How this 29-year-old made landline phones cool again—and brought in $789K last year selling them

People are nostalgic for a simpler time without smartphones, social media and AI. Cat Goetze is dialed in.

The 29-year-old in Los Angeles is the founder of Physical Phones, a Bluetooth-enabled landline phone business that’s taken off in recent months.

In 2025, her business brought in over $789,000 in sales, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It.

But like all “overnight” success stories, Goetze has been working at it for a while now.

Goetze says she first had the idea for a landline-style phone product in 2023 after spending the better part of the pandemic trying to reduce her screentime. She daydreamed about her childhood sharing a landline with her family.