This article (in a throwaway remark at the very end) reminded me that some people do in fact save piles of those foam egg cartons (or did, as I think foam ones aren’t common anymore). I seem to remember seeing a pile in my grandmother’s house once upon a time.
The question is: Why? What possible use could there be for these things?
I vaguely remember using them for arts and crafts projects in grade school.
I use egg cartons as handy containers for various colors and sizes of glass beads when I’m making beaded jewelry. Egg cartons are nice for starting seedling plants, too.
If you cut out two of the egg-cups together with one of the peaky divider things between them, and glue googly-eyes into the bottoms of the cups, you can make a silly craft face from it.
Or you could use an entire one as a mancala board.
Other than that, I’m not sure. I think the prevailing reasoning is along the lines that there has to be some craft use for them, and people are just trying to figure out what.
You’ve never had lizards have you?
The cardboard ones get thrown into a tank with the crickets, gives them something to crawl around on.
Good for starting seedlings in.
My old roommate used them to theoritically “soundproof” his room when he was learning how to play his Stratocaster. You walk in and it was like Bo Pilgrim meets JPL.
You can glue them up as a cheap form of acoustic baffling.
She’s just a newt
who says that I am the one
but the e-e-e-egg was not my son
I have always used them to store golf balls in. They work great.
Some people make fire starters out of them.
That’s good if your egg carton is cardboard. I wouldn’t try that with a foam egg carton, though.
I save them and give them to my MIL, who then gives them back to me containing fresh eggs from her chickens. 
Finely sliced, an old egg carton makes an excellent garnish on sweet potato pie.
My roommate would do the following:
- Go to supermarket and buy a dozen eggs in a foam carton. Devour eggs. Save carton.
- Go to Costco and buy 5 dozen eggs. (These come in a stack of a dozen eggs divided on 5 cardboard holders and is wrapped in plastic.) Come home and remove the top layer of the 5 dozen eggs and relocte them to one of the foam cartons.
I think the point of this was to avoid fussing with the big stack of 5 dozen eggs and only have to deal with a dozen at a time. This way took up more refrigerator space, but I assume it made devouring the 5 dozen eggs more manageable.
He hasn’t bought 5 dozen eggs in a while, but we still have 3 empty foam cartons lying around.
We’ll all eventually end up in the DSM, right? It’s tough to throw containers of anykind away. Coffee cans (I think I have enough), plastic lidded containers, peanut butter jars, pickle jars - egg containers? The “deluxe” type would be the paste cardboard style, I’m thinking. The foam ones aren’t very substantial. I’ve only stashed a couple of egg cartons, as I really haven’t found a use for them. Storing small parts on disassembly of something?
Absolutely
That page uses wood shavings, but I’ve heard them Boy Scouts also use dryer lint.
…
I’m suddenly wondering how much cat hair would stink since it’s all I can do to avoid tumbleweeds from my two extra large cats.
Our longhaired cat Felix (shown in his youth, when he was half the size is is now) pulls chunks of fur off himself while grooming, and every now and then one of the hair-wads works its way under the burner of the electric stove. Trust me, burning cat hair smells very bad indeed.
Yeah, I’m old enough to have been taught as a kid not to throw anything away which might come in handy for something. I don’t save egg cartons though, because they’re better DIY seed-starting options, but I do have a cupboard filled with various interesting jars I figure will be just what I need someday. For something.