When choosing a product, there are many reasons that come into play. Sometimes we choose products for patriotic reasons while other times health, price or taste is the main concern.
Sometimes something upsets us and we decide to boycott a product, brand or company so choose an alternative. That is what has been happening the last few weeks in Canada.
The ketchup controversy initially started as a French's vs Heinz choice. Here is the initial Facebook post that started it.
What Mr. Fernandez is saying is accurate but some people (including me) started to extrapolate and make incorrect conclusions. I wanted to find out more and read article after article on the subject.
Yes Heinz make its ketchup in the USA but Heinz is the biggest customer of the Leamington plant for other products including tomato juice made from Canadian tomatoes. Boycotting Heinz would not help the Leamington farmers.
Yes French's is free of high fructose corn syrup but so is Heinz.
Initially people reading the post went out to buy French's (like I did) but President's Choice came into the controversy when Loblaws decided to remove the French's product from their stores and then reversed the decision after the public outcry. During this media blitz, the public is reminded that President's Choice ketchup can also be considered a Canadian product. One article said they get tomatoes from California and make the ketchup in Canada. Another says they also use Canadian tomatoes.
So which is best? There is no clear cut winner in my mind.
- PC Tomato Ketchup is the most Canadian of the three (Canadian company producing ketchup in Canada with Canadian and/or California tomatoes). It has the least amount of salt (125mg) but has more sugar (5g) and calories (25) per tablespoon. Also strangely, PC Organics Ketchup has 210mg of sodium more than one and a half times the regular ketchup (is this because the regular ketchup has preservatives and the organic version needs more salt as a preservative?).
- French's is a British-Dutch company that uses Canadian tomatoes and donates to Food Banks Canada for every bottle sold. I also appreciate the maple leaf "Canadian tomatoes" logo on the bottle. I wish more companies would do the same to inform us of where the product comes from. I notice that the logo isn't on the Facebook photo. Did French's change their label?
- French's ketchup is produced in Ontario for commercial purposes but the ketchup we buy in the grocery store is made in the U.S.
- Heinz and French's have the least amount of sugar with 4g and 20 calories. Heinz has less sodium (140mg) than French's (170mg)
- Heinz is an American company and use "Heinzseed" tomatoes. Since Heinz also use Leamington tomatoes for other products, is it accurate to say that perhaps French's ketchup would get Heinzseed tomatoes or are those tomatoes reserved for Heinz?
- French's, Heinz and PC use liquid sugar and have no high fructose corn syrup.
- Heinz is the biggest customer for the Leamington plant. If you choose French's ketchup because you want to support Leamington tomatoes, boycotting all Heinz products could hurt Leamington because more than 100 Heinz products are produced there. The mayor from Leamington posted the following:
Note: E.D. Smith ketchup may be Canadian grown and made (I haven't found confirmation of that) but according to their website they use glucose-fructose as an ingredient (which is high fructose corn syrup). It is also difficult to find so am not including it in the final findings.
In the end, for me, the main ingredient being Canadian is more important. I would rather consume a product grown in Canada than made in Canada for health reasons. So if a product uses Canadian tomatoes, I will choose it over one that is not. The same goes for mustard seeds. French's uses seeds from Saskatchewan. Where are the other mustards from?
So will you make your choice according to patriotism, health or taste? The choice is yours.
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In case you're interested in more information, here are other facts and further reading on the subject.
- The Heinz plant in Leamington opened in 1909 and closed in 2014 affecting 740 full time workers and 350 seasonal workers.
- Heinz sold the plant to Highbury Canco and signed a 5 year agreement to produce about 120 products in Leamington. It is also the distribution centre for all Heinz products sold in Canada.**
- The founder of Highbury Canco is originally from Leamington but was working for Heinz in the U.S. when Heinz decided to pull out of Leamington. Was he patriotic in founding Highbury Canco or was it Heinz's plan to decrease costs and worker salaries as the conspiracy theory goes? Heinz workers took a large pay cut when they were re-hired by Highbury Canco.
- Loblaws reversed a decision to stop stocking French's ketchup after public outcry. A leaked memo suggested that increased sales of French's ketchup was causing a decrease in PC ketchup sales.
**"Tomato juice in the United States is often made from tomato paste, but Canadian regulations require fresh tomatoes. If Leamington closed, Heinz would have to find another place to produce tomato juice for Canada, where it dominates the market for the beverage.
Along with the plant sale, Heinz signed a five-year agreement with Highbury to produce about 120 products. The warehouse will also continue to serve as the distribution centre for all Heinz products sold in Canada, regardless of where they are made."
Further reading:
Ketchup Catch-Up
This 2007 Globe and Mail article reviews various brands of ketchup.
Town Where The Tomato Is King Rallies To Save Its Heinz Plant
This New York Times article covers the Heinz plant closure, the Canadian law that resulted in Heinz tomato juice being made in Leamington from Ontario tomatoes, how Highbury Canco was founded and the conspiracy theory of cost cutting.
This CBC article talks about PC ketchup also being Canadian.
Former Heinz plant ends 1st tomato season under Highbury Canco
This 2014 article
French's ketchup just part of the Leamington processing tomato comeback
This Windsor Star article interviews Leamington farmers and names other products we can buy to support them including Unico, Aylmer, Utopia and Primo.
Leamington reels as Heinz Announces Closure
This Windsor Star article covers the initial news of the Heinz plant closure and what it meant to this small town.
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