Fiestaware, the brightly colored dinnerware first introduced in the United States in 1936, has been a cultural phenomenon from its inception. This paper seeks to explain the extraordinary popularity of Fiestaware and to understand the role the ware occupies in U.S. popular culture. Fiestaware achieved enormous success, in spite of its introduction during the Depression, because it was shrewdly marketed at the lower- and middle-class segments of society, and was made available everywhere, mostly in five-and-dime stores. The design was clean and bold, in startlingly bright colors, and mostly, inexpensive. Even though Fiestaware remains very popular today, a collector's item, in fact, its success can be explained in terms of its widespread availability. Familiar to generations of North Americans Fiestaware became a "collectable" that would never be out of financial reach for the collector of modest means. (DB)