saintz

Does anyone have experience using both of these bags, or similar (wheeled brief vs. carried one-bag), for business travel (meaning wearing and/or packing a sport coat/suit).

Has anyone gone from an under seat wheeled bag to a carried bag? I'm worried a Tristar might be too heavy to carry, and with a sport coat on, shoulder/back straps are out.

IsleOfMan

I can't comment directly to the two bags in question, but I can comment to my personal preference at the bag style level.

I'll preface with the following so you can compare my methods, needs, and circumstances to your own...

- I travel wearing a sport coat about 90% of the time, usually with jeans but occasionally with slacks if I have a meeting upon landing (very rare) or if I'm returning after a meeting (more likely). I've found my sport coats arrive in better condition if I wear them as opposed to any form of folding/hanging outside of a discrete drycleaner's bag. I hang if I'm in F or fold loosely and place overhead if I'm in Y.

- The jeans I travel in usually serve me for evenings and return for the whole trip.

- I usually pack 1-2 less pairs of slacks than the length of the trip (almost always seeing a different customer each day) and a dress shirt for each day... for a 2-working-day trip I would take 1 pair of slacks and 2 dress shirts, for 3-days I would take 2 slacks/3 shirts, etc.

- I pack with Eagle Creek Pack-It Folders, Cubes, Saks, etc more for organization but I do get some compression, especially with underwear/undershirts/socks. I don't employ most of the more extreme packing measures (i.e. bundling) because it's inconvenient for being in a different city/hotel every night.

In terms of bag types, I've tried most of them. I started early in my carrier (mid-2000s) checking a bag even on trips as short as 2-nights but stopped checking a bag entirely after 3 lost-bag incidents in a matter of ~6 months, one that left me with no change of clothes for ~4 days in India. After this, I went exclusively carry-on and started with a 22" roller + laptop bag. About 2 years ago I downsized to a 20" roller with built-in laptop compartment. 6 months ago I downsized again to a rolling-tote + smaller laptop bag for trips 2-3 nights, the 20" + smaller laptop bag for 4+ nights, and a larger laptop bag + all clothes in a pack-it folder in the main compartment for 1-night trips. Along the way I experimented with backpacks and duffles, especially for 1 and 2 night trips, as well as spinners which I've not had luck with to date but may try again with better quality wheels (looking at the Ricardo form Costco that uses the same wheels as Rimowa).

I found that using any type of shoulder bag with any notable weight comes at the cost of wrinkled shoulders and torso on my sport coat (which is an otherwise moderately wrinkle-resistant light stretch wool). Even when using a larger laptop bag for 1-night trips, I remove the shoulder strap and only carry it by the grab handles. My main smaller laptop bag (made for 11.6" laptops/netbooks, comfortable fit for my Surface Pro) goes without any sort of shoulder strap and rides on top of whatever roller I'm using for that trip.

Right now my most used combination is for 2-3 nights trips and consists of the Ciao Wheeled Tote from Costco (similar in design/layout to the U116 if not in build quality) along with a Pack-It Folder 15 (dress shirts), Pack-It Cube (undershirts/underwear/socks), Pack-It Tube Cube (toiletries, liquids in their own bag inside), and an Amazon Basics 11.6" Laptop Bag (Surface Pro, 8" x 6" notebook, chargers/headphones/gadgets, business cards, pens, etc). I really like the small laptop bag... when on a plane I can place it under the seat in front of me without having much impact on foot space, and using it with the rolling tote means I rarely if ever have to gate-check on RJs.

Again, the main reason I personally stay away from shoulder-carry bags of any significant weight (more than ~5-7lb packed) is purely centered around my preference to wear my sport coat while traveling and avoiding wrinkled shoulders/torso. In the rare instances that I travel by air purely for leisure and without a sport coat, I will revert to a duffle or backpack, but this happens maybe once/year at best (most personal/leisure travel is done with the whole family and I'm the bus[minivan] driver).

saintz

My general thought right now is the same as yours, Isle.

So all the people using Tom Bihn and Red Oxx bags, which seem to be really popular, are just traveling for leisure or not in business attire (specifically a coat)? I was wondering if any of these bag users are business travelers and actually hand carrying these bags, but the folks I see in airports with suits are almost always rolling a 22" bag and folks with backpacks are normally in hoodies or camo.

IsleOfMan

I think plenty travel with them for business but either pack their coat or aren't quite as OCD about wrinkles as I am. Even after traveling with a roller bag, I still usually use wrinkle release at the hotel the night before a meeting (as I do with my shirts and pants as well, I hate ironing). I also can't see taking an Air Boss or Tri Star into a meeting (and I don't even work in that formal of an industry), but it looks like plenty of people do it. I see plenty of business people carrying backpacks, but it seems to be the khakis and company-logo-shirt crowd, though I still see plenty of suit-and-tie folks with their Swiss Gear backpacks too. I fall right in the middle (non-chino slacks, button-down button-collar shirt, sport coat) but just can't make a shoulder-carry bag of any type work for me when wearing a sport coat or even a dress shirt that would show wrinkle.

Cargojon

Question on the Ciao -does it have strap on the back to ride on top of a larger roller if one desires?

IsleOfMan

Unfortunately it does not.

I've taken to using the add-a-bag strap that came with my TravelPro Crew 9 20" when I need to use this combo, which actually aids in preventing tipping of the Crew9. It also decreases the perceived weight of the combo by minimizing the moment arm created by the second bag. I would have liked the option, especially to stack two of the Ciaos (possibly for carrying a second for my wife when we fly ULCCs together) but the add-a-bag strap has been a perfectly workable alternative for me.

GadgetFreak

I have used both. I usually don't travel with a suit but I have with the B&R. There was a thread here a few years ago on how to fold a suit jacket that was quite useful. I think the Tristar would be easier to fold a jacket in since it has a larger compartment. The real key is how you fold it I think, however, as well as the material of the suit.

cb1111

I love my Tri-Star and use it almost exclusively for short business travel. Like one of the previous posters I use packing cubes and the Eagle Creek shirt folder.

The shirt folder holds 2 slacks and 3-4 shirts and goes in the rear compartment while the center compartment holds a computer in a brain cell and a packing cube with underwear and so forth. The front larger compartment holds an iPad and cables (in a slim EC packing tube) while the other side can (just barely) hold a pair of shoes - something I don't often need as I'm a guy and can easily go with one pair of shoes.

The front curved compartment is empty - I use that to dump all my stuff from my pockets going through security so I (knock on wood) never lose anything. The three sippers on the other side hold all the little bits and a book or two.

Papers can go in a slim folder either between the laptop case and the packing cube or in the back