Decoder Ring | I am Tupperware, I Contain Multitudes

Summary

Decoder Ring Episode Summary: The Enduring Allure of Storage Containers

In this enlightening episode of Decoder Ring, host Willa Paskin delves deep into the cultural significance of storage containers, tracing their evolution from Tupperware’s mid-20th-century dominance to today’s digital-age obsession. Joined by historian and author Bob Keeling, the episode uncovers how these seemingly mundane objects have become integral to both organizing our physical spaces and expressing our emotional landscapes.

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1. The Rise of Restocking Videos and Modern Storage Obsession

The episode opens with a discussion on the burgeoning trend of restocking videos circulating across social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok. These videos, often featuring satisfying sounds of items being neatly placed into clear containers, have captivated millions.

Bob Keeling explains, “Restocking videos are usually a few minutes long. They are generally sort of a close-up on a woman's hands taking a set of containers… stacking and crunching and… just thing after thing after thing being put inside of all of these crystal clear containers” (02:05).

Willa Paskin adds, “These restocking videos are just barely scratching the surface. Storage containers are all over stores and not just the container store. They're on social media, TV shows, magazine magazines, they're the subject of books” (31:52).

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2. Tupperware’s Pioneering Influence: Brownie Wise as the Original Influencer

Transitioning to the historical context, the episode highlights the pivotal role of Brownie Wise in transforming Tupperware into a household name. As a charismatic leader, Brownie pioneered the home party sales model, which revolutionized direct sales and empowered women in the post-war era.

Bob Keeling remarks, “Women would come over and have hors d'oeuvres and maybe cocktails and chat and… watch her show the way to use Tupperware's patented seal” (16:50).

Historian Bob Keeling further emphasizes Brownie’s impact: “Brownie was the communicator. Brownie was the motivator. Brownie loved to get out among the public and have her picture taken” (21:12).

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3. The Tupperware Party Model: Revolutionizing American Domestic Life

The innovative Tupperware party model not only boosted sales but also created a social platform for women to connect, share, and support each other. These gatherings became a socially acceptable means for women to earn income, fostering a sense of community and empowerment.

Willa Paskin observes, “The national scaling of these home parties changed everything for Tupperware” (18:46).

Bob Keeling adds, “Tupperware Parties sort of pioneered this concept of, like, women selling to women. It is a completely different, different selling experience” (17:29).

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4. Internal Struggles and the Downfall of Tupperware’s Founders

Despite their success, internal conflicts between Brownie Wise and Earl Tupper, the company’s founder, led to the eventual downfall of Brownie’s influence within Tupperware. The infamous 1957 Jubilee disaster, where a planned luau turned chaotic due to sudden thunderstorms, exacerbated tensions and resulted in Brownie’s dismissal.

Willa Paskin recounts, “So Earl Tupper fired Brownie Wise in January of 1958. She didn't own any stock or have any stake in the company” (24:32).

Following her departure, Earl Tupper sold the company to Rexall Drug, marking the end of an era but leaving behind a robust brand that continued to thrive independently.

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5. Modern-Day Storage Trends: From Organization Gurus to Social Media Stars

Fast forward to the present, the episode draws parallels between Tupperware’s past and today’s storage container trends. Influencers like Marie Kondo and organizations such as The Home Edit have popularized meticulous home organization, often showcased through aesthetically pleasing storage solutions.

Bob Keeling explains, “And then until you have Plexiglas clear containers. And first Instagram and then TikTok have created a sense that different parts of our home are actually opportunities for public performance in a way that they wouldn't necessarily have been in the past” (33:46).

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6. Emotional and Cultural Significance of Storage Containers Today

Storage containers today serve not just a functional purpose but also hold emotional value. They represent control, preparedness, and an idealized version of domestic life. This shift mirrors broader cultural changes from scarcity to abundance, where the emphasis is on displaying excess rather than conserving resources.

Bob Keeling reflects, “What we have been asking them to hold not just our physical stuff, but our emotional stuff too” (43:58).

Personal anecdotes, such as Bob’s experience of organizing during a period of grief, illustrate how storage can provide a semblance of order amidst chaos: “I ordered some clear acrylic storage containers off of Amazon and I reorganized the shelves in my bathroom… I can set right the shelves in my bathroom Storage containers” (42:35).

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7. Conclusion: The Legacy and Future of Storage Solutions

The episode concludes by affirming that storage containers, from Tupperware to modern acrylic organizers, remain a steadfast element in our lives. They continue to evolve, reflecting our changing needs and societal values while retaining their fundamental role in organizing and expressing our personal spaces.

Willa Paskin muses, “We are all pushing toward the idea of this totally sort of like self-contained at home life” (40:26).

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Notable Quotes

• Bob Keeling: “Restocking videos are… just thing after thing after thing being put inside of all of these crystal clear containers” (02:05).

• Willa Paskin: “Storage containers are all over stores and not just the container store” (31:52).

• Bob Keeling: “Brownie was the communicator… the motivator” (21:12).

