Growing stale

Thanks to OZ’s Kelly Willis for sharing news of an iconic American brand that has hit the skids – Tupperware.

Tupperware blames its recent struggles on COVID and inflation, but every brand has dealt with COVID and inflation.  Tupperware’s troubles go deeper than that, according to the experts quoted in the article.

One problem is that the brand has lost its identity.  As the author points out, you probably have bought “tupperware” recently, but you haven’t necessarily bought “Tupperware.”  The brand name has become synonymous for the whole category of plastic containers.  Sometimes this works out just fine for a brand (e.g. Kleenex) but somehow Tupperware hasn’t maintained the same kind of premium image that Kleenex has.

Another problem is that the brand is now widely available in retail stores.  You wouldn’t think that to be problem, but the wide availability, combined with a lack of innovation and differentiation, have just reinforced to consumers that all plastic containers are pretty much the same, whether they say “Tupperware” or not.

Also, in migrating to big retail stores, Tupperware may have lost what made the brand unique – its distribution.  For decades, it relied exclusively on direct sales – “Tupperware parties” where someone would invite all their friends and neighbors to their home and sell them new Tupperware products.  COVID put the kibosh on that.  You still can host a Tupperware party, but why? 

If you were Tupperware, what would you do?  Where are there unmet needs that Tupperware could meet via innovation?  How could the brand reinvent Tupperware parties to make them distinctive and once again a special part of the brand experience?