Interesting part of flyertalk here that I've never visited in the past.
I currently have a double-fold suit carrier that has served me well for 5 years but has started to suffer damage from being checked-in repeatedly. I travel for work 3-4nights/week and travel via plane to get there, its in the same location though so the bag gets a home-plane-office-hotel rather than being with me at all times.
As I'm already comfortable with a suit carrier I'm happy with a Garment bag as my next purchase, but need to make a final choice. I am now looking for a bag I can take without needing to check in as a change from my existing approach - its time to save myself that extra time. Luckily the airlines I fly with (primarily BA/BMI/LX/LH/OS) allow a normal size bag and a "personal bag such as a laptop bag". My laptop bag that I always have with me is a
Tumi T-Tech Presidio so the suit carrier tends to be held in my hands rather than carried on my shoulder.
Based on this I've put together a shortlist of the 3 bags below. Whilst I can see that the B&R has a strong following on this forum I think the price in the UK (£490 vs ~£250-300 for the other two) means that I'm unlikely to make this choice as the value outweighs the advantages. I didn't like the look of the Briggs and Riley Baseline Compact Garment Bag.
So I don't know if anyone has a view between the three options above. Unfortunately I didn't see the Samsonite bag when looking around London's Oxford street but did see the Victorinox and it looked nice with plenty of pockets etc, not sure how well it stops creasing of course. From looking online I think the Samsonite bag looks a little better.
The other question is place of purchase. I'd like to buy in the next month, but in that time I'll be in the following places (airports and attached cities);
London (home),LHR,LCY,EDI,ATH,GVA,NYC,IAD,ZRH
It would appear from searching online that the offline/online prices are pretty much the same - I suspect the US would be cheaper but don't know any stores, can anyone reference any reputable store in any of these locations that is likely to be better value?
tia, lv