major funding for Tupperware provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities additional funding provided by the Massachusetts foundation for the [Music] humanities American business women make an impression on America's economy through home party selling in millions of homes Across the Nation each year in the 1950s women discovered they could make thousands even Millions from bowls that burped there did you hear it Tupperware ladies built an Empire by selling their Plastic Products in living rooms across the country at Tupperware parties and anyway I made the party fun they really had a good time and they liked
playing the games I I'd say well that's it well one more come on Leon one more game haven't you wished for unspillable containers that wouldn't break I'm here to show you modern dishes for modern living that will save you time and money tupperware's Creator was a small town inventor with oversized dreams named Earl Silas Tupper the man was a genius not with people though with product it took a genius with people a woman named Brownie wise to push tupper's product onto the world stage when she came out all the halalu and the Applause and this
was our Brownie and everyone wanted to be like a brownie I guess best Bernstein lost about 2530 lb 20 to look like brownie my impression was your here was was a powerful woman a woman ahead of her time brownie had the ability to just talk to your dreams things you didn't even know you wanted she draw these beautiful pictures and you could suddenly see yourself being you know something that you hadn't thought about before you have to understand in the 50s women didn't get too much recognition they were teased on all the comedy shows about
boy she's your spends my money in a hurry and you hear these were the jokes of the times then in the back in the ' 50s you know back then it was a masculine World wives done what their husbands told them to do without arguing I guess my generation is the one that broke that up I've got thater feeling up in my head deep in my heart down in my toes I've got that tougher feeling all over me all over me [Music] [Music] to I wish I wish the faucet wouldn't drip all day I wish
that refrigerator door would close and stay closed well I I frankly think that everybody believed A Woman's Place was in the home and in the kitchen and in the bed and that was it I I think that that uh a lot of men did not want their wives to go out and earn money a brand new sink built in oven a new refrigerator and a phone a kitchen phone a bright red phone I got to go goodbye goodbye goodbye I'll call you later women were celebrated for working in defense factories during World War II but
but after the war they got a clear message go back to the kitchen I got divorced after the war was over yes and uh it was tough and I knew I had to make money I came from a very poor family I mean very poor they were farmers and not good ones at that I guess and I would hate to think that my life would have been like that forever America had survived the depression in World War II and the country was booming women who' done without now wanted a piece of the pie tupperware's burping
bowls provided just the chance they needed I was looking for something to do to earn some money because on a farm I wanted this blonde coffee t and that is just not on the list so I went to that party and she said I made $10 here today there wasn't anything that I could have done and worked all day at that time in the Panhandle and have made $10 so I was thinking gosh if I could just make $5 10 parties down the road I could have that blonde coffee table so there I went home
with my kit and mother said now vanon you can do that Bob said it won't amount to nothing you'll hold a few parties and we'll have all his junk on hand and he didn't know at that time that I was having to pay for that junk and it didn't seem like the right time to tell him so I just didn't [Music] tell Tupperware offered people with limited education a shot at success the training was on the job I we were in the bedroom so I said Frank that was our only private room cuz we lived
in a house with everybody we didn't have place yet I'm going to sit on the bed you're going to set the kid up on the dresser then you'll stand in front of this mirror and you'll start your Spiel he says okay so we set it up now I sit on the bed and I'm really going to listen to this so Frank gets up and he says good evening ladies and I burst out laughing Tupperware was designed with an accent on Beauty for people of fine taste and with an ACC my first party was my next
door neighbor and I must have started setting up the display about 1:00 in the afternoon for 7:00 party I was a nervous wreck most Tupperware dealers had never imagined themselves as business women but browny wise encouraged them to remake themselves much as she'd remade herself years before in 1938 brownie was stuck in a bad marriage in snowy Detroit with an infant son she was 24 years old well my mother didn't talk much about her childhood it may have been because she was too poor or too backwards or didn't have enough education she'd grown up in
rural Georgia the product of a broken marriage her mother traveled as a union organizer and left her for years years at a time with her cousins she never thought that Bry never thought that Georgia was a place to brag about being from brownie married a Ford Motor Company employee and moved North my parents were divorced when I was 3 years old my mother took night courses and worked as a secretary she could type A mile a minute we did scrape by Brownie's life turned around one day in 1947 someone knocked on our door selling Stanley
