Good point. Perhaps the mushroom part is to keep the cap from slipping out? In any case, this seems to be a solved problem. Fast-food restaurants already have

Good point. Perhaps the mushroom part is to keep the cap from slipping out? In any case, this seems to be a solved problem. Fast-food restaurants already have ketchup pumps, with a very long stem that goes nearly to the bottom of the container. For home use, there are ketchup squeeze bottles that sit on their caps, so the watery stuff is on the opposite end of the bottle. It appears that the real problem is that ketchup companies persist in selling ketchup in bottles that are not appropriate for ketchup -- and consumers keep buying them.