• Willa Paskin: “The national scaling of these home parties changed everything for Tupperware” (18:46).

• Bob Keeling: “Tupperware Parties sort of pioneered this concept of, like, women selling to women” (17:29).

• Willa Paskin: “Earl Tupper fired Brownie Wise in January of 1958” (24:32).

• Bob Keeling: “What we have been asking them to hold not just our physical stuff, but our emotional stuff too” (43:58).

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Further Resources:

• Books: Tupperware Unsealed: Brownie Wise, Earl Tupper, and the Home Party Pioneers by Bob Keeling.

• Documentary: Tupperware (PBS).

• Articles: Amanda Mull’s writings on Tupperware and modern storage trends available on Slate.

For those intrigued by the intricate dance between cultural trends and everyday objects, this episode of Decoder Ring offers a compelling narrative that underscores the enduring influence of storage containers in shaping our lives.

Transcript

[Willa Paskin]

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[Amanda Mull]

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[Carvel]

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[Amanda Mull]

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[Bob Keeling]

Before.

[Willa Paskin]

We begin, this episode contains adult language. Amanda Mull is a senior reporter at Bloomberg Businessweek, where she writes a column trying to make sense of consumer culture.

[Bob Keeling]

Seeing people's neuroses and emotional lives play out and the way that they choose to spend time and money is fascinating to me.

[Willa Paskin]

Amanda is always noted, and last year she became very curious about a strange kind of video that's all over the Internet.

[Unnamed Influencer]

It's time for another drink Fridge restock. It's been a little over a month, so we're gonna get it full again.

[Willa Paskin]

You just tell me what a restocking video is.

[Bob Keeling]

Restocking videos are usually a few minutes long. They are generally sort of a close up on a woman's hands taking a set of containers, usually out of a refrigerator, out of a pantry, out of a laundry room.

[Willa Paskin]

And then those hands start filling containers.

[Bob Keeling]

With stuff, food or cleaning products stuffed and stacked and plunked and crunched and.

[Willa Paskin]

Peeled and chopped and decanted.

[Bob Keeling]

Just thing after thing after thing being put inside of all of these crystal clear containers.

[Willa Paskin]

The hands are disembodied, you can't see who they belong to, and the women rarely talk. They let the containers speak for themselves.

[Bob Keeling]

A lot of people find the sound of things getting sort of crunched and plunked and put into these containers. Very satisfying. And then those containers are put back in the pantry, in the laundry room, wherever, and we're all stocked up.

[Unnamed Influencer]

It looks so beautiful, nice and full again.

[Willa Paskin]

And while you had disarray, you now have order.

[Bob Keeling]

Everything is abundant and you have all of your choices in front of you. And walking into your kitchen or your bathroom or your laundry room is like walking into a store of your very own.

[Unnamed Influencer]

Okay. I love this drawer. I hope they love it, too.

[Willa Paskin]

How popular are they?

[Bob Keeling]

Incredibly popular. There are people online who make an entire living out of making these videos. It's very, very easy to find ones that have millions or tens of millions of views. I think that to watch something that was like a little bit of a mess, go to clean and pristine and organized and perfect is satisfying for a lot of people.

[Willa Paskin]

This booming genre of video of people basically pouring pasta into plastic is fascinating all on its own. But over the years, as Amanda has seen more and more of these videos, a particular aspect of them started to jump out to her. The stars. The storage containers.

[Bob Keeling]

Plastic storage containers have never been more popular. They have never been more ubiquitous. They have never been more culturally salient.

[Willa Paskin]

Amanda's talking about regular, plain. Put your leftovers in them containers. She has some. I have some. I dare say you have some. They're easy to overlook because the focus is usually on what's inside of them. Everything from last night's dinner to, yes, dried pasta and Q tips and colored pencils. Still, they have become an absolute staple, not just of online videos, but mainstream home decor. Or as the headline of a piece Amanda wrote for the Atlantic puts it, home influencers will not rest until everything has been put in a clear plastic storage bin.

[Bob Keeling]

There are clear acrylic containers in virtually every size and shape and scale. They are incredibly widespread, incredibly visible in culture, incredibly visible online.

[Willa Paskin]

These containers have crept into every corner of our lives. But it turns out that as modern as some of their uses are, this is not the first time we have lost it over an empty plastic box. They just used to go by another name.

[Bob Keeling]

We're all still living in the world that Tupperware built, and we probably will be for quite some time.

