How Tin Can’s modern landline became a viral hit by embracing nostalgia in its branding

Tin Can’s first model, the Flashback, launched in early 2025. Its next model, the Tin Can, has already sold out of two batches that ship in October and November, with the company now offering pre-orders for a third to be shipped in December. The startup has already accumulated more than 43,000 followers on Instagram while building up a reputation with parents across the country. One Seattle investor told the tech outlet GeekWire that ” you can legitimately say Tin Can is one of the fastest-growing and most viral businesses I have seen in more than 25 years of venture investing.” And the startup has already been featured on the “Today Show” less than a year after launching.

Beyond its own growth, though, Tin Can is tapping into a larger phenomenon in the consumer world where people are once again embracing popular technology and trends from the past as they look for a cleaner, less noisy way to communicate outside of digital screens. It’s a similar ethos behind the rise of vinyl music collections, digital cameras and products like Brick that help people control screen time.

Kodak, for example, recently released a vintage-style toy camera that sold out in a couple of days. Meanwhile, a Morning Consult Pro report from July 2024 found that about 42% of Gen Zers are somewhat or very interested in integrating “dumb” technology into their lives overall.

Tin Can co-founder Chet Kittleson declined to share sales figures with Modern Retail but said the company has quickly gained customers, thanks to people buying more than one phone at a time to connect with each other, and is anticipating a hot Q4. Modern Retail confirmed that the company has raised $3.5 million to date.

To help get the message across, Tin Can has tapped into a powerful nostalgia marketing vein — one that millennial parents would recognize. Its website uses scrolling headers, and its photography is shot on film. From a brand perspective, Tin Can leans into the bright colors and optimism of the 1980s and 1990s, when its target customers were kids.

Kiser Barnes, chief creative officer and partner at branding agency Red Antler, said this helps connect Tin Can to the images parents may have had from their childhood, of sitting on the phone in their bedrooms.

“Some of it is about the future. Some of it is about recapturing the past,” Barnes said. “Consumers are looking for comfort, familiarity and simplicity, and nostalgia offers a sense of control and grounding.”

Given the current explosion of AI-generated creatives, Barnes said many shoppers are responding to brands that harken back to a simpler time. The Gen Z staffers at Red Antler love vinyl and digital cameras, and even set up a listening room in thier new office, he said.

But nostalgia is about more than just marketing when reaching parents, who may see kids heavily invested in screen-based video games as a form of socializing, he said. There are also concerns about the kind of apps or connections kids may develop online if they get a smartphone, Barnes said.

“We don’t fully understand what’s happening with kids online,” said Barnes, parent of a teenager. “Millennials, in particular, aren’t as familiar. Even a kid on Snapchat today is in a whole other world. The way they use it is different than the way we did. They see it as a chat app or a group connection space.”

Still, Tin Can isn’t “anti-technology,” Kittleson said. The landlines do come with an app for parents to set quiet hours or do-not-disturb mode, and to manage contacts — only approved contacts can contact Tin Cans directly.

Kittleson said the genesis for Tin Can started as he and other parents in his community commiserated over being their children’s “executive assistants.” While they didn’t necessarily want to give their kids smartphones, parents were getting exhausted arranging all their playdates for them and didn’t want to inhibit their social lives.

That led to the Tin Can prototype that Kittleson and his fellow co-founders Graeme Davies and Max Blumen developed last fall. They tried to make it look and feel like the phones they grew up using — Kittleson said he spent a “painstaking” amount of time looking at twirly cords that had the right amount of coils and stretch.

By January, the team was passing out units of its Flashback phones in their Seattle-area communities for kids to speak with one another. By the second quarter, they had received orders from people in more than 30 states, without any ads or even a landing page. Since then, they’ve expanded their presence to all 50 states.

“Part of the reason things have gone so well for us so quickly is that we hit at a moment where everyone was becoming aware there was a problem but wasn’t totally sure what the solution was, especially for their kids,” Kittleson said. “And then it kind of reminds you of your childhood, which is magical in its own right.”

The word-of-mouth growth partly stems from how Tin Can works: Since Can-to-Can calls are free, people want to buy them for their friends. Kittleson said there are two moments when people tend to talk about Tin Can to their friends that lead to orders: when they first order it, and then when it gets to their door.

“They send videos to all of their friends saying, ‘Oh my gosh, here’s a picture of my kid getting their first call and jumping over the couch to answer the phone. You have to get one of these so our kids can connect with each other,'” he said. “Virality compounds. Every single day, … we’re growing more than we were the day before, because there are more parents who heard about it, which means there are more parents who are sharing about it.”

To lean into the acquisition factor, the company offers at least a $5 discount per device for orders of two or more. So far, about a third of all its orders are group orders, meaning two or more are purchased at once. Overall, about 60% of Tin Cans sold have been part of a group order, Tin Can told Modern Retail.

The company also has a subscription play. While Tin Cans can freely connect to each other, people who want the phone to be able to call non-Tin Can phones can sign up for a Party Line plan at $9.99 a month. So far, about 85% of customers have the Party Line plan. 

Though Tin Can’s growth has been largely organic up to now, it is starting to get into paid ads and is pitching gift guides ahead of the holiday season. Kittleson said he sees Tin Can as part of larger trend of people looking for ways to communicate outside of smartphones and social media apps.

“Not everything has to be on a smartphone,” he said. “I always say, there was a moment in time where the cigarette was cool and we didn’t really know it was bad for you. And then the other shoe dropped.”