Tuesday, November 11, 2014

On the origin of Tupperware parties

Tupperware Brands Corporation logo.svg

If you can overlook the drippy title, here's a Mental Floss article about the Detroit News columnist/secretary/cleaning supplies saleswoman/marketing genius who figured out how to sell Tupperware in the 50s.
[Brownie Wise] didn’t know that the key to fulfilling this dream would be in plastic food-storage containers. Wise first glimpsed Tupperware at a sales meeting. One of her coworkers had seen the products gathering dust in a department store and decided to bring them in. At first, Wise didn’t think they were anything special. But when she accidentally knocked a Tupperware bowl off the table, she realized its full potential: Instead of breaking, it bounced. 
It seemed like magic. Tupperware was unlike any home product she’d seen before. It was attractive, coming in pastel colors and flexible shapes, almost like art. More importantly, it was functional—no other competing product even came close. Convinced of its potential, Wise traded in her Stanley brooms in 1949 and started throwing parties to sell Tupperware. What she didn’t intend, exactly, was to kindle a revolution.

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