As we reel from the news that the stalwart of many a kitchen and picnic, Tupperware, files for bankruptcy, Dame Jen Greenhalgh recalls the place this brand holds in many of our hearts.
Cast your mind to the dusty corners of your kitchen cupboards, I’m certain you have a collection of assorted Tupperware—bases long estranged from lids, the container that only comes out once a year for the Christmas cake, the box stained with the yellow hue of curries past.
But do you?
Or do you actually have a collection of containers from various other brands—Rubbermaid or Sistema, perhaps?
Tupperware has, since its launch in 1946, become one of those brands that we use as a common noun. Like Hoover, Launderette, or AstroTurf. This level of recognition and genericisation is rarely good for brands in the long term, and that, sadly, seems to be true for Tupperware, as they have filed for bankruptcy in America this week. Though the UK arm remains unaffected currently, it’s certainly made me feel nostalgic for all those brightly coloured tubs of my childhood.
One of my most vivid and treasured memories is climbing on the step stool in my aunt’s pantry to peel back the lids of Tupperware containers to assess what I could get my sticky little fat fingers on inside. Leftover dark fruity malt loaf? A slice of blackcurrant pie? A Cumberland sausage roll or a jumble of bulk-bought broken biscuits?
My Aunt Renee was my surrogate grandmother. Being 16 years older than my mum, she was very much the matriarch in one of those jumbled, multi-generational, mixed-up conjoined family households that were common in the post-war, working-class North West.
She was also a wonderful cook and made almost everything from scratch every day, mostly out of necessity. There was always veg being dug up from the garden and scrubbed for tea, or bread rising somewhere. She was also very much defined by the austerity and rationing of earlier years and never ever threw anything away. Buttons were cut off old clothes and squirreled away in tins, and leftovers and the day’s baking went into Tupperware.
Those Tupperware boxes, bowls, and jugs were ferried around from house to house, on picnics, in the car for sarnies or ginger nuts to counteract car sickness. There was a blue flowered bowl with a well-worn, scuffed white lid that was used exclusively for bird food, a tall cereal container with a yellow flip lid stuffed with my least favourite Weetabix, and a hybrid cake stand/cake transporter that had a very satisfying clip-on lid.
I’m not the only one to have extensive and fond Tupperware memories. Our very own Dame Cathy Sloman’s mum was a Tupperware party host and recalls how those were not always as straightforward as you would think. She told me that, when at a party at her friend Iris’s house, a neighbour’s husband burst in and demanded that she went home with him “immediately” and accused Iris of holding an orgy! “We all sat there open-mouthed!” Quite! I’m not sure how he came to that conclusion. The mind boggles!
Tupperware is so versatile it wasn’t even just the containers themselves that proved useful. She also told me that “after I had a party, all the Tupperware was delivered in an enormous box which I then decorated and put Patrick (Cathy’s younger brother), aged about 2/3, in, dressed as a Jack-in-the-Box. It was for a Sunday School fancy dress competition and two of the teachers carried the box on to the stage, and we had told him not to jump up until they knocked on the box. Great success.”
If only that success could be translated to sales today. I’m hoping that Tupperware can shake off that common noun status and find itself a new place in today’s climate and waste conscious society, but whether the brand survives or not, the memories it holds for so many of us will continue to be passed down, lid by lid.
Family friend of Dame Cathy Sloman, recalls with affection her time hosting Tupperware parties. Here she shares her memories with Cathy…
Regular Tupperware hostess, Angela, believes Tupperware parties were one of the first of their kind, paving the way for other companies to offer their products to customers in the comfort of their own or their friends’ homes. Jewellery, beauty, clothing and so much more!
Angela hosted many a party and, although as hostess she got a bonus for a great sales evening, it wasn’t all about making money – she loved getting friends and neighbours over for drinks and nibbles and chat about the joys of food storage.
She still remembers her excitement at decanting her store cupboard items from the old (much-loved) pantry tins in to the fashionable new containers, with their labels – and she still uses them.
It wasn’t just about storage to keep your cupboards spick and span – there were cooking aids, such as the trusty bowl with a lid that had a hole in so you could mix cream or icing without it spurting out all over the kitchen. Angela still uses her multi purpose use egg “thing” – a type of small jug, with a lemon squeezer inside and a egg separator and a lid. All in one handy item – genius!
Angela’s aunt invested in a picnic set, a large box filled with round containers, large and small together with beakers again all with lids and the container had a plastic handle for carrying. Something for every conceivable picnic treat.
There were very small travel dishes for baby food, warmed up with boiled water from a flask – so much easier for mums on the move these days. Tupperware even produced a round ball with holes and shapes that her boys spend hours inserting (while she was busy cooking).
For Angela it was always exciting to see what new products she absolutely need to have for her collection…