Home Products and my mother said she could do a better demonstration than that woman did on her Stanley Home Products was part of a long tradition of men selling products door too demonstrating brushes vacuums pots and pans but Stanley added something new I've heard a little about this kind of party but I've often wondered how it works well here's the idea all you have to do is invite about 12 or 15 of your friends to drop over some afternoon or evening for a party and I'll help you put it on tell them we'll have lots
of fun and then I suppose you take orders from the guest yes but no high pressure selling none of your friends will be embarrassed into buy home party selling appeal to women it was a job that took advantage of their Network works of friends and relatives brownie wise was a star in Stanley and soon became a manager motivating others hi gang Florence siwicki has set a new record for the time it takes to build success in Stanley and what Florence awiki is doing you can do too be wise Stanley eyes another star Stanley dealer in
the Detroit area was 16-year-old Gary McDonald most of the people in Stanley of course were uh in their 20s or 30s or 40s so I think I was probably the only teenager in our part of the country at least it was Gary McDonald who brought Tupperware and brownie wise together well my first exposure to Tupperware was when I saw it in the JL Hudson department store and I said wow that is a product which must be demonstrated Gary and brownie left Stanley and started their own Tupperware home party business to Mary karanda for the juicy
Hostess party she napped last week that was wonderful Mary good luck to you one and all though confidentially kids luck has very little to do with it we got calls from uh Mr tupper's sales manager who said just what in the hell are you people doing to sell the amount of Tupperware you're selling this was a lucky turn in the life of Earl Silas Tupper he grown up dirt poor in central Massachusetts he barely graduated from high school but was obsessed with becoming a millionaire convinced he could be the next Edison or Ford a tree
surgeon by day at night he filled notebooks with his inventions got his hands on some pure polyethylene pellets a recently invented wartime plastic Dupont didn't believe raw polyethylene could be molded but Earl tinkered with his machines for months and invented the wonder Bowl and the Tupper seal made the story of how he got the idea of using the seal he says I can make a seal that would fit it exactly and would be watertight and airtight even though it's actually I got the idea from a paint [Music] can called the company to complain that her
order was late again she insisted on speaking to Mr Tupper himself he would improve his business she told him if he sold Tupperware only at home parties he wanted to hear more and invited her to Massachusetts and she convinced him that this was the way to go and that he should pull out his Tupperware out of every other place and go strictly on the party plan and he did Earl hired brownie on the spot this was an unlikely but perfect match mother was very smooth very Gentile and a perfect lady and Earl Tupper was um
a little rougher on edges got Dale carneg of course who would have fixed him up good and so she worked late and Mr Tupper would work late and he would come over from his office and they would work together which probably created a little bit of Gossip in the town we're talking small town USA here she was always Brownie and Mr Tupper was always Mr Tupper brownie didn't stay in Massachusetts long Earl split his company in two with brownie heading up the sales operation called Tupperware home parties almost immediately brownie was talking about moving to
Florida and that was her heart's desire to get Tupper headquarters in Florida Earl Tupper bought a th000 Acres of cow pasture and swamp in CMI Florida and brownie transformed it into a fantasy landscape when you first drive up you're going oh my gosh the beautiful Lake out in front first time I ever saw it I believe the sign was there then that welcome to Tupperware and it was just um you know really set your heart pounding because it was very impressive brownie created a monument to salesmanship a pilgrimage site for her Salesforce it was like
a a fairy tale like a you're in you know Wonderland or something she made up New Traditions she baptized poly pond with polyethylene pellets showed her dealers how to Place their wishes in 2 OZ Tupperware containers then toss them in the wishing [Music] well we came from dry land flat land farm land not too far away from the Dust Bowl years this looked wonderful brownie staff meetings were brainstorming sessions everyone contributed and brownie presided from her peacock chair Rah was Florida this is motivation time Rah let's really get up there let's think of the next
promotion rise and shine Rudy tootu who you going to recruit all of this stuff they were the rasm [Music] Matas I'm sure Mr Tupper was very much aware of everything that brownie was doing I'm sure she would never do anything major without consulting with him and you know with all these business meetings and conferences and so on he had to have been aware of what she was doing and he approved I'm sure he did for the most part Earl was all business a perfectionist with a short fuse but not when it came to brownie brownie
