At the beginning of last year, Canadian agency, Rethink, and The Kraft Heinz Company wondered what would happen if you asked people to “draw ketchup”. So they asked people throughout the world. Nearly all the drawings looked like a bottle of Heinz ketchup, which the agency underlined by noting that ketchup means Heinz. This year, Rethink and Heinz wondered what the world’s most unbiased source, an AI image generator, would draw if you typed in ketchup.

Here are some of the results:

Yes, ketchup even means Heinz to AI. It didn’t matter whether AI was fed the single word, ketchup, or phrases containing ketchup. Same result.

The experiment was conducted using the AI image generator, DALL·E 2, which uses machine learning across billions of reference points to create a unique image.

Heinz commented, “When the digital artwork was generated it was clear that whether it was ‘ketchup’, ‘ketchup art’ or ‘ketchup renaissance’, AI created drawings that were almost always quintessentially Heinz ketchup.”

The campaign has launched with a video, featuring a montage of all the wild generations, a selection of the images shared in social content across Twitter and Instagram and an OOH activation in downtown Toronto. To get ketchup-lovers across the world involved, Heinz is also inviting fans to share what AI ketchup creations they would like to see, and Heinz will produce some of them and share them across social media.

“With AI imagery dominating news and social feeds, we saw a natural opportunity to extend our Draw Ketchup campaign – rooted in the insight that Heinz is synonymous with the word ketchup – to test this theory in the AI space,” stated Jacqueline Chao, senior brand manager, brand communications at Heinz. “From the distinct keystone label to our iconic slow-pouring ketchup bottle, we know Heinz is unmistakable to people around the world, and we’re thrilled to see even the most unbiased source recognises that when it comes to ketchup, it has to be Heinz.”

Where the campaign began: