Mystery of the ketchup cups
On the first day of August, 2012, Foodbeast.com published the article “So Apparently, We’ve Been Using Ketchup Cups All Wrong.”
The editor, Elie Ayrouth, explained how he unsuccessfully tried dipping a burger into the small ketchup cup with no avail until a friend of his showed how one can unroll the cup’s upper rim and fan the cup out, exposing more space and fit more ketchup to a larger area.
You can’t fit too much additional ketchup to an expanded cup, but you can dip larger items to it once it’s fanned out.
Two days later, MTV uutiset (a Finnish news outlet) published the article “Believe it or not: you’ve used ketchup cups wrong your entire life.”
The article was more or less the original foodbeast piece, only translated. Other Finnish news sites took notice and at least Kaleva, Iltalehti, Ilta-Sanomat, Herkkusuu, Aamulehti, MTV uutiset again and likely many others over the course of six years published their own piece about the same thing.
I had had my doubts about the truthfulness of the piece since the beginning — I had a hunch the cup opens by stretching the rim only because the container uses no adhesive, which in turn is because a package that uses no adhesive is cost-effective and environmentally friendly to manufacture. But what was the Truth™?
At lunch time last monday I decided to finally get to the bottom of the case. Was the feature a conscious design choice by the package designer or a byproduct of ecological and cost-effective design?
I asked the clerk behind the Burger King counter where their cups come from. She could only tell me that they are supplied by a wholesale company called Kespro and showed me a large box. On the box, there was a logo that said “Genpak.”
It was evident that Kespro orders their cups from Genpak, from either Canada or the United States. There wasn’t a contact e-mail listed on their web page so I sent a contact request through Facebook Messenger and was immediately greeted by a chatbot.
Thank you for taking time to message us. We will do our best to get back to you as soon as possible. Talk to you soon.
While I was waiting for a real person to answer my inquiry I did some more research and found out that Genpak isn’t the only company manufacturing these kinds of cups. I found similar containers for sale by the Solo Cup Company* of the Red Cup fame and Medline, a company I had never heard of. In fact, it appeared that many companies sold the cups, but only a handful manufactured them.
*Solo Cup Company was acquired by Dart Container Corporation in May 2012. Dart also manufactures these paper cups.
Out of these three I found Medline the most interesting, namely because they had nothing to do with ketchup. They outlined themselves as a “manufacturer and distributor of healthcare products and solutions” and described the cups as “Ideal for medication distribution”. On the product page both the Supplier and Manufacturer was listed as none other than Medline itself.
The website also had a “Patents” page that listed several of the patents claimed by the company. Though I couldn’t find the cups there, the general thought about patents stuck with me — if I could find the original patent document of the cup, that, if anything would describe exactly how the cup should be used the right way.
Scrambling through the Google Patents page was an exercise in futility however. A query of “paper cup” alone brought over 20,000 results.
I turned to the company’s Twitter and asked who I should contact and got the US customer service number. After clarifying that I was from Finland I was given the European customer service number. Its area code appeared to be that of Netherlands.
So I called them:
Hallo! Dit is Medline, hoe kan ik u helpen?
»Good day, this is Verneri Kontto calling. Do you speak English?»
Well, a little, heh…
»Well, I’m calling about a certain product on your page. I would like to know some patent information, do you think you can help me?»
I might be able to, do you have a shipping address in the Netherlands?
»No, I do not.»
Hmm. Just a minute. What country do you have a shipping address in?
»Finland.»
Alright, then I have to give you the number of the exports department.
* at this point he gave me the number*
»Thank you, have a nice day.»
You too, good bye!
The number he gave me had an area code that of Germany.
I called it immediately…
…but the number could not be reached. I tried fiddling a bit with the settings once more but it was no use.
Hm.
I decided to call the United States customer service.
Thank you for calling Medline Customer Service, this is Susan. How can I help you?
»Hello, this is Verneri Kontto. I’m calling from Finland.»
From Finland?
»Yeah.»
Hahaha, you’re a long way away!
»Yeah.. my question is about some patent information, do you think you could help me?»
Let me go ahead and get you over to my corporate office, okay? Can I have you hold for just a moment?
»Sure.»
Thank you.
* five minutes of music later I was greeted by a pre-recorded message *
Krueger at Medline. I’m not available to take your call right now, please leave a message and I’ll get back with you as soon as possible. Record your message after the tone. *beep*
»Hello, this is Verneri Kontto calling. I would like to inquire about a product patent. You have a product called “Disposable Paper Soufflé Cups” on your web page. Its Identifier number is NON024214. I would like to know the patent number for the product or any information regarding its design patent. Thank you.»
I got my message through but I was still pretty doubtful what would come of it. I don’t know company policy on returning calls when the caller is from the other side of the world.
48 hours later, no one had called me back.
I still remembered what the answering machine had said to me, however.
“Krueger at Medline. I’m not available to take your call right now.”
Who was this “Krueger” anyway? I looked around a bit and found a strong candidate from LinkedIn.
Krueger. Marcia Krueger.
On her resumé her surname was Harding. Had she changed it recently? I thought the best way on going about it would be to send multiple e-mails to several different addresses I would guess. marciakrueger@medline, marciaharding@medline, etc.
All messages bounced back as “no such e-mail address” type of errors.
Except one. So I waited.
While I was waiting for Marcia and Genpak to answer me, I sent a message to Dart Container Corporation as well.
Hello!
My inquiry is about the Solo® Paper Portion Containers (link to product) and their design. [see Figure 1 — the Cup in question]
Because of the nature of the cup’s design, its assembly requires no glue — only creasing, overlapping folding and rolling of the edges.
Is this a conscious (possibly environmental) design choice or are the cups meant to be unrolled and unfolded [see Figure 2 — An exaggerated unfolding] as to fit more condiments?
A food news aggregator “Foodbeast.com” wrote about said cups in August 2012 under the headline “So apparently we’ve been using ketchup cups all wrong” demonstrating the unfolding nature of the container. [see Figure 3 — screenshot from the article]
Can you (or anyone involved in the design process) confirm the correct usage? Are the cups supposed to be expanded or is the reason they “fan out” only a side effect of environmentally friendly design?
Additionally, I noticed that another company called Genpak also sells containers with a similar, if not identical folding mechanism, under the Harvest® brand name (link to product) leading me to believe the patent for the cup template is registered by some unrelated entity and licensed to parties like Dart Container Corporation and Genpak.
I would greatly appreciate if you could point me into the right direction regarding any Patent information related to the cup or its mechanism.
Thank you!
After sending that message it had already been some time since I first messaged Genpak. With no answer still, I visited their web page once more to see if I could find a contact e-mail hidden somewhere. I couldn’t, but I did notice a “Genpak Live Chat” link. Through that, I found Michelle from the marketing department.
I told her I’m looking for a general e-mail address I could use to inquire about a complex question — and indeed — she gave me one. I thanked her and sent them the same message I had sent to Dart, only swapping the company and brand names around.
I had now contacted all three entities.
Someone had to answer, right?
A few days went by.
No answer from Dart Container Corporation.
No answer from Genpak.
No answer from Marcia.
Until one night I got a message from Dart.
Thank you for your interest in Dart.
Please provide us with, your company name and complete business address and telephone number, so we may process your inquiry.
Thank you again for your interest in Dart.
— Dart Container Corporation
I told them that I don’t represent any company nor do I wish to do any business. I simply wanted more information about the cup.
And on the next day I got an answer [emphasis mine]
Dear Mr. Konto [sic]:
The pleats used in making Paper Soufflé Cups may vary by manufacturer, but each type of pleat goes back many years, and any related patents have likely long since expired. Solo has been making pleated Paper Soufflé Cups since the 1920s. Making Soufflé Cups with no adhesive is simply the most economical way to make those products, so any environmental advantage is incidental.
Regarding the comment, “So apparently we’ve been using ketchup cups all wrong”, we think this is more likely just one consumer’s idea that they considered worth sharing. It is not anything we have recommended. It would seem to make usage more messy, and it would not appear to make use of the cups easier, but, to each his own.
We appreciate your interest in our products.
DART CONTAINER CORPORATION
Dart had spoken.
- The cups have been made since the 1920s.
- The reason for the lack of adhesives is an economical one, any environmental advantage is incidental.
- Dart Container Corporation has never recommended opening the cups in that way and believe it’s only a personal idea of a random individual they thought was worth sharing.
Of these points, the most important one was the year. 1920.
You see, Dart Container Corporation was founded in 1960 and Solo Cup Company in 1937. Had there been some kind of a misunderstanding, or a typo, even? Maybe a separate company operated in the 1920s, manufactured the original paper cups and Solo Cup Company bought them out years later?
I trusted the words of Dart and with this information in hand I did a new search of “Paper Cup” on Google Patents with a date range from 1919 to 1921. Among the first results was a patent by Ernest R. Huntley filed on September 1st 1920.
This looked like it. It was filed in 1920 and granted 1924.
Ernest R. Huntley had invented the cup (and a device for making them) almost a century ago. He described it as a “new and Useful Improvement in Paper Cups.” In his document he doesn’t mention the act of expanding it at all and instead emphasises its sturdy and strong features and how it’s advantageous for drinking purposes. The entire purpose of the cup was to be very sturdy despite being made from a single circular blank.
For extra confirmation I wanted to check and see if there had been later references to the patent and clicked on the “Similar Documents” link. The list was somewhat short, but one patent caught my eye; “Paper drinking-cup” from September 1911. It was the oldest related document.
The patent for the cup was filed September 29th 1911 by Samuel D. Washburn. It was granted in the summer of 1913. Additionally, he was granted a patent for a contraption for making the cups earlier that year.
The cup was very similar to that of Ernest’s but Samuel talked about the design of the cup in more detail in his document, emphasising a few points:
- The cup was meant for temporary and individual use and could be thrown away or destroyed after a single use if desired.
- The cup was of low cost and simple to manufacture.
- It was made from a single, circular blank without glue, paste or other foreign matter.
- The edge rim prevents the cup from losing its shape and in effect renders it impossible to destroy the shape of the cup except by a determined forceful effort.
Samuel also made it clear in the application that the cup holds a substantial and solid form so that it readily maintains its shape under use and that it is impossible to destroy the shape of the cup without a determined effort to break it.
Samuel never meant for his cups to be folded open.
Ernest never meant for his cups to be folded open.
The entire cult of those who open their ketchup cups is built upon lies, misinterpretation and shitty journalism.
Neither Marcia Krueger nor Genpak contacted me afterwards. Maybe I would’ve reached the same conclusion with additional information provided by them, maybe not. Maybe I’ll get a message from them later, maybe not. The important thing is that the true nature of the cups has been unveiled. Folding them out is misusing the cups.
So the next time you’re eating at Burger King, filling your paper cup with ketchup, think twice before folding it out. Even if you’ll fit more ketchup in it, know this: both Ernest and Samuel will be spinning in their graves.
Originally published in Finnish as Ketsuppikupin arvoitus.