I've just opened your package tonight the one with the two party pictures you sure look super anyone that cute has no right to be so smart I'm eating the nuts and candy now yum yum many thanks to you brownie on our first birthday for the happiest hours this business has known sincerely Earl s tuer we get lots of wonderful letters from consumers anyone who can create a product outstanding enough to consistently draw forth that sort of unsolicited praise and enthusiasm should be very proud of himself I hope you are BW you know the era and
the business were made for each other women didn't have a car to get around anywhere so we sat home all day and we took care of our kids so a Tupperware party was the social function it was the way to get away from the kids for a few hours during the week in the city we lived in an Italian um area probably could have walked down the street and had three tupp Weare parties that week and didn't even have to get in your car most of them would be in apartment buildings apartment three three family
Deckers and stuff like that walk ups when I sold as a dealer yeah I travel lots of miles I was 13 miles from the closest little town uh and then worked a lot of Farm neighborhood 25 miles from the next two towns and I prefer to hold three parties a day that's the way I like to work and then I could be home a day and if I didn't get that worked out I was just running like a crazy woman from one place to the other but you know I'd have three and four parties a
day I'd have one a breakfast party I'd have a party between breakfast and lunch sometimes I lunch in party afternoon party sometime night parties I went the whole route I like it they were selling to themselves they were selling to people with the same needs same budget right that they had so when they walked in and said I haven't thrown away ahe of lettuce in six months cuz even though my family doesn't eat it fast enough when I put in my Cris bit it doesn't turn brown it doesn't go at this whole thing keeps up
out of the water it works like a charm you really should try one it's only $149 your demonstration is so much better when it's spoken with authority and so when I try this out and say I kept bread for this long I kept sliced tomatoes from one meal to the next I had lettuce crisp or several days then you was more it was more effective and we we exaggerated a lot too we did we we got carried away with our own stories we we would make it like you could you could keep the food in
there for months but it wasn't so it wasn't so but you know that's the way we felt some foods yes oh yeah but you know macaronis flow sugar Dry Goods but but we would you know we would we would exaggerate brownie always said if we build the people they'll build the business brownie traveled all over the country 150,000 m a year to visit her growing Salesforce she loved them and they idolized her she even gave away the clothes she wore as prizes she she would just right on the stage just almost like she suddenly thought
of something like this do you like this outfit well I'll tell you what whichever one of you does so and so you can have this outfit she you got every distributor's sales figures every day every day I guess all of them promoted the manager got a note handwritten from brownie wise brownie used everything she could to motivate her growing network of dealers to stand up in front of a group and have that wonderful magical sound of Applause oh hey they do anything for that she rolled out the red carpet for the stars of her Salesforce
and she made sure they were featured front and center each month in tupperware Sparks a mention was good but a photo with brownie was the [Music] best most people only had their name in the paper when they graduated from high school or when they got married or when they die and uh I think that she Drew on all aspects of that uh to to create a feeling in these people that they were a queen that they were special that they were somebody [Music] different browny sent a small army of Tupperware ladies out across the country
recruiting more dealers at a party I'd see a lady who seemed to be very enthusiastic she seemed to like people she was bubbly type of person and I would say to her you know I don't know if you've ever thought about doing any work outside your home but you would be a terrific Tupperware lady when we were recruiting people we tried to uh feel a need for something that they wanted like I want new carpet or I want a new refrigerator and then we would map out for them how many parties they would have to
hold in order to get whatever it was that they wanted and after the party's over I'll take a little extra time with you and I'll show you exactly what I sold I will show you exactly what the Tupperware cost me what the hostess gift cost and you will see when I have it all on a piece of paper exactly how much money you would have made if you had done what you saw me do the type of lady that decides to sell Tupperware I do not think there's a set type not by age or race
or anything I think it depends on who introduces them to it I had a tendency to recruit when I first started more young people because I was young and I had children so I think you recruit someone like yourself hello this is brownie will you do yourself and someone else a big favor take a little extra time this week and call back on some of the people that you've t talk to about being a Tupperware dealer she would say now how many dealers have you recruited in a month Mary perhaps there is someone in your
