78 Australian House & GardenH&G INSIDER
Design moment
TUPPERWARE
An innovative design and novel
party plan sealed this brand’s
success, writes Chris Pearson.when they met Tupperware president
Hamer Wilson, who invited them to a
sales party. Impressed, Mary o ered
to stage one Down Under.
Back home, her guests pored over
the array of Wonderlier bowls and lidded
Bell tumblers, then mainstays of the
Tupperware pantry. Convenient and
durable, they proved to be instant hits.
The product line changed little in the
1960s, apart from new colours. In the
’70s, canisters in orange, mustard and
jungle green, with decorative foil motifs,
became de rigueur. Heat-and-eat ranges
responded to the 1980s microwave
revolution. Later the range expanded to
include essentials such as cookware,
knives and even toys.
Pat Murphy of Queensland sold them
all. Now in her 80s, she was a
Tupperware consultant for 50 years and
only recently retired, a er holding more
than 4000 parties. The mother of four
found the job o ered fl exible hours and
an enjoyable social aspect. “You could
have fun and get paid for it,” she says.
Today, the focus has shi ed from
stay-at-home housewives to time-poor
families. “Tupperware has moved beyond
plastics and storage into areas like the
microwave, freezer and fridge, to help
consumers save time,” says Stephen
Beddoe, managing director of Tupperware
Australia/New Zealand. Current best
sellers are the MicroSteamer, the Extra
Chef food processor and perennially
popular Modular Mates mixed containers.WHAT IT MEANS TO US
Tupperware is now sold in more than 100
countries through 1.9 million consultants.
In Australia, with a strong social media
presence and even sponsorship of the
AFL, the company is targeting a very
di erent market to the ladies of 1960s
Camberwell. Meanwhile, Tupperware
Unsealed, a fi lm starring Sandra Bullock
as Brownie Wise, is in development.
The lights won’t be going down on the
Tupperware party any time soon. #B
ehind closed curtains in a home
in Camberwell, Victoria, one
night in 1961, a party was in full
swing. A dozen women, drinking tea and
nibbling sandwiches, were gathered
around a woman opening and closing
neatly stacked storage containers. She
invited her audience to do the same. But
they were li ing the lid on more than
containers. They were pioneers in a
global phenomenon, because this was
Australia’s fi rst Tupperware party.
In the early 1940s, US inventor Earl
Tupper was experimenting with purifi ed
by-products of the burgeoning plastics
industry. The result was a light, fl exible
material, moulded into stackable, airtight
containers that would keep food fresh for
longer. This was facilitated by a ‘burping’
seal, later patented, which expelled air as
you closed the lid. The new containers
were perfect for the refrigerators fi nding
their way into US households.
In 1946 Tupper introduced his products
to retail stores... where they languished
on the shelves. Enter an entrepreneurial
woman named Brownie Wise. She
believed the public had to be shown how
the products worked. In the early ’50s
she began selling Tupperware through
home parties. In the postwar US, when
women were tied to the kitchen, she
found no shortage of recruits. The party
became the sole means of distribution,
while Brownie became a celebrity.
Melbourne couple Craig and Mary
Paton were in the US in the late 1950sA Servalier set
from the 1990s.A 1980s salad
bowl and server.Foil motifs
adorned
Tupperware of
the 1970s.Tupperware’s
early product line
at a 1950s party.Versatile,
stackable
containers from
the 1960s.Coastal bowls
from the current
Tupperware
range.Foil motifs
adorned
Tupperware of Tupperware of
the 1970s.A 1980s salad
bowl and server.Versatile, Versatile,
stackable
containers from
the 1960s.Coastal bowls
from the current
Tupperware Tupperware
range.range.Photography from Getty Images (1960s), courtesy Tupperware (all others).