I’ve seen red tomatoes, green tomatoes, and even yellow and purple tomatoes in the produce department, but for years I’d only seen red ketchup on the store shelf. Heinz ketchup is an iconic American brand, practically perfect in every way. Why mess with it?

In 2000, that’s exactly what Heinz decided to do, when it turned the ketchup world upside-down when they began rolling our vibrant, crazy-colored ketchup in purple, pink, orange, teal, and blue varieties. Heinz EZ Squirt’s first color entry was ‘Blastin’ Green’ and was created as a promotional ketchup in support of the first Shrek movie, and moms and kids came running. Each new color resulted in incremental sales volume. In fact, more than 25 million bottles of colored ketchup were sold, helping Heinz capture an all-time high of 60% of the U.S. ketchup market, before softening sales resulted in the EZ Squirt brand being pulled from the shelves by January 2006.

Where They Went Wrong

1. Target Audience – There’s no-doubt that this kid-friendly ketchup is fun and exciting. Heck, even the package shape is ergonomically designed for young kids’ hands. But the real purchase driver on this one was the movie tie-in. Kids wanted to be like Shrek, the big, strong, lovable green ogre they saw in the movie. Parents enjoyed the movie just as much as the kids, and they were more than willing to buy a novelty-colored ketchup (versus a sugary promotional candy) to keep the movie memory alive. At $1.79 for a 24-ounce bottle, it was a relatively small investment to keep the kids happy in the grocery store aisles and at the dinner table.

But that’s not a good strategy for creating a sustainable brand. Kids have short attention spans and are easily distracted by the next new movie, toy, or superhero on the cereal box. And Mom is not going to keep buying a product that her kids stop asking for if she’s not going to use it herself. After all, red ketchup is just fine, kids love it, and it has been a stock item in her refrigerator for years. Plus, you’ll never have to wonder if you accidentally poured Windex on your fries instead of ketchup.

2. Timing – Timing is everything, and it’s no different when it comes to new products and line extensions. Heinz initially introduced EZ Squirt in green. Believable because of green tomatoes, it was a safe color to begin with. As incremental sales volumes skyrocketed, you’d think that the brand would be quick to react and roll out the next color. But instead of taking advantage of this momentum, they waited 2 years before introducing the next sku in the lineup. We’ll never know if it was due to manufacturing issues or simply short-sightedness, but it seems like someone dropped the ball.