Let’s do lunch! Lunch boxes display pop culture trends
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September 2025
Everything Old
Let’s do lunch! Lunch boxes display pop culture trends
by Corbin Crable
When I was in elementary school in the late 1980s, a pretty girl in my class slipped me a note in the opening days of the school year.
“I really like your lunch box,” the hastily scribbled note read. This was useful information to possess, for now I knew the love for Ghostbusters that I shared with Audrey could have been the foundation of something special.
Though no young romance came of that brief, silent interaction, it makes me think of the lunch box not just as a useful tool that transports the midday meals of students and blue-collar workers alike; when you’re a kid, the type of lunch box you carried was almost a status symbol of sorts. Most of us carried metal lunch boxes bearing images from a popular TV show, film, or cartoon; today, the metal boxes have fallen out of favor, replaced by soft, insulated polyester models.
According to the Smithsonian Magazine, the lunch box’s origins can be traced to the 19th century, when working men had to protect their midday meal from the rigors of their everyday job. Smaller models would be made for the children who inevitably wanted to emulate their proud dad. The first commercially available lunchboxes in 1902 were metal and designed to look like a picnic basket.
Beloved pop culture characters began appearing on lunch boxes in the mid-1930s, with the first being the big guy himself, the face of the Disney empire – Mickey Mouse in 1935. After the invention of television and the creation of even more pop culture characters, lunch boxes – especially those manufactured by a company called Aladdin Industries — became the hot item to buy for the coming school year, festooned with icons such as The Lone Ranger, Batman, and Charlie Brown and Snoopy.
“Reaching the height of their popularity at the dawn of the television era, lunch box sales became barometers for what was hip in popular culture at any point in time,” according to the Smithsonian’s website.
The arrival of vinyl lunch boxes onto the school supply scene in the 1960s didn’t halt the ever-increasing popularity of metal versions. Metal boxes remained the standard until the 1980s, when plastic took off. The following decade, Aladdin would stop making lunch boxes, but Thermos picked up the slack.
Believe it or not, the Smithsonian itself boasts a sizable collection of vintage lunch boxes featuring characters like Barbie, Woody the Woodpecker and the Partridge Family, as well as TV shows like “Lost in Space.”
An exhibit on lunch boxes at the Smithsonian, called “Taking America to Lunch,” displays just a few pieces in the museum’s permanent collection. Another exhibit, Lunchbox Memories,” toured the U.S. between 2002 and 2006.
“Like an old song, a metal lunch box takes us back in time, recalling school days or workdays, favorite foods, a friend. Yet, the boxes can move us beyond personal reminiscence,” according to the Smithsonian’s website.
And for several decades, the lunch box made that bold statement for us. “I’m here, new school year, and I’m down with the hottest pop culture figures. They don’t only have a special place in my heart; they hold a special place for my sandwich. With any luck, I’ll take my place among the popular kids.”
Well, like my visions of a would-be romance, that never happened, either. Still, lunch boxes have proven themselves to be excellent topics of conversation among consumers of a certain age, and an easy way to make a new friend. Much like Trapper Keepers, in fact – another school supply that enjoyed its moment in the proverbial sun for years, and about which you can read in this month’s issue.
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