Padded Envelopes, From Failed Wallpaper Project To An Office Essential

The original Jiffy mailer (or "Jiffy Bag" as it is colloquially known) was created in the 1960s by the Jiffy company, an enterprise specialised in making wood wool products. The envelope was simple in the extreme. It comprised two layers of thick paper, with shredded newsprint and wood wood packed between them, providing padded protection for the contents.

The Jiffy mailer was an instant success. It was cheap to make, and a product that was useful to almost every business. Not only did it protect its contents from the inevitable knocks endured as it passed through the postal system, it also offered a degree of added security. The padding meant it was almost impossible to determine the contents of the mailer without opening it.

For all its advantages though, the Jiffy mailer did suffer from one fairly major drawback - its weight. The shredded paper and wood wool padding was heavy, and that meant sending anything in a Jiffy mailer cost considerably more than a regular envelope.

Around the same time that Jiffy was experimenting with their own padded envelope, another company, Sealed Air, was working on a quite different product - wallpaper. Engineers Alfred Fielding and Marc Chavannes were coming up with ways of trapping air inside plastic sheeting, in an attempt to create deeply textured wallpaper. Although the wallpaper product itself never saw the light of day, the inventors soon saw an alternative use for their creation. They quickly realised that their trapped air system offered great protection to anything wrapped within. Thus Bubble Wrap was born. Air could be trapped between two sheets of plastic, creating blisters of varying sizes.

From there, was only a small step to incorporating Bubble Wrap within a mailing envelope. Suddenly, Jiffy mailers looked very old fashioned compared to Sealed Air's new paper and plastic envelope. Much lighter, and equally cheap to manufacture, Sealed Air's products stole the market. Jiffy had no option but to adopt the new technology, and switch their own envelope line to air bubbles. In 1987, Sealed Air acquired Jiffy. The company that had invented padded mailers became just one in a long line of acquisitions made by Sealed Air, acquisitions which included Instapak, Sentinel, and most recently Diversey.

Available in all shapes and sizes, padded envelopes have become ubiquitous. These days they are to be found in every office in the land, and most homes too. The high quality paper used for the outer, and the almost indestructible plastic within, makes these envelopes highly durable, and reusable. They are so light, they can be used in place of regular envelopes without a second thought as regards to additional postage costs.

The rise of e-commerce and online retail has only bolstered their success. As more and more products are sold online, so more products pass through the postal system, many of them in padded envelopes.

Not all retailers are fans. One notable exception is Amazon, who developed their own cardboard based packaging. Even cheaper to make than padded envelopes, and more environmentally friendly, Amazon's mailers use no plastic.

Other online stores have chosen to use hybrid systems, such as cardboard mailers with sealed air plastic lining. These offer even more protection than a standard padded envelope.

As more and more companies seek to improve their environmental credentials, many are looking at greener packaging options. Thus, in a twist of fate, the original paper padded envelope is coming back into fashion. Updated to take advantage of clever new manufacturing processes, these envelopes are now much lighter than the originals of the 1960s, but every bit as green. They are based on recycled paper, and are entirely biodegradable. And so the padded envelope has come full circle.