[Willa Paskin]

This is Decoder Ring. I'm Willa Paskin. The storage container is a stealthy star of the modern home. It's something we use to organize more of our stuff than ever before, and also something other people use to organize their stuff for our viewing pleasure. Its role as a source of soothing, satisfying, potentially viral clicks is new. But storage container innovations are not something we had occasion to remember when Tupperware the company found itself in the news last year. Tupperware was the original container craze, and in today's episode, we're going to connect it to the contemporary one. Because as it happens, for a long time now, we've been filling empty boxes with far more than just leftovers. So today on decoder Ring how did Tupperware take over our homes this new year? Why not let Audible expand your life by listening? Explore over 1 million audiobooks, podcasts, and exclusive Audible originals that'll inspire and motivate you. I've been listening to Wesley Morris's energetic the Wonder of Stevie all about Stevie Wonder, and I'm sure there's something you'll like too. Just open the app and tap into your well being with advice and insight from leading influencers, experts, experts and professionals. Whatever your focus or interest, there's a listen for it on Audible. You'll find titles on health, relationships, career, finance, and so much more. Let Audible help you reach the goals you set for yourself. Start listening today when you sign up for a free 30 day trial at audible.com decoder. New members can try Audible now, free for 30 days with your first audiobook included. Visit audible audible.com decoder or text decoder to 500500 that's audible.com decoder or Text decoder to 500500 the start of a new year is the perfect time to get organized and set goals like financial wellness. Thanks to Rocket Money, those goals feel achievable. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps lower your bills. You can grow your savings, see all of your subscriptions in one place and know exactly where your money is going. For subscriptions you don't want anymore, Rocket Money can help you cancel them. Rocket Money will even try to negotiate lower bills for you. Rocket Money has over 5 million users and has saved a total of $500 million in canceled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year. When using all of the app's premium features, cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com Decoder today. That's RocketMoney.com Decoder RocketMoney.com Decoder Tupperware is now an old and troubled company, but for years it was a thriving one. And it owes much of that success to an archetype we tend to think of as very contemporary.

[Bob Keeling]

Whether or not today's influencers realize it, they are taking part in a long tradition of women using their charisma to ignite the imaginations of women around them.

[Willa Paskin]

And the proto influencer who started that tradition by turning Tupperware into a household name was Brownie Wise.

[Bob Keeling]

Hello, this is Brownie.

[Historian]

You know, Brownie was a minimally educated woman from South Georgia.

[Willa Paskin]

Bob Keeling is a historian and the author of Tupperware Unsealed.

[Historian]

Her marriage fell apart not long after her son was born, so it was up to her to make money to raise him.

[Willa Paskin]

Brownie was working as a secretary in the suburbs of Detroit, making ends meet, when one day, opportunity called.

[Historian]

Brownie has a guy for Stanley Home Products who knocks on her door selling these utilitarian home cleaning products, kind of dowdy brushes, brooms, you know, different things you can use around the house. And he gives this very fumbling demonstration of all the products. And she says, oh, my God, I could do better than that.

[Willa Paskin]

So Brownie started selling Stanley Home Products herself.

[Bob Keeling]

Sometimes we overlook the prospects closest to home.

[Willa Paskin]

You know, from the start, she had the thing good salespeople have where even when they're selling you something, it doesn't feel like they're just trying to sell you something. She seemed authentic. She was warm and fun. And unlike all those male traveling salesmen, she could recommend products to other women as a peer.

[Bob Keeling]

That is just such a meaningfully different sales pitch than going to a store and buying something off a shelf.

[Willa Paskin]

Soon she was selling a lot of Stanley, which, by the way, is not the same company that makes the current, very popular big cup. And she wanted to sell even more. But she hit a wall. Or rather, the man who ran the company.

[Historian]

She wanted to move up in the world. And she told him, I'd really like to get into management. And he said, honey, management's no place for a woman.

[Willa Paskin]

And so Brownie decided she was going to find something else to sell. A colleague had just pointed out a new product available in department stores, a product created by a chemist named Earl Tupperware.

[Historian]

Earl Tupper was a spartan New Englander. He was a dyed in the wool inventor who had said, I am going to be a millionaire by the time I'm 30.

[Willa Paskin]

Long before he created his namesake product, Earl was constantly jotting down ideas and sketches in a notebook, like for a fish powered boat and for pants that wouldn't lose their crease. When the Great Depression hit, he took a job to support his family in a plastics factory in Massachusetts. By the 1940s, he had his own plastics manufacturing company, and When World War II ended, the multinational chemical company DuPont reached out and asked if Tupper could figure out what to do with this material. They developed a hard brown slag product they called polyethylene.

[Historian]

It was like a byproduct of what the military would use for helmets, a product no one else would consider even using.

[Willa Paskin]

Earl started experimenting with polyethylene, mixing it, processing it, refining it, and eventually he turned it into something brand new.

[Historian]

He was able to make it more malleable and softer, and he could even add certain dye colors to it to make it more attractive.

[Willa Paskin]

Earl named this promising new material Poly Table and set out to find a use for it. One day, Earl saw a paint can with its resealable lid, and he realized something like that would be really useful for food. At the time, home food storage was very haphazard. 1940s housewives would improvise, sometimes putting leftovers in a bowl and covering them with a shower cap. Earl saw an opening for something better. And so, using his poly T material, he set about creating a new kind of storage container. Unbreakable, attractive, and with an airtight resealable lid. He named the resulting product tupperware. And by 1946, he was ready to start placing his first products, including the pastel colored Wonder bowl, in department stores, where they promptly just, just sat on the shelf.

