The last time I bought one, it arrived securely padded in a box approximately 10 times the size of the laptop inside.
I think you'll find that was the final shipment from your local reseller (or their local distributor) to your door, infact I can pretty much guarantee you that's what you experienced.
The laptop boxes themselves (no outer packaging, just the basic manufacturer's boxes) are just tied together on pallets for the main bulk shipment !
And no, they are not always sent on container ships (too slow), many manufacturers use UPS and other air freight companies for many of their shipments !
For example, order a custom laptop from the Apple website and that'll be sent to you from China by UPS with no outer packaging to speak of other than a basic unpadded cardboard box to obscure the contents. You can track it all the way, it doesn't get a sniff of a container ship ! Its not just custom Apple stuff either, Apple ship the bulk of their general stock by UPS, especially around launch time for new products. Its not only Apple either, many of the technology manufacturers operate just-in-time manufacturing .... technology changes too quickly and is too expensive to stock in bulk numbers because there are so many competing manufacturers. That's why they tend to do deals with the air freight companies instead.
I bet you've never seen a pallet of laptops in your life !
I'm afraid you're destined to loose this argument. You don't need excessive amounts of packaging to protect a laptop in the hold, just common sense.
I fully agree with the security argument on taking laptops with you .... but the fragile argument ... that's just plain stupid.
