FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Review Of And Recommendations For Luggage Brands
Old Jun 16, 2004, 12:39 am
  #2  
CryptoFlyer
 
Join Date: Jun 2004
Location: Formerly 1.25 miles WSW of 32L threshold, KNUQ; now near ORD
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Posts: 25
Big Briggs & Riley fans...

My wife and I are big Briggs & Riley fans. We own one of the big expandable uprights (the 26", I think...it's definitely not the 28"), a 22" expandable upright, the zip-closed wheeled garment bag, and the hanging toiletry kit. The good news is, these bags are fantastic--my 22" probably has 750k miles on it in 5 years, and the others easily have over 200k miles on each. The bad news is, since we've had them for a while, we're missing out on some of their newer OneTouch features, but it's not enough to make us chuck the bags for new ones just for a smidge of convenience.

We've only had a couple of issues...the wheeled garment bag's wheels became squeaky, and needed to be sent back for de-squeakage. The other thing is that the pull tabs on the zippers have been destroyed repeatedly--I think my 22" has gone in 5 or 6 times, and the garment bag has gone in twice. Frankly, this usually happens on CO regional jets when checked as valet luggage, so maybe I need to take this up with them.

I'm also a huge fan of Eagle Creek's products; we own a number of their expandable wheeled bags, both 22" and 26". However, the Eagle Creeks are a little less squared-off than the Briggs & Rileys, meaning that my clothes tend to travel a little better in the B&Rs. For weekend or leisure travel, the Eagle Creeks are awesome, and I even like their wheels better than the B&Rs, but the B&Rs simply do a better job with my dress shirts and pants.

Of course, if I were using my Eagle Creek Pack-It cubes and folders, maybe it wouldn't be an issue.

Also, about 5-6 years ago, I bought leather Briggs & Riley briefcases for my entire team of 6. While we've all moved on to other jobs, 4 of us (that I'm aware of) are still carrying our B&R briefcases. I did a very serious bake-off of the B&R briefcase versus Tumi, and the B&R won in a close race from a feature standpoint, and won in a not-at-all close race from a cost/value standpoint. I'm also fortunate that I have a very capable luggage purveyor in Mountain View, CA whom I've been dealing with for about 8 years, and they were very patient as I spent time in their store, tearing apart and comparing bags.
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