[Historian]

It was not doing well. People didn't really know what to do with it.

[Bob Keeling]

They have to be told. Somebody has to identify the problem in their lives for them and then explain how a product fixes that problem. And that was the case with Tupperware.

[Willa Paskin]

When Brownie Wise saw Tupperware, she immediately knew how to explain it to her customers, how to make it comprehensible and also desirable. She started bringing it into women's homes and demonstrating its effectiveness in ways that would blow their minds.

[Historian]

She would take the Wonder bowl, she'd fill it up with grape juice, seal it, and then throw it across the room in somebody's family room, and they'd be aghast, but it wouldn't spill a drip.

[Willa Paskin]

And then Brownie would explain how to seal that very same Wonder Bowl.

[Historian]

You burp it just like a baby. That was one of the things Brownie would say to her prospective customers.

[Willa Paskin]

You burp a Tupperware just before sealing it completely by pressing down on the center of the lid while holding up one of the corners, forcing a little burp of air out and ostensibly locking in freshness.

[Bob Keeling]

I don't know if it's necessary, but this was like a thing that women were taught to do when they got their first Tupperware. It was like after a meal, you burp your baby. After a meal, you burp your Tupperware. It is a small act of care toward your leftovers.

[Willa Paskin]

This turn of phrase was beyond canny. Grauni knew her audience, wives and mothers in the post war era who could afford to see spend a Little more, but felt more virtuous doing so when the exciting new product they were splurging on promised it was also the latest way to take care of their families. Soon, Brownie was selling $2 million worth of Tupperware in today's money, and she wasn't even officially affiliated with the company. But when Tupperware saw her sales figures, that changed. They offered her distribution rights for the entire state of Florida.

[Historian]

It took about 15 seconds to say, oh, it's warm down there. Yeah, we'll go.

[Willa Paskin]

Brownie quickly set up a shop in Fort Lauderdale called Patio Parties. Not only was she selling Tupperware herself, but she was also recruiting other women, teaching them her winning sales pitches and then sending them off to sell Tupperware, too. But no one was just knocking on doors. Rowney had developed a more compelling method, one she'd first learned about from her old company, Stanley, and then honed and improved. She had the Tupperware party.

[Unnamed Narrator]

Now, let's go to a little town in New Jersey where things are really popping. Yes, there's a party going on at Mrs. Betty Martin's house. It's a Tupperware party, and it's really fun.

[Historian]

You get somebody who would be willing to host the party. It turns into a social gathering.

[Unnamed Narrator]

The girls get together and meet their old friends and make some new ones.

[Bob Keeling]

Women would come over and have hors d'oeuvres and maybe cocktails and chat and.

[Historian]

Gossip, and they would give their demonstration.

[Unnamed Narrator]

Watch her show the way to use Tupperware's patented seal.

[Willa Paskin]

See, a Tupperware party was such a good time it could obscure that it was also, for at least the women doing the demonstrations work. In the late 40s and early 50s, selling Tupperware, something that happened almost entirely in the female sphere, was a socially sanctioned way for women to bring in money to be a part of the working world, but one in which business degrees and special training were less valuable than a wide social circle. An eye for presentation and the personal experience, charm, and authority to recommend a product.

[Bob Keeling]

Tupperware Parties sort of pioneered this concept of, like, women selling to women. It is a completely different, different selling experience. To hear somebody say, oh, you've got to try these. They're so cute. They're so useful. I can order you a set if you're interested.

[Willa Paskin]

This kind of direct sales method, which is now everywhere and not always for the good, worked incredibly well. In 1951, Tupperware's owner, Earl Tupper, arranged to meet with Brownie face to face for the first time. Soon after, he decided that her sales strategy, the Tupperware party, would be Tupperware's only sales strategy. Goodbye, department stores. Goodbye, any stores at all. He also moved Tupperware headquarters down to Kissimmee, Florida, the state in which Brownie was already located, and gave her a promotion.

[Historian]

He told her, you know, when you talk, people listen. And he made her the head of sales for the brand new home party division that he created at her encouragement to sell the product exclusively through home parties.

[Willa Paskin]

The national scaling of these home parties changed everything for Tupperware.

[Unnamed Narrator]

This is Tupperware.

[Willa Paskin]

It became an IT product, a modern marvel that was the must have item of the day, something I initially anyway, found a little hard to understand. It's kind of hard for me to wrap my head around the status symbol ness of Tupperware because it's pedestrian and plastic, and it stores food like it is just this plastic container, you know, like what made it so revered.

[Bob Keeling]

Humans love to take objects and imbue them with meaning. And sometimes it doesn't really matter what the object is. If it's in the right place at the right time, it can be an incredibly meaningful thing. And that is what you got with Tupperware. And I think it makes a lot of sense if you think about how Tupperware spread. You couldn't just go into a store and if you had the money, you could buy it. You had to be invited to a Tupperware party. You had to have social ties to people who could get it for you. You had to have enough money to actually buy it. And then when you had it, it was this indicator that you were up on the latest things and also that you were a fastidious and reasonable steward of your family's domestic life.

