50 Fun Facts About Heinz

Heinz's 57 Varieties slogan was inspired by a New York advert boasting 21 styles of which product?

Shoes were the unlikely spark: Henry Heinz spotted the sign from an elevated train and borrowed the idea, even though his company already sold more than 60 products.

Which fast-food chain dropped Heinz in 2013 after a former Burger King chief took charge of Heinz?

McDonald's ended a 40-year relationship months after Heinz's new owners installed Bernardo Hees, who had been running its arch-rival, as chief executive.

Henry J. Heinz's father came from Kallstadt, a German village also home to which US president's ancestors?

Donald Trump's grandfather Frederick left the same village, and the two families are related: the Heinz founder's grandmother was born a Trump.

Which NFL team's touchdowns were once marked by giant Heinz ketchup bottles tipping on the scoreboard?

The Steelers played at Heinz Field from 2001, and Heinz agreed to pay $57 million for the name, a figure chosen to echo its famous slogan.

Which British singer-songwriter teamed up with Heinz in 2019 for a limited-edition ketchup renamed in his honour?

Ed Sheeran's bottle, nicknamed Edchup, went on sale on June 5, the date marked as National Ketchup Day.

Which frozen potato snack did Ore-Ida, a brand Heinz bought in 1965, invent to use up scraps from making fries?

Tater Tots began in 1953 as a way to use potato slivers that would otherwise be thrown away: Ore-Ida's founders chopped them, added flour and seasoning, and pushed the mash through holes.

A Heinz 57, in a playful nod to the 57 Varieties slogan, is a nickname for which pet of mixed ancestry?

A mixed-breed dog of uncertain ancestry gets the nickname, sometimes shortened to Heinz hound, because it seems to contain dozens of varieties at once.

Heinz Tomato Ketchup first went on sale in 1876 under which alternative spelling of its name?

Catsup was the word on Heinz's first bottles in 1876. The company later switched to the ketchup spelling, which is now the dominant term in North America and the UK.

Henry J. Heinz started out in 1869 by bottling which sharp-tasting product, years before he sold ketchup?

Horseradish came first, and in 1896 it was also the first product promoted under the 57 Varieties slogan.

Which American food giant merged with Heinz in 2015 in a deal arranged by Berkshire Hathaway and 3G Capital?

Kraft joined Heinz in July 2015, creating what was then described as the world's fifth-largest food and beverage company.

HP Sauce, the British brown sauce Heinz bought in 2005, takes its initials from which London landmark?

Houses of Parliament gave the sauce its name after its inventor, Frederick Garton, heard a rumour that a restaurant there was serving it. He later sold the name and recipe for £150.

Teresa Heinz, widow of a Heinz family heir, married which future US Secretary of State in 1995?

John Kerry first met her at an Earth Day rally in 1990. After they married in Nantucket she went on using the name Teresa Heinz.

Long before Heinz bottled the tomato kind, traditional British ketchup was made mainly from which ingredient?

Mushrooms were the base of early British ketchup, and other old recipes called for oysters, mussels or walnuts rather than tomatoes.

An alleged 2012 scheme to fake Simply Heinz ketchup came to light when the abandoned bottles did what?

They exploded, apparently because the repackaged ketchup had begun to ferment after the site was left unattended.

Heinz's Dip & Squeeze ketchup packet, announced in 2010, was designed to be easier to use in which setting?

Inside a car was the test: a Heinz vice president bought a used minivan to try the packets at drive-up windows, while developers watched diners through one-way mirrors.

Heinz made ketchup for over a century in Leamington, a town nicknamed the Tomato Capital of which country?

Canada's Leamington, in Ontario, had a Heinz plant from 1908 until 2014. Heinz was the town's largest employer when it left, and a new owner, Highbury Canco, took over tomato processing at the site.

Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce, now a Heinz brand, was first made in 1837 by two men of which profession?

Chemists John Wheeley Lea and William Henry Perrins sold it from Broad Street in Worcester, and the sauce was being imported to the United States as early as 1839.

Heinz owned which diet company from 1978 to 1999, launching Smart Ones frozen meals under its banner?

Weight Watchers cost Heinz $72 million in 1978. When it sold the business in 1999, it kept a licence to use the name on food products.

Which canned tuna brand, known for its cartoon mascot Charlie, belonged to Heinz from 1963 until 2002?

StarKist came to Heinz in 1963, two years after Charlie the Tuna first appeared, and was later sold to Del Monte together with the pet food division.

What shape is the classic Heinz ketchup glass bottle, patented in 1890 and considered an icon of package design?

Octagonal glass bottles first carried Heinz ketchup in 1889, and the restaurant version holds about 14 ounces.

Heinz gave away its first pickle pins to lure visitors to an out-of-the-way upstairs booth at which event?

Chicago World's Fair crowds took home about a million of the pins in 1893, and Heinz has produced more than 100 million of them since.

From 1898 Heinz ran a seaside pier offering free food samples and a museum in which New Jersey resort?

Atlantic City's Iron Pier became Heinz Pier in 1898, and visitors were handed free souvenir pins there for nearly half a century.

The outline of the Heinz label copies which architectural shape, a symbol of the company's home state?

A keystone is the wedge that locks an arch together, and Pennsylvania, where Heinz began, is known as the Keystone State.

Which vegetable was pictured on Heinz Tomato Ketchup labels from 1890 until a tomato replaced it in 2009?

A gherkin stayed on the label for more than a century, a reminder that pickles were among the company's earliest products.

Henry J. Heinz said the 5 in 57 Varieties was his own lucky number, while the 7 was whose?

His wife's lucky number completed the pair, although Heinz also claimed he picked 7 for its psychological influence on people of all ages.

