He could have sold them on ebay in plastic bags - but then he would learn a different expensive lessons: onions need to breath, don't ship in plastic. Actually it is more complex, if you ship fast enough in plastic you might be okay, and some types of plastic are better than others, thus this is a lesson that he might or might not have learned the hard way depending on if he was lucky enough.

Real business is hard because of all the not obvious things you need to account for.