[Willa Paskin]

Tupperware had the release model cachet of a streetwear brand and the trendiness of, yes, a Stanley cup, all while making wives and mothers feel good about how they were being wives and mothers. And so it became a behemoth. Tupperware amassed 20,000 dealers across the country, women who worship Brownie as a sales God, an aspirational lifestyle guru, and who flogged enough Tupperware that the company soon reached $25 million in retail sales, almost $300 million in today's money.

[Historian]

I mean, Earl Tupper's over the moon. He's finally found somebody to burp his baby.

[Willa Paskin]

Soon, Brownie, with her incredible story, became the face of the brand. Heralded as a single mom, revealed to be a sales genius, now leading an army of saleswomen.

[Unnamed Narrator]

I Hadn't realized there were so many people in the Tupperware family. And to think there are more than 10,000 others who could not be here.

[Historian]

Brownie was the communicator. Brownie was the motivator. Brownie loved to get out among the public and have her picture taken. And so Brownie started becoming famous as the Tupperware Lady.

[Willa Paskin]

Brownie went on talk shows and did interviews for countless magazines. She became the very first woman to appear on the COVID of BusinessWeek. She wrote an entire memoir, slash business manual. And the press often credited her with the success of Tupperware.

[Historian]

Nominally, Earl Tupper is the president of the company, but she's the genius behind this. It was good advertising. It spread the message. But ultimately that's what started to cause the friction with Tupper and Brownie.

[Willa Paskin]

As the 50s wore on, Earl became increasingly aggravated by Brownie's popularity. Brownie became increasingly aggravated by Earl's micromanaging. They were both trying to grow the company, but they were often at odds. A situation that became prickly and tense over time.

[Historian]

And then the big thing was the annual Jubilee in Kissimmee in July of 1957.

[Unnamed Narrator]

Yes, this is Jubilee 1957, the Tupperware home Cutting Jubilee.

[Willa Paskin]

Called by many the most unusual sales.

[Bob Keeling]

Convention in the world.

[Willa Paskin]

The Tupperware Jubilee was an annual over the top themed celebration and team building exercise Brownie had started in the early 1950s. Tupperware dealers and managers would come to Tupperware headquarters on their own dime for an elaborate four day show of appreciation and indoctrination.

[Historian]

Oh, they wear costumes, they'd sing their songs. I got that topper feeling down in my heart. I mean, they were into it.

[Willa Paskin]

For the 1957 Jubilee. The theme was around the World in 80 Days. And the highlight was a massive excursion organized by Brownie.

[Historian]

Brownie had bought her own island in the middle of Lake Toho, which is in Kissimmee, right near Tupperware headquarters. And Brownie had decided she was going to have a luau on her private island.

[Willa Paskin]

So the thousand plus attendees all headed off to Brownie's island in boats, ready to party. But the weather had something else in mind.

[Historian]

If you're ever in central Florida in the summer, in the evening, you can almost set your watch by the thunderstorms that are going to to brew up. And sure enough, they did. And there was no cover for anybody on the island. The boat drivers were struggling to get people back on dry land and there were a bunch of boat accidents and there were people injured and it was a disaster. And Brownie left and went home.

[Bob Keeling]

Wait, sorry.

[Willa Paskin]

So she gets off, Brownie left.

[Historian]

She saved her own skin, let's say.

[Willa Paskin]

You know, by the end of the evening, 21 people were in the hospital with serious injuries.

[Historian]

Some of the people who were injured ended up filing lawsuits. And Earl Tupper wanted no part of that. And he was livid.

[Willa Paskin]

Earl had also already started thinking about cashing out and selling the company. And he did not want a headstrong, self interested female executive with a lot of pull internally and externally to get in the way.

[Historian]

He felt she would be a liability. He was just going to go out there and say, you're done.

[Willa Paskin]

Earl Tupper fired Brownie Wise in January of 1958. She didn't own any stock or have any stake in the company. She didn't even own the house she lived in. And she never again achieved the kind of success she'd had at Tupperware. Meanwhile, at the end of the year, Earl sold Tupperware to rexall drug for $16 million, divorced his wife, and bought his own island off the coast of Panama. He also renounced his American citizenship to avoid paying taxes. All this means that by 1959, the two people most responsible for making Tupperware Tupperware were no longer at the company. But they had done such a good job establishing the brand that even without them, Tupperware entered a golden age that lasted for decades.

[Unnamed Narrator]

She told me, hun, hmm. We're having a party, a Tupperware party. It's Tupperware's 10th birthday and you're getting the present. For over 30 years, Tupperware has revolutionized food storage.

[Willa Paskin]

Now we've revolutionized food preparation.

[Unnamed Influencer]

Tupperware, now you're cooking.

[Willa Paskin]

It's in the 60s and 70s that Tupperware became a fact of American life. It was a useful and popular product, but also an iconic and intimate one that almost everyone had a personal connection to.

