Earl Tupper knew immediately that Polyethylene, the new plastic that was formulated in 1942, was exactly what he had been looking for over the past several years. A Du Pont chemist, Tupper saw that the pliable, attractive, and very long-lasting synthetic polymer was the right material for a host of home products. He began by producing a bathroom drinking glass available in a rainbow of colors and quickly moved on to his famous lidded bowls. His products were originally sold in retail stores, but he had another marketing idea that would make him a multimillionaire.
In the late 1940s, Thomas Damigella (in Massachusetts) and Brownie Wise (in Florida) were selling household products through Stanley Home Products. Purchasing through local plastics distributors, both began offering Tupperware as part of their product line, and were moving enough Tupperware to attract Earl Tupper's attention. In 1948, Tupper met with Damigella, Wise, and several other local distributors at a Sheraton in Worcester Massachusetts to discuss a new distribution plan. Modelled on the home party plan pioneered by Stanley Home Products and expanded and refined by Brownie Wise, the home party plan became and remains the exclusive outlet for Tupperware.
His Tupperware parties proved to be an enormous success, and fit in perfectly with the new mobility of Americans in the postwar era. Wherever Americans moved, and they moved more with every passing year, they would find a Tupperware party where housewives could meet new neighbors and of course purchase some more of Earl Tupper’s extremely useful products.
Comedians loved to joke about Tupperware parties, but that just provided free publicity. By 1958, Mr. Tupper was able to sell his company for approximately sixteen million dollars and retire for life.
