Except if you want to listen to things while charging the phone (which happens when you are on the plane/train/...).
Other than that: fair point!
Hopefully iPhone 7 will be forward compatible with Bluetooth 5, and will really spark the market for good quality Bluetooth 5 headphones with longer battery life.
Although the box is dopey, it's probably quite important to keep people from loosing the airpods, and to make it easier and quicker to charge them. You know that the box also contains a battery right? There's 24 hours of capacity there.