[Bob Keeling]

My mom still uses the Cake Keeper and like, I don't know what else she would put a cake in. Like, it has to be the old Tupperware thing. And you can also tell what the big, like, aesthetic color palette of a particular decade was in America by what colors Tupperware came in during those years. You know, in the 60s, it was like pastels. It was very girly, it was very feminine. In 70s and 80s, you get avocado green and citrus and orange. And it's all very like warm and deep and sort of looks like you've smoked around it for a long time.

[Unnamed Narrator]

And more more, more delicious colors.

[Bob Keeling]

Go to a Party Soon, Tupperware got so big and so dominant that it was one of these sort of rare American brands where the name of the brand becomes synonymous with an entire type of product, no matter who it's made by.

[Unnamed Narrator]

Your Tupperware lady has the freshest ideas for locking in freshness.

[Willa Paskin]

But in the 1980s, Tupperware's fortunes slowly started to turn. With more and more women in the workforce, the Tupperware party started to seem like a lot of effort just to get something to hold leftover mashed potatoes. And in the years to come, the plastic holding those potatoes became a known health hazard. The very things that had once been so innovative about Tupperware were starting to hold it back. Still, Tupperware might have been able to survive if not for the competition. But when Earl Tupper's patents ran out, you could buy other perfectly functional food storage containers, often for less, at any store. You might call whatever container you were buying Tupperware, but strictly speaking, it was not. For years, things were obviously trending in the wrong direction, but it all came to a head in September of 2024. For Tupperware, the party is over. The iconic brand, once a staple of American kitchens, filed this week for bankruptcy, citing what it called macroeconomic challenges. Tupperware the brand still exists, even a diminished state. It's actually even sold in stores where it competes with its own descendants who are thriving. As Amanda said earlier, we're still living in the world that Tupperware built if we are also inhabiting it a little differently. So after the break, we dive into the brave new world world of modern storage. Science and tech are constantly evolving, with new discoveries happening every week on Curiosity Weekly from Discovery, make sense of some of the biggest questions and ideas shaping our world. Each week, unpack breaking science and tech news with expert guests who make it all make sense. In one episode, they'll cover the science of sleep and how scientists are now studying asmr videos on YouTube to see how people's brains are responding and how it can be used to help insomniacs. Also, did you know you can fly from Florida to England on a plane using recycled plastic jet fuel and that AI can now read hieroglyphs from Egyptian pyramids? Curiosity Weekly will cover all of this and more. It's for anyone who wants to understand the world a little better. Listen to Curiosity Weekly wherever you get your podcasts. A new year brings opportunity to reimagine ourselves and our wardrobes. This year, resolve to refresh your look with quality pieces and stay on budget with quints. I have a really nice sweater from them that I've been wearing like a fisherman sweater. It's just so cold. And I also have a thick, stretchy pair of pants that are good for running and lounging around the house. And I haven't even tried Quince's moisture Wicking bras and leggings which are designed to move with you during your workout. However you choose to refresh your look this year all Quint pieces are priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. Upgrade your closet this year without the upgraded price tag. Go to quints.com/decoder for 365 day returns plus free shipping on your order. That's Q U I n c e.com decoder to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quints.com/decoder.

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[Willa Paskin]

So Tupperware. The brand is troubled, but storage containers in general are as great an obsession as they ever have been.

[Unnamed Influencer]

I get so many questions on my videos about these acrylic organizers and I actually just bought a second set. It comes in so many different Remember.

[Willa Paskin]

Those restocking videos that's just barely scratching the surface. Storage containers are all over stores and not just the container store. They're on social media, TV shows, magazine magazines, they're the subject of books. And it's not just some top down phenomenon. They're in our homes, the things you buy to help organize and declutter the things you already have. The contemporary passion for storage has a lot of connections to the craze for Tupperware. It too is trendy, influencer driven, feminine coded, and all tangled up with our ideals about domesticity. But it also has some differences and I wanted to talk with Amanda Malt to try to make sense of them. I feel like in the last couple years I genuinely have become aware of like trends in storage, like trends in other people's habits about storing the private stuff in their house. Which I guess is just to say like this whole sphere has moved online and has therefore become public in just a way. Like it was not.

[Bob Keeling]

Yeah, I think Tupperware had, like, some public elements to it, because if you brought food in for the class at your kid's school, if you brought something to a potluck, there were elements of public performance that you could do with Tupperware. But I think what's happened is that we have sort of taken that to its logical extreme with all these, like acrylic and glass containers. And first instagram and then TikTok have created a sense that different parts of our home are actually opportunities for public performance in a way that they wouldn't necessarily have been in the past. Like how you organize your bathroom, how you organize your refrigerator, your pantry. Things like that are now like genres of content unto themselves.

[Unnamed Influencer]

I've been wanting to stock our guest bathroom up with a bunch of toiletry items for whenever guests are staying with us and may have forgotten some items. I've actually seen a few people, people on TikTok do this and thought it was such a great idea.

[Willa Paskin]

So how did this all happen? Like, what is the chronology here?

