The Stevens Institute of Technology reveals that in the late 1950s, Marc Chavannes and Stevens graduate Al Fielding created a textured plastic that was to become a new wallpaper. It failed, but they realized that this "failure" could be used as packaging material. Today, the Sealed Air Corporation, the company these two men founded in 1960, has annual revenues of more than $3 billion.
Its original name was Air Cap. Bubble Wrap is a registered trademark of the Sealed Air Corporation. In 1971, Sealed Air laminated Bubble Wrap to paper to make the first Mail Lite shipping envelopes. Bubble Wrap has more than 2 million fans on Facebook. The last Monday in January is Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day.
In November 2009, with interest in making their sealed wrap "green," Salazar Packaging, a competitor of Sealed Air, introduced a bubble packaging that was degradable. Unlike biodegradable products, this bubble packaging has a chemical additive that is blended into the wrap that accelerates the breakdown process when disposed of in landfills. Thus, another manufacturer of bubble packaging makes it a "green" product.