
Bank told ESPN that he initially posted the sauce as an auction item with a minimum bid of $10,000, though nobody ever met his price. However, with the help of the “Buy It Now” button and a few viral news stories, he eventually secured an offer of $9,995. “If I had known it was going to be red hot on the internet, I might have done it differently, but $10,000 for barbecue sauce is pretty good,” the seller said.
Pop-Tarts Frosted Hot Fudge Sundae – The Breakfast Collectible
Some discontinued items achieve collectible status simply by being remembered as especially delicious. If you love snacks, your old Frosted Hot Fudge Sundae Pop Tarts are selling for more than $100 per pack. These particular Pop-Tarts flavor represented peak 1990s breakfast innovation before disappearing into the vault of discontinued Kellogg’s flavors.
The high prices for expired pastries might seem absurd, but they reflect the power of taste memory. For many collectors, these aren’t just snacks but edible time machines that promise to transport them back to childhood mornings, even if the actual consumption isn’t recommended.
Altoids Sour Varieties – The Tin That Became Treasure
A 24-pack of Cinnamon Tic Tacs is listed at $145, or if Altoids are more your thing, a tin of beloved Mango Sours is selling for $55. The discontinuation of various Altoids flavors, particularly the sour varieties, created an immediate scarcity that collectors eagerly exploit. Unlike other items that gained value over time, Altoids achieved collectible status relatively quickly after disappearance.
The compact tins themselves have become part of the appeal, serving as both packaging and display piece for collectors who treat them like miniature time capsules from a more flavorful era of mint innovation.
Surge Soda – The Mountain Dew Alternative That Never Caught On
One of the most coveted discontinued drinks ever, Surge, was pulled from shelves in 2003 – but online, one person is offering 12 cans for the outrageous price of $89.99. Coca-Cola’s attempt to compete with Mountain Dew in the extreme sports market failed to gain lasting traction, but its brief existence created a dedicated fanbase that refuses to let it die.
Surge represents the late 1990s and early 2000s marketing approach that equated fizzy citrus drinks with extreme lifestyle choices. While the marketing failed, the actual product developed enough of a following to sustain a secondary market decades after its removal from store shelves.
Twinkies During the Hostess Crisis – Panic Buying Gone Wild
That was evident just a few years ago, when Twinkies became the focus of junk-food nuts and hoarders after Hostess said it would shut down its operations. While some consumers may have been buying up the snack cakes for their own pleasure, others started hawking them on eBay at considerably marked-up prices. While that run was short-lived, given that Twinkies were back in production after an eight-month hiatus, other discontinued snack foods go on enjoying a long afterlife, thanks to the Internet.
Perhaps one of the most famous examples of beloved eats selling for sky-high prices is, of course, Twinkies. When Hostess went out of business in November of 2012, people were terrified they would never be able to satisfy their Twinkie fix again. Some boxes reportedly reached extremely high prices on online auctions during the panic buying period. Though Twinkies eventually returned, this episode demonstrated how quickly perceived scarcity can drive collectors into a frenzy.
The world of discontinued fast-food collecting reveals something profound about human psychology and our relationship with food memories. These items transcend their original purpose as mere sustenance to become cultural artifacts, emotional triggers, and investment opportunities rolled into one expired package. Whether driven by nostalgia, curiosity, or the thrill of owning something impossibly rare, collectors continue to fuel this bizarre marketplace where a sauce packet can cost more than a car payment.
What fascinates you most about this underground economy of expired edibles? Have you ever been tempted to bid on your own childhood favorites?