[Bob Keeling]

Yeah, so American homes are sort of like, stuffed to the brim with things. The American single family home has gotten a lot bigger. The closets within it have gotten a lot bigger over the past several decades. And people feel, I think, generally a sense of overwhelm with trying to figure out what to do with all their stuff.

[Willa Paskin]

The average size of a new home when Tupperware came on the market in the late 1940s was less than 1,000 square feet. Now it's two and a half times as large. Nearly one in five Americans rent an additional storage unit on top of that. And pantries bulge with bulk purchases from warehouse clubs like Costco, where memberships have soared.

[Bob Keeling]

And so in the late 2010s, early 2020s, you got this uptick in content that was about how to deal with that. Hello, I'm Marie Kondo. One of the more famous versions of that is Marie Kondo's Netflix show, Tidying Up. You feel cute. And then you have a lot of creators who run organizational businesses in their own lives that like, actually do this in people's homes. And the sort of granddaddy of them all is the Home Edit, which is a Nashville based business run at its outset by two women who would just go into your house and make everything look nice in your organizational areas.

[Unnamed Influencer]

We love organizing by color for any space. We really do like to rainbow, fy everything.

[Bob Keeling]

There are four steps. Their method in doing this requires A lot of clear acrylic to store all of this stuff in a visually appealing way. So unhealthy snacks in the basket so that they're concealed.

[Willa Paskin]

Yes.

[Bob Keeling]

Okay, but healthy snacks and clear.

[Willa Paskin]

Yes. So like all the pouches, it was.

[Bob Keeling]

This way of thinking about storing your own things that didn't really require you to get rid of a whole lot of stuff. It sort of was like, you know what if your stuff is actually gorgeous and beautiful and we could display it like you're in a museum or in a store.

[Willa Paskin]

If Marie Kondo successfully pointed out that we have too much stuff, the owners of the home edit and plenty of other influencers besides did like brownie wise before them. They helped consumers identify a problem that they didn't quite know storage containers could solve. Solve. This time, the problem isn't about food and food waste. It's about organizing the vast quantity of stuff that has accumulated in our homes since Tupperware first appeared.

[Bob Keeling]

And that really caught on with people. The idea that you could take all of that clutter and turn it into this beautiful display of abundance if you had the right containers and tools and methods is really, really tempting to people.

[Willa Paskin]

So just about abundance, like, it seems so tied up with what's going on with storage now. But that's not what was going on with Tupperware, right?

[Bob Keeling]

Yeah. So when Tupperware became popular, it was being bought by people who had experienced real scarcity, who had lived through the Great Depression or rationing during World War II. So you still had this sort of like leftover cultural understanding of like, waste not, want not eat the leftovers. Use everything you have. Like, this was a middle class or upper middle class value that stuck around. That has changed over time. In the US we have incredible consumer abundance in the US if you have resources, and to fail to take advantage of that for the benefit of your family in a lot of these affluent spaces is indicative that you are disorganized or lazy or not focused on the right things or whatever.

[Willa Paskin]

We used to use Tupperware to demonstrate our frugality, but now we aren't even frugal about how much Tupperware we have.

[Bob Keeling]

So now the correct way to run a household is to never run out of anything, to never hit the bottom of a container and be like, ah, I gotta go to the store. And displaying your incredible, huge, fully stocked pantry, that's like walking into a small grocery store is a demonstration that you are making things as comfortable as possible for everyone around you and for yourself.

[Willa Paskin]

This is all making me think of Khloe Kardashian's pantry.

[Bob Keeling]

Totally.

[Unnamed Influencer]

I am taking you in my pantry, literally.

[Bob Keeling]

In the annals of online status organization, Khloe Kardashian is a legend. Put her in the hall of fame.

[Unnamed Influencer]

As you could tell, I like containers. I like things to to all kind of look the same and have some fluid flow to it.

[Bob Keeling]

There are some really famous photos online of what is putatively a pantry, but looks like just a whole separate room unto itself that just includes a ton of packaged foods, sort of all lined up in either these white wire containers or clear acrylic containers. And some of them are on like clear acrylic lazy Susans so that you can spin them and see all the different bottles on the different sides. And then pasta has all been taken out of its container and loaded into these cylinders of either glass or acrylic.

[Unnamed Influencer]

And I like to kind of organize by category. Like these are all my crackers or cookies on this side. And also these are the things that I think I would grab the fastest, which is the junk food.

[Bob Keeling]

And everything is really spaced far apart. It looks like it is a boutique sort of. There is a lot of custom lighting installed under shelves and everything is sort of like warm and glowing.

[Willa Paskin]

Also, there is this sense where you're like, you must have a whole other storage room to restock this storage room every time one thing is used. Like it doesn't have the feeling like there's a lot of turnover here.

[Bob Keeling]

Yeah, it's a display space totally. It is not a functional space. Everything is just available. Everything is just at your fingertips. There's no sense of, oh, I wish I had that, or like, ugh, we're out of that. There's never any gap between having a thought and getting what you want. You're always prepared, which is probably great. I a person who is prepared for nothing.

