Heinz turned messy ketchup smiles into a Halloween campaign

Ketchup stretches beyond the corners of a diner’s mouth, exaggerating a smile into something unsettling. The person is still eating familiar food, but the red smear gives the portrait the appearance of Halloween makeup.

“Heinz Smiles”, created with GUT New York and launched in October 2024, used that transformation across a series of three advertisements.

The accompanying line supplied the final cue: “It Ha-Ha-Has to be Heinz.”

The work built on the brand’s portrayal of fans whose enthusiasm for Heinz overrides ordinary behaviour. Here, that enthusiasm was written across their faces.

The product creates the Halloween effect

The campaign began with an everyday eating mishap: getting sauce around your mouth.

By extending the ketchup into an exaggerated grin, the ads gave that familiar mess a sinister identity. The food remained part of the scene, keeping the image connected to eating and taste.

The portraits drew on the visual language of creepy clowns and Joker-like smiles. A red condiment supplied the colour and shape needed to make the association.

That made the ketchup responsible for both parts of the image: the meal and the seasonal transformation.

A laugh changes the familiar brand line

“It Ha-Ha-Has to be Heinz” adapted the existing “It Has to Be Heinz” platform by adding the sound of a laugh.

The repeated syllables connected the wording to the exaggerated smiles. Read beside the portraits, the line became another part of the unsettling joke.

It also kept the campaign recognisable as Heinz communication. The Halloween treatment changed the tone while retaining the structure of the established brand phrase.

The work was announced for multiple markets across outdoor, digital and social channels, with support from Kraft Heinz’s in-house agency, The Kitchen.

The campaign’s reception changed its course

The intended Halloween reference did not determine how everyone read the images.

The campaign drew complaints that the treatment of a Black model recalled racist blackface and minstrel imagery. Heinz subsequently apologised and pulled the advertisements.

That outcome is a material part of the campaign’s history. The original idea used ketchup to communicate exaggerated enjoyment and a creepy smile, but the imagery also carried associations beyond that intended reading.

“Heinz Smiles” therefore sits as both a seasonal extension of a familiar brand platform and an example of a visual execution whose reception led to its withdrawal.

Credits

Brand: Heinz. Advertising agency: GUT New York. Chief Creative Officers: Lucas Bongioanni and Juan Javier Peña Plaza. Head of Art: Rosario Muñoz Lopez. Executive Creative Director: Brynna Alyward. Creative Directors: Brian Mekjian and Ryan McCarthy. Associate Creative Directors: Alejandra Guerrero and Meghan Smart. Art Director: Amanda-Rose Cabrera. Copywriter: Kianna Coley. Head of Production: Renata Neumann. Media agency: Carat. In-house agency support: The Kitchen.