No, actually there were a few wadded up paper towels in with the shredded paper. He had tons of padding. I don't know why he was in such a huge bag, might have been the only size that Alfredo had to ship with, I dunno. Either way, when I pulled him up out of the box, I could tell that he was packed well in there, but still had enough room to move away from or toward the heat pack as needed. The heat pack was still nice and warm. Thanks for the compliments on him, I'm really super excited to have him!