[Willa Paskin]

This kind of super stocked pantry can seem like a bulwark against momentary irritation, toddler tantrums, and being without crackers when you're really craving one. But it's about something bigger too.

[Bob Keeling]

It's all getting a little doomsday prepper, isn't it?

[Unnamed Influencer]

Just like anybody else, I prioritize what's important to me. I keep a stacked pantry at all times, so if I pull from that stack, I need to replace it.

[Bob Keeling]

We are all pushing toward the idea of this totally sort of like self contained at home life. You need less and less from the outside world. The shit could hit the fan tomorrow and Khloe Kardashian could close off that compound and she and her kids could look of off can goods for years.

[Willa Paskin]

What do you think is gonna happen with this trend? Like, do you think we're at the outer limit of storage?

[Bob Keeling]

It does feel to me like we are sort of at or nearing a logical extreme of what you can do with clear acrylic. There's just so many videos of people using their storage containers for all kinds of purposes that probably some of them shouldn't even be used for. I've seen videos online of people decanting their orange juice in milk into these containers and putting them in their fridge. And in my mind I'm like, I don't, I don't think that's necessarily like a good idea. Like, it just seems like we are bumping up against the far extreme of what we can really do with this type of stuff.

[Willa Paskin]

To Amanda's point, there was a recent viral craze that involved people beautifully organizing their stuff in order to get through the security line at the airport. Like, think extremely artful and clever displays of a computer and a coat and a pair of shoes and a phone and a carry on. All in the spatial constraints of the storage bins provided by tsa.

[Unnamed Influencer]

Okay. To the girlies, these photos look so cool. If I met LAX and I tried to curate and take a photo the way that those TSA agents are going to hook me to a crate, crisp and eat me alive.

[Willa Paskin]

Like so much viral organizing content, these photos are weirdly satisfying, but they are also clever in a way that makes me feel like the low hanging fruit has already been plucked. When we're talking about organization, do you think you have been influenced by the storage container craze?

[Bob Keeling]

Yeah, absolutely. The only time that I've really sat down and looked for and bought these clear acrylic storage containers was I came back to New York from Atlanta after my dad died somewhat unexpectedly. And, you know, I had several more weeks off from work and I didn't really know what to do. And like, I felt like my brain wasn't working and my life had been tipped upside down. And I ordered some clear acrylic storage containers off of Amazon and I reorganized the shelves in my bathroom and I was like, you know what? I am overcome with grief. I do not know where to point myself in the morning. Like, I don't know what I'm doing. It was a time of incredible chaos in my life that was so far beyond the bounds of my ability to set it right. But, like, you know what I can set right? The shelves in my bathroom Storage containers.

[Willa Paskin]

Are cheap, plastic and pedestrian. But for decades now, we have been asking them to hold not just our physical stuff, but our emotional stuff too, and it's hard to imagine we're going to stop anytime soon.

[Bob Keeling]

There's always something that needs to be filled, and always something that you can go ahead and fill it with.

[Willa Paskin]

This is Decoder Ring. Welcome. I'm Willa Paskin. If you have any cultural mysteries you want us to decode, please email us@decoder ringslate.com this episode was reported and produced by Olivia Briley. Decoder Ring is also produced by me, Evan Chung, Max Friedman, and Katie Shepard. Derek John is Executive producer. Merritt Jacob is Senior Technical Director. If you'd like to know more about Tupperware, I recommend Bob Keeling's book Tupperware Unsealed, Brownie Wise, Earl Tupper and the Home Party Pioneers, and also the PBS documentary Tupperware. We'll link to them on our show page, as well as to Amanda Mull's great articles about both Tupperware and today's storage containers. If you aren't already a Slate plus member, you can subscribe now on Apple Podcasts by clicking Try Free at the top of the Decoder Ring show page or visit slate.comdecoder/ to get access wherever you listen. We're going to be releasing bonus episodes regularly, so please sign up now. Don't forget, Slate plus members also get to listen to our show and every other Slate podcast without any ads, and you'll get unlimited access to our website again. You can subscribe on Apple podcasts by clicking try free or visit slate.comdecoder plus to sign up. Thanks for listening. We'll see you in two weeks.

[Carvel]

Hi, it's Carvel from Slate's how to Podcast. Are you ready for a fresh start in 2025? To celebrate the new year, Slate is offering an extended free trial of Slate plus exclusively on Apple Podcasts. As a Slate plus member, you'll get ad free listening on every Slate show. Solve life's toughest problems on how to get advice you actually want to follow on Dear Prudence. Keep your pulse on the Zeitgeist with Culture Gabfest and navigate the big questions of life with death, sex, and money all uninterrupted. Plus starting this month, Howto is releasing bi weekly bonus episodes exclusively for Slate plus members. That means more advice, more experts, and more stories to help you tackle life's challenges head on. Don't miss out. Try Slate plus for free now on Apple Podcasts, or visit slate.com howtoplus to get access wherever you listen.