own family or a very close neighbor who needs the money that Tupperware can supply sometimes we Overlook the prospects closest to home you know she says wouldn't it be wonderful she squeezed your hand and said if it would be eight or 10 wouldn't that be nice oh and where we when I come up to to your Rally or whatever I want you to tell me you did it so I ran home you did it and I did it when I first started and my husband was so against it uh he belonged to the Lion's Club
and they had a wife's evening or something anyway he said now whatever you do you better not be talking about tupperware when you go there and I said okay so I feel some little 2 oz smidget just with water colored water took them with me put them in my purse and I accidentally turned my purse over and they rolled out everybody won't know what it was so that was my chance and I dated parties I had to talk to the husband at some length to persuade him to let her come in just part-time to make
a little extra money and I used to say you know you bring in the bread you're the bread winner but she can bring in a little cake Earl Tupper personally designed every new piece of Tupperware and sent prototypes to Florida as Mr Tupper would design a product he would send it to me and it was sent to me personal to Elsie mortland to be opened by Elsie mortland only he he um really kind of treasured uh the secrecy of what he was doing and how he was doing it Earl felt his product should be able
to sell itself but the marketing experts were telling him something different when he hired a fancy Madison Avenue firm to promote his growing company they told him You' got three things going for you a good marketing plan a great product but what's really unique is having a charismatic female executive you should run with that Earl resisted putting brownie above his product [Music] Earl Tupper was not too sure in the beginning but by the time Rutter and Finn got through all of the potential of brownie being the peg for the stories he was buying into that
and so we made brownie the Queen of the Universe and indeed uh as far as our people were were concerned she was in 1954 brownie brought the Tupperware dealers and managers to headquarters for the first first Tupperware Jubilee a 4-day Extravaganza designed to build the Loyalty of the Tupperware ladies 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 it's just like a family reunion and with so many brothers and sisters the staff decided jubilees should have a theme the
first was the Gold Rush 600 shovels on an acre of ground and do we have fun watches diamond rings mint coat television sets we really strike gold I was so excited I got on that shovel and I dug up that dirt and I hit a box and I pulled the box out of the the ground opened it up and it was a double boiler an echo wear and I still have that from all those years I just saved that little double boiler with a cover I thought it was [Music] wonderful even though Tupperware was still
a small company its publicity efforts began to pay off those photographers they're from Life magazine and business week we had the people down from Business Week thinking well you know we're going to get maybe a column or column and a half in business week because this is sort of unusual and we wound up with a cover for the first time in the Magazine's history a woman on the cover and naming her a businesswoman of the Year well you know we were kind of happy it was working even better than they had hoped the product the
plan and the person brownie had turned the stereotype of the suedes shoed door-to-door salesman into a woman in heels no less our managers when they got promoted they were told that they were to wear a hat and wear gloves when they went recruiting on their recruiting calls and heels heels yes and hoes because some of them were running around without hose on it was a very priv lged job and selling had been denoted back in the 50s and 60s like a hustle and tupperware moved us up to being a lady all this was really Uptown
and if you ever won a trip with Tupperware you were just treated like royalty you know I'm sitting on top of the world women who'd worked in factories were now Tupperware ladies dressed in white gloves and [Applause] [Music] hats as the company grew so did the dealers [Applause] [Music] enthusiasm jubilees got more elaborate and Brownie and her staff borrowed without apology from TV game shows would you like to be Queen for a Day from beauty [Music] pageants the movies what is this the Cavalry Supply train frightens the Indians off and drops gifts for the second
category of Tupperware salespeople children's fairy tales trumpets Harald the colleag captains as they Charmed giant Cobra into a hypnotic State removing another obstacle to the city of Richards she try anything and intuitively she understood [Music] Earl Tupper never showed up at a Jubilee He did not want to be in the in the Limelight he was invited but [Music] no I'll make you a promise if you will sell Tupperware with your left hand and sell America with your right hand you will sell more Tupperware with the left hand than you ever sold with both hands [Applause]
