Honestly, I’d never heard of Longaberger baskets until my family and I went to Boyd’s Bears of Pigeon Forge, Tennessee one day. We had coupons for free meals, and a free bear for each of the girls, and it’s a 45 minute drive and sounded like a good idea. Longaberger representatives were there, demonstrating how to make baskets. In fact, you could make your own little basket for about $75. But they were handing out door prizes each hour, and we happened to win a medium Spring genuine Longaberger basket, signed by two members of the family.
Along with our new basket, we received a couple Longaberger catalogs. And I was introduced to a whole new world. This is a world above Martha Stewart Living; and miles above my usual Wal-Mart shopping. Apparently, Longaberger customers exist in a world where it is perfectly reasonable to pay $100 for a small basket to sit on the back of your toilet and hold whatever it is you store on the back of your toilet.
And then I read the Longaberger story. In some ways, it is a touching example of one man’s purely American entrepreneurship combined with European quest for excellence. Dave Longaberger’s father made hand-woven baskets at the turn of the twentieth century, when baskets were used in place of shopping bags, boxes, plastic bins and the other items we use today. In the 1970’s, when Dave noticed that baskets were becoming popular as a decorative device, he began making the type of hand-made baskets he had seen his father make. Years of economic hardship for both Dave, his family, and his dedicated little band of basket makers ensued.
Even though he was having difficulty selling his baskets to craft fairs, malls, department stores and any other likely basket-selling place, Dave Longaberger was utterly convinced that America needed and wanted his high-end, hand-made, indestructible baskets. In 1978, he decided to take the time-honored tradition of the home sale. That is, one woman (an independent Longaberger Sales Consultant) selling in the home of another woman (the Longaberger host). This sales technique, initially popularized by Tupperware maven Brownie Wise, allows for an intimate, tea-party like atmosphere to show off the enjoyment of owning Longaberger baskets.
Like most other home-sale models, Longaberger consultants recruit other consultans, future hosts, and new customers at each “tea party”. By holding each sales event in another woman’s tastefully decorated home, artfully interspersed with Longaberger baskets holding everything from napkins to dirty laundry, a mystique begins to surround owning a Longaberger basket. It’s not longer just a basket; it becomes a woman’s ticket to a lifestyle.
There’s nothing wrong with creating this type of mystique and envy. Almost all advertisements share the same goal. Some of us uninitiated and uncreative people, though, have to sit back and ask “What is the purpose of owning a $300 hand-woven basket to hold my dirty laundry that is going to be artfully concealed in my walk-in closet anyway?” The answer of course is simple: because then you get to join the family of Longaberger basket collectors.
And the vast majority of Longaberger basket owners become collectors. Apparently, owning one hand-woven basket made in Dresden, Ohio gives you the key to a lifestyle that must own many baskets to be sustained. There are baskets to hold hot casseroles, baskets to hold snacks or facial tissues; baskets to hang on the wall, sit on a shelf, fill up the corners of your room, hold pinecones on your hearth, or a basket to collect your inkpens in.
Perhaps the crowning glory is the picnic basket. Meant to evoke simpler times, and childhood pleasures, this basket to hold peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and juice boxes along with pate, crackers and a bottle of wine, is all yours for $500.
We don’t use baskets to haul around potatoes, apples, or gallons of milk anymore. Cute little baskets hanging from bicycles are largely symbolic, since we don’t send our children to the corner store for the day’s groceries anymore. I like baskets in my home. I do think they add a certain organization and homey flair to what would otherwise be clutter. But if you don’t need hand-woven, indestructible collector’s items, how about a nice $20 basket from Michael’s or other craft supply store?
Perhaps a great example of the almost religious fervor that surrounds Longaberger baskets is that I couldn’t find more than one other negative review on the Internet. And that’s fine. For us, I think our medium Spring Longaberger basket is worth exactly what we paid for it (see the beginning of this story), and I proudly use it to store all that top-of-the-refrigerator stuff.
