Bubble Wrap Will Soon Lose Its Pop

The one company that makes Bubble Wrap has decided to move forward with a lot less air. They've revealed a new product for shipping that does the same thing for products, but a lot less for those lovers of popping the otherwise-trashed bubbles after the unwrap. Instead of each individual bubble being inflated with air, the new wrap, called iBubble, will come with a row of bubbles connected by tubes. As such, each long tube of bubbles will have one air chamber instead of a bunch. No more popping.

Apparently the people at Sealed Air want to save space. Apparently they want to be able to ship their new iBubble product further than 150 miles from its factory. Apparently Bubble Wrap isn't super efficient to sell to people who want to use it to ship things because it's... you know... full of air.

Images above and below from the Wall Street Journal.

All the way back in 1957, Bubble Wrap was first invented.

Sealed Air sold Bubble Wrap for many moons, keeping its patent to itself until 1981. For the first several decades after its invention, Bubble Wrap was Sealed Air's top seller.

Above: a comic from Tatsuya Ishida, from the series Sinfest.

Those that hope to use the iBubble product must purchase a special air pump, as iBubble shipping wrap comes shipped deflated. This pump will cost you $5,500.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Sealed Air hopes to knock this price down to $1,000 per pump by the year 2017.

Needless to say, this shipping material won't be for the general consumer.

Those of you headed to eBay to purchase old rolls of Bubble Wrap may want to reconsider. The old style isn't leaving production – they're just ALSO producing iBubble. So no worries – the pop shall continue.