before business sessions such as these occupied more than 65% of jubiler time they actually had homework that they had to do and there were tests that they took and at the end of every Jubilee there was a graduation here youve got women that are in their 40s never graduated high school coming across this stage it it must seem kind of corny but I can tell you we were very proud to walk across that stage and I remember the year that I was at a seminar and I was valedictorian and I had to leave the last
line off my speech I was about to cry it was very important and it was to everybody I choked up but that's just the way it was and it's meant an awful lot to thousands and thousands of women who were able to go out and make a good living for themselves and their family that never dreamed that it would turn out that way the most successful tuare ladies were moving up the ranks in 1951 there were only eight distributors by 1956 there were more than 100 distributor couples selling Tupperware in every part of the country
some even made Millions so when I had six people and a date book with four to um three to five parties a week in it I could be promoted from dealer to manager as a manager I got this added Commission on my my team my unit and I helped them and trained them and motivated them and got them to sales rallies and then from from that point to move up to distributor that was a longer haul I really had to be one of the top managers in the country and that wasn't [Music] easy brownie and
her staff believed it was ideal for two people to run a distributorship one to oversee sales and one to manage the warehouse brownie made the distributorship offer to top managers and their their husbands saying yes meant the husband gave up his job and joined his wife in tupperware I remember the stories of my grandparents uh disapproving of the move I know that all of my dad's friends disapproved of his giving up the the uh fireman position um for this risky thing nobody had ever heard of before it also meant moving wherever Tupperware needed a distributor
well we were so excited about going to be Distributors was incredible Fort Wayne Indiana where's Fort Wayne Indiana we had no idea so when we left for St Louis uh we had my two boys that from a previous marriage Michael and Patrick and our dog Blondie we bought a brand new Mercury station wagon oh that was a gorgeous car wood on the side leather interior and we took off for St Louis moving into wit was an experience I stayed lost most of the time uh Bob would have to lead me to my party sometimes and
then I usually could get back home our arrival into Indiana we always said we must have come in the back way I'm not sure I just couldn't believe what I was seeing and I thought my gosh how are you ever going to sell Tupperware they must all be hundred years old in this city and it it was just really got me scared after couple blocks I started crying and I thought oh my mother was right we should have never done [Music] this brownie understood the problems these young distributor couples [Music] faced success rarely comes overnight
this is when the husband begins to think back to the time when he had that steady job and her tension increases and we were all willing to move thousands of miles our husbands quit their jobs we just went out on a wing at a [Music] prayer every Monday morning Distributors held sales rallies for their managers and dealers on a local scale they imitated what brownie did at believe we gave all different hints and helps how to speak on the phone how to talk to people on the street how to knock at a door and all
these hints were Incorporated at your sales rally and they were looking for knowledge how do I get better how could I sell more how do I say it to sound better at our rallies my father would always dress up as the Tupperware lady and it was this kind of yellow Gham dress with a pinor and a wig with [Music] pigtails and I don't know you know part of the maybe it's some dark thing about how people like to see men dressed up as girls I don't know it runs through Tupperware and the whole idea of
the Tupperware lady um was handed down to my generation and my husband picked up that role and did that for a while and his out he had one Carmen Miranda outfit with great big colored B earrings and these big beads and thongs with butterflies on them and oh his outfits were outlandish just outlandish and fun it was fun I mean it just seemed I was glad that none of my college friends could see me doing this [Music] but Tupperware a company built by women was ultimately run by men even brownie surr rounded herself with men
in an interview that was done for the Cosmopolitan magazine the reporter asked her why she didn't have any women on her staff and she said if there's going to be a primadana on this staff I'm it and the only one uh Tupperware was such a woman's company um right from the bottom to just about the top and then suddenly magically it wasn't a woman's company anymore all the executives were Ma and um it was at the distributor level I think where it became the man and the woman working together and then suddenly The Next Step
was a man step yeah the next step after being a successful distributor is to for some they would say okay can I get on staff can I be a regional that's a was a very showy position in the company there was like only 10 or 11 of them it was very hard on marriages when the guys were promoted and given the title and the girls were told that they were going to work with their husbands and all of a sudden they were pushed out I I think brownie surrounded herself with guys on the staff because
