eat me drink me

Have you ever given much thought to Heinz Ketchup as a style statement? No? Me neither.  But I completely agree with the New York Time’s assessment of this classic image.

“Yet there is one example of something that is generally considered to be “good design,” which does break the golden rule. It is part of our daily lives, and has been designed to similar specifications for more than a century — the glass Heinz Tomato Ketchup bottle. If you asked the millions of people who use that glass bottle whether it is well designed, they would probably say “yes.” If not they would be fools, because they could achieve exactly the same outcome — seasoning their food with fresh ketchup — by buying one of Heinz’s plastic bottles, which are not only cheaper, but do the job more efficiently.”

I don’t even like ketchup, but do have a bottle in my fridge. At least some things stay reliably the same.