Heinz has found itself cleaning up a saucy mess after one of its ketchup bottles directed a customer to a hardcore porn website.

German man Daniel Korell scanned a QR code on the bottle, thinking he was accessing a promotion to design his own label, but instead was directed to a German porn site called Fundorado, TheLocal.de reported.

It turns out the bottle had expired, and Heinz had allowed the website for the contest, which ran between 2012 and 2014, to expire. The porn site had since jumped in to claim the domain for itself.

“Your ketchup really isn’t for underage people,” Mr Korell wrote on the company’s Facebook page. “Even if the bottle was a leftover, it’s still in lots of households. It’s incomprehensible that you didn’t reserve the domain for one or two years. It really doesn’t cost the Earth.”



Heinz’s social media team replied: “We really regret the event very much and we’re happy to take your suggestions for how we implement future campaigns on board.”

Heinz also offered Mr Korell a free bottle of ketchup with a label of his own design by way of apology.

Sensing a marketing opportunity, Fundorado’s Facebook page chimed in, suggesting Heinz had confused their “Hot Pink” porn site with “Pink EZ Squirt” ketchup.

The most shocking part of the story, however, is that people actually use QR codes.