Ikea plans mushroom-based packaging as eco-friendly replacement for polystyrene

Styrofoam cases?

Air-filled bags?

Starch 'peanuts'?

Mushrooms?

Well, not exactly mushrooms...more like something called mycelium which is certainly mushroom-adjacent. It's certainly a fungus-based product.

And apparently if you grow it just right, let it grow into the right shape, bake it to make sure the final product doesn't grow mushrooms in the process of shipping, you can use mycelium - as produced by a company called Ecovative - to protect your widgets during shipping.

And Ikea ships a whole lot of stuff across the oceans. They're not quite ready to ship entirely in fungus-based packaging, but they're looking into it.