After Heinz shut its Leamington ketchup plant in 2014, which mustard brand started using the town's tomatoes?

French's launched a ketchup made with Leamington produce, and a grassroots campaign for it helped cut Heinz's market share in the country from 84 to 76 percent.

Heinz was bought in 2013 by Berkshire Hathaway and 3G Capital, an investment firm with roots in which country?

Brazil's 3G Capital and Berkshire Hathaway paid $23 billion, which Heinz called the largest deal in food industry history at the time.

Which Heinz condiment, first prepared by hand in 1914, was the company's first brand created just for Britain?

Salad Cream was nearly dropped in the 1990s, but a public outcry led Heinz to relaunch it with a £10 million advertising campaign.

Which variety of bean goes raw into every can of Heinz Baked Beans before being pressure-cooked in tomato sauce?

Haricot beans cook within the sealed can, which is what thickens the sauce and gives the product its long shelf life.

During World War II, the Heinz food plant in Pittsburgh was converted for a time to build which aircraft?

Gliders for the War Department came out of a factory better known for soup, while company president Jack Heinz made five wartime trips to England to help ease its food shortages.

The Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh displays original sets from which children's television host's show?

Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was filmed in Pittsburgh, and the museum, the largest history museum in Pennsylvania, keeps pieces of the original set.

Heinz 57 sauce, a ketchup-based blend with malt vinegar and raisin, is marketed to go with which food?

Steak sauce is what Heinz 57 became around 1940, once the slogan was well known enough to name a bottle of its own. An earlier version had been sold as Beefsteak Sauce.

Morris the Cat is the finicky mascot of which cat food brand that Heinz sold to Del Monte in 2002?

9Lives began in 1959 as a tuna-based cat food, and the first Morris television commercials aired ten years later, after Heinz had taken over the brand.

Heinz brought Mayochup to American stores in 2018 after over 500,000 people voted yes in a poll on which platform?

Twitter users backed the blend of mayonnaise and ketchup, and Heinz followed it with Mayomust and Mayocue to mark the company's 150th anniversary.

Heinz Hall in Pittsburgh, a restored 1920s movie palace, has been home to which kind of ensemble since 1971?

A symphony orchestra moved in after Jack Heinz helped rescue the closed cinema from demolition. Plans had already been made to turn the site into a parking lot.

The NFL stadium Heinz Field took which insurance company's name after Heinz gave up the naming rights in 2022?

Acrisure bought the rights after 21 years of Heinz Field, a change many home fans fiercely opposed. Heinz kept its name on one of the stadium gates.

Henry J. Heinz left money for the Heinz Memorial Chapel at the University of Pittsburgh to honour which relative?

His mother, Anna Margaretha Heinz, was the inspiration. After he died in 1919 his three surviving children added to the bequest, and the chapel was dedicated in 1938.

Heinz Noble & Company, the first business Henry J. Heinz founded, met which fate in 1875?

It went bankrupt, but Heinz started again the following year with his brother and a cousin, and tomato ketchup was among the new firm's first products.

Henry J. Heinz reworked his ketchup in the early 1900s to drop which preservative, common in rival brands?

Sodium benzoate kept thin, watery ketchups from spoiling. Ripe tomatoes and extra vinegar let Heinz leave it out, and gave ketchup the thick texture it is known for.

Henry J. Heinz began bottling food in 1869 in which Pennsylvania borough, where his father made bricks?

Sharpsburg lies along the Allegheny River a few miles from downtown Pittsburgh, and a Heinz glass works there once made all of the company's glassware.

Henry J. Heinz sold his first goods under which brand name, picked for its biblical meaning of hope?

Anchor Brand suited a devout founder: Heinz later opened his will with a confession of his Christian faith, calling it the most important item in the document.

Heinz's Kitt Green plant, one of Europe's largest food factories, stands near which northern English town?

Wigan gained the Kitt Green factory in the late 1950s, and by the 2010s it was producing more than a billion cans of food a year.

Heinz ketchup pours more easily after a good shake because ketchup is which kind of fluid?

Non-Newtonian fluids change their thickness under stress. Ketchup is a shear-thinning one, so shaking the upturned bottle makes it runnier and easier to pour.

Tony O'Reilly, the first Heinz chairman from outside the family, was earlier an international star in which sport?

Rugby union made the Irishman famous long before ketchup did: he scored 38 tries for the British Lions across tours in 1955 and 1959.

Kecap ABC, a leading product of Heinz's Indonesian business, is a sweet version of which condiment?

Soy sauce is the heart of the ABC range, which Heinz bought into in 1999. The Indonesian operation grew into the company's largest business in Asia.

Heinz opened a pickle factory in 1897 in Holland, a city beside Lake Macatawa in which US state?

Michigan's Holland plant has been described as the largest pickle factory in the world, handling more than a million pounds of pickles a day in season.

Which upmarket London department store was the first place in Britain to sell Heinz Baked Beans?

Fortnum & Mason sold them as an American import, since Heinz did not open its first British factory, in Peckham, until 1905.

Henry J. Heinz led a successful lobbying effort in favour of which landmark American consumer law of 1906?

The Pure Food and Drug Act was signed by President Theodore Roosevelt, and it suited Heinz, whose company had already pioneered sanitary ways of preparing its products.

Heinz fought the Great Depression by launching ready-to-serve soups and which other line, both soon top sellers?

Baby food and soup were the idea of Howard Heinz, the founder's son, who had become company president after his father died.

Henry J. Heinz offered the women who handled food in his factory hot showers and which weekly treatment?

Manicures were part of his drive to keep products clean by looking after his workers. The plant also had three dining rooms and a 3,000-seat auditorium with a pipe organ.