that was why it was done major corporations were run by men she she was not the Trailblazer that you would think in as much as there was not an all girl band here I mean she was realistic enough to know that at some level Bankers don't talk to [Music] women brownie lived in the spotlight brownie wi became Tupperware and tupperware became brownie wi they were almost synonymous they say you should never believe your own press notices well she began to believe hers and uh it made her feel that she was uh Irreplaceable being in the
spotlight fulltime began to take its toll on brownie the company's success put more demands on her the growing number of salese all wanted her attention she was pulled in different directions and she was exhausted yes I remember she went to the Mayo Clinic and she was very disappointed that they couldn't find anything wrong with her you see I really don't believe that I know of any any friends of hers I don't remember her having any personal friends I think her whole life was the business she had a typewriter on her bed she'd wake up in
the middle of night and scribble down ideas about business oh yeah most people had no idea what fulltime me where he was in 1957 Brownie's dealer force was so successful they were selling more than Earl's factories could produce when brownie demanded that Earl keep up he was more than a little annoyed small disagreements between them escalated quickly Dear Mrs wise sales management means Sales Management and not just sales the manufacturer isn't in the business for the benefit of the the sales department very truly yours Earl s Tupper president your comment that the sales were wild
uncontrolled consumer demand seemed inappropriate most manufacturers would welcome wild consumer [Music] demand at the 1957 Jubilee tupperware's Rank and file were oblivious to the storm clouds gathering over the company yes this is Jubilee 1957 the Tupperware homecoming Jubilee called by many the most unusual sales convention in the world dear brownie I believe a lot of our problems could be solved if you would just keep me informed you don't have any business secrets from me have you ever seen a million dollar worth of sales know how here it is brownie wise with some of the nation's
foremost sales authorities don't you realize that I would do nothing but write letters and memos if I had to put everything into writing it used to be when I had something to discuss with you I could pick up the telephone I can't do that anymore apparently you have not chosen to talk to me one of the speakers is Paul McAdam who uses Brownie's book best wishes as part of his talk Earl was annoyed that brownie hadn't asked his permission to give out copies of her book a collection of her motivational talks did you have in
mind that I was planning to get rich on this book if so and it sounds that way I'm surprised at you yes I bought 6,000 books for thp without any okay I also built the Pavilion designed and contracted for the lakes in the Garden Wall etc etc without any okay let's see some okays I got on other projects shall we Tupperware projected its sales would reach $100 million several bigger businesses approached Earl wanting to buy the company which he owned outright he considered cashing out he wanted to sell the company and he felt he couldn't
sell it with a woman the head of it and certainly a woman with such great power over the whole system over the whole organization after almost 7 years together the relationship between Earl and brownie neared the breaking point just before Christmas 1957 he raised questions about her expenses for jubilees prizes clothing and Landscaping I think she made a mistake in her figures that last year and this was one of the things she would not take her books up to Rhode Island Earl ordered brownie to bring the books to New England immediately she refused claiming she
was Ill personal dear brownie from your recent conduct you seem to resist coming up here there can be no justification for refusal or unreasonable delay since I'm president of the corporation sincerely Earl s Tupper P.S let's go for a happy New Year in what way have I not carried out your wishes believe me if I haven't it's because I haven't been able to find out what your wishes are because I have certainly never been secretive with you about what's going on not want to give her anything and and I was very vocal and said well
that's just not right and that's when he came up with the $335,000 and she didn't have a contract no Employment contract and the clothes that she wore she never owned those clothes that's what we were told she didn't even own it she didn't own nothing she kind of just sort of like disappeared and then people ask questions but then nobody really gives you an answer you know it was I thought too sudden for her to have have quit or retired so I assumed something had gone BR she was the queen you know all of a
sudden the queen was gone that summer Tupperware put on its first Jubilee without brownie this one had a pirate theme official uniform is eye patches bandanas and cutlasses and new things in tupperware are shown by Gary McDonald here is the new brush comb 3 months before Jubilee brownie had started a new home party company Cinderella Cosmetics we had a cream of Tupperware at this particular Jubilee we were worrying whether or not she would romance them over into Cinderella they had a double page ad in the CMI newspaper announcing the launch of Cinderella Cosmetics with brownie
