Tupperware changed women's lives. Now it might go out of business

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Tupperware is now selling some products at Target, but it still makes most of its money through individual sellers. Scott Olson/Getty Images hide caption

Tupperware is now selling some products at Target, but it still makes most of its money through individual sellers.

Stacey Sottung shows off a stack of colorful bowls in an Instagram video, filming for her followers a taste of the modern Tupperware party, which in addition to bowls and vintage tumblers, may include cake pans that go in the microwave, cold-brew carafes or vegetable choppers.

To this day, individual dealers like Sottung are how Tupperware makes most of its money. Many sell on Facebook or at virtual parties; Sottung has been trying out TikTok. But fundamentally, the brand's business harkens back to its 1940s roots: women selling to women, ideally in someone's living room.

"Tupperware is best when it's shown, when you can touch it, when you can feel it," says Sottung, who began selling as the Philly Tupperware Lady during the pandemic. "When I have the ability to go to a house and do a house party, I just love, love, love it."

Tupperware once revolutionized women's roles — in the kitchen and the country's economy — and sealed its place in American lore as a synonym for kitchen storage. It popularized party-style sales. Its plasticware is in museums. But now, the company faces financial peril.

Women attend a Tupperware Party in someone's back garden in 1955. Archive Photos/Getty Images hide caption

Decline happened slowly over a decade. Fewer people joined the sales force. Sales stagnated, then slid. Tupperware's value is now less than a tenth the size of its debt. Since April, the company has been warning of a possible pending bankruptcy. It has now missed deadlines for at least two financial reports.

Fath Davis Ruffins puts on disposable gloves before opening a dream 1950s cabinet: Tupperware storage containers, little spears for finger foods, serveware and cutlery, in a rainbow of pastels. This collection in storage at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History is proof of just how influential these products once were.

"We're in the forever business," Ruffins, a curator, explains the gloves.

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Tupperware's design and historic impact landed it in museums worldwide, including these bowls at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History. Smithsonian's National Museum of American History hide caption

Tupperware's design and historic impact landed it in museums worldwide, including these bowls at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History.

The forever business was certainly a goal for Tupperware, the brainchild of inventor Earl Tupper. After World War II, he created a softer durable plastic and patented a lid with a double seal, said to be inspired by the paint can.

But the invention needed a show-and-tell. Enter Brownie Wise, a single mother in Detroit, who convinced Tupper to sell at Tupperware parties and oversaw their runaway success. Tupperware ladies hustled to get a cut of each sale to friends or neighbors, or win grand prizes like Cadillacs and trips to Disney.

It was the perfect moment for the company: women had lost wartime jobs to men; a spike in divorces left many, like Wise, scrambling for income with few well-paying options; and of course,the baby boom arrived, leading to bigger families and housewives at home in the sprawling suburbs.