I want you, the reader, to visualize this situation.

You’re dining at your favorite on-campus dining location, whether it’s a place like the State Chick’n or the Pollock Dining Hall. You get some chicken tenders and/or French fries and want to pair them with a condiment. I understand ketchup isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but it’s mine. You go to get the ketchup, sit down to eat, and dip your food in the ketchup.

And it tastes like pickles.

That is the unfortunate reality that I and surely a bunch of other people have experienced since Penn State dining added ‘pickle ketchup’ to the array of condiments at some point in January. The condiment, which Heinz introduced over two years ago, definitely has its fans, but even those who like the addition can agree that there is a fundamental flaw with its introduction.

When you go to any place that has self-serve condiment containers, it’s easy to tell from far away which is which. Yellow is mustard, green is relish, light blue is ranch, dark red is barbecue sauce, etc. Ketchup is obviously red, but the design of these containers makes pickle ketchup look the same color, with the differences only apparent up close.

I will admit it’s my fault for accidentally getting the wrong condiment, but the worst part about all this isn’t one dumb mistake: it’s that the confusing branding is also impacting the workers.

On multiple occasions, I’ve made sure I got regular ketchup from the right dispenser, and it turned out to be pickle ketchup. It’s this kind of thing that takes it from a minor inconvenience to a bigger issue. If Penn State dining’s workers are also struggling with telling the two containers apart, it becomes abundantly clear that something needs to change.

The problem you run into is that there are likely contracts between the university and Heinz that require the condiment to be displayed and likely do not give them much leeway to change the branding that makes it so confusing, but could it hurt to see if you can change the color? Maybe this is a bigger issue with Heinz and not something Penn State itself can do, but something needs to be done.

Self-serve condiment containers are not only found in on-campus dining, however. They’re also found at various stadiums around campus. The Bryce Jordan Center will be hosting THON this upcoming weekend, where thousands of people will take in the atmosphere and, likely, will go to the concession stand. For the people working and staying at THON for extended periods (many of whom will be sleep-deprived), the similarities between the regular and pickle ketchup containers will be rough on the patrons.

Speaking of foods that go well with ketchup, we’re only a few weeks away from the first Dollar Dog Night for Penn State baseball at Medlar Field at Lubrano Park. If you like ketchup on your hot dog, I can’t imagine you’d be very receptive to a pickle flavoring. If you wanted a pickle flavoring, there’s relish right there!

This is a very first-world problem, but there’s never been anybody who gets misled or incorrectly gets something they don’t want and is happy about it. The students are confused, the workers are confused, and the problem is going to get worse before it gets better. Plus, I don’t see any other wacky condiment flavors out there. The world will not be worse off if pickle ketchup is put back on the shelf in the back.