wise uh the famous brownie wise as uh president of the company in the ad brownie invited the Tupperware dealers to come learn about her new business Cinderella Gary McDonald and HR Wilson browny's former Chief lieutenants were now in charge no one knew what would happen next and I believe that leadership prevailed HR uh made a very wise decision he said you know rather than try to hide this or bury it why don't we just face a head on and in fact I'll tell you what and he turned to me and he said Pat why don't
you get down of the Sentinel and see if you can buy about 2,000 copies of this paper and he said we'll just pass them out and he made it uh very clear that anybody in that audience that I can hear that speech even today that anybody in the audience anybody out there that would like to get up and go out the door and go with brownie wise's new organization please feel free to do it and not a soul not a soul stood up and walked out that door and uh I think that was a downfall
uh uh she was an idol on a pedestal from that day on she fell off of that pedestal I think they were smart enough to know that Tupperware was where their bread and butter was and I think at that time Tupperware was doing so well that she didn't really want to rock the boat I said brownie I don't think I could do it because I wouldn't have the belief or the feeling for the these products that I have for Tupperware I said as far as I'm concerned I'm stuck with Tupperware well she says well I'm
sorry then that me means that means that our relationship has ended I said well I'm sorry too [Music] brownie lost more than her job she also lost her Salesforce the people who adored her the Tupperware ladies brownie had trained were able to carry on without her and of course I inquired about brownie I expected to see at least pictures of her around but no one seemed to know who brownie was or the fact that she might have been important they appeared to have erased her right out of their files at the time she was really
purged from the company so all the photographs of brownie um anything to do with jubilees anything that she was in certainly any anything to do with brownie wise was uh was totally removed from the offices well I think that they didn't want the legend of brownie wise to continue the staff even dug a pit behind headquarters where they buried the remaining 600 copies of Brownie's book best wishes in 1958 less than a year after firing brownie Earl Tupper sold his company to Justin Dart of Rexall chemicals for $16 million Earl divorced his wife gave up
his us citizenship and bought himself an island in Central America R never talked about Tupperware she didn't even seem to want it around she didn't use any of the pieces that I thought would be very useful for her or anything I think leaving Tupperware the way that she did had an effect on her life it uh caused her to more or less withdraw 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
as Earl and brownie retired from the world the Tupperware ladies took Tupperware across the globe hosting parties in Europe South America Asia and Africa Tupperware became the biggest and most successful international party plan company of its time Earl Tupper died in 1983 the patent on his burping seal expired the next year and his design idea was widely copied brownie lived modestly and died in 1992 just a few miles from Tupper Weare headquarters the marketing techniques brownie perfected were copied by every successful home party company I think a lot of what Tupperware was about uh for
me is enjoying and participating in the success of [Music] women I was the one that was able help my mother when she didn't have any more money I was the one that was able to do things for my sisters that they couldn't afford to do if you are traveling through the country at that time and your car broke down don't call a garage you call look under the Yellow Pages for Tupperware someone will come right out they'll bring you to their home they'll take your car they'll lend you a car they'll feed you they'll give
you money Just Amazing Just whatever's got to be done feeling the kind of the that's what it was like then really was and you know we we were just tupp away you know a tu Weare family that's that's what you had to call it really was super I've got that Tupper feeling up in my head up in my head up in my head I've got the Tupper feeling up in my head up in my head to stay I've got that tuer feeling up in my head deep in my heart down in my toes I got
that Tupper feeling all over me all over me to stay that was a good one I've got thater feeling up in my head I've got it up in my head I got it up in my head I got theer feeling up in my head I got it up in my head trying to think of what the words are feeling deep is it up in my head I thought it was deep in my heart down in my toes I've got that Tupper feeling all over me all over me to stay yeah I got to tell you
something I used to hate that song dear this song has got so much so many mixed feelings it brings about such incredible enthusiasm for thousands of people and such incredible dread for thousands of others it was years later that I realized it's also sung in churches it's it's like a little kid church song I didn't even know that yeah I've got that Tupper feeling I'm just gonna sing the last verse because I'm not going to do them all okay up in my head I've got it deep in my heart I've got it and bend over
down in my toes I've got the topper feeling all over me all over me to stay yay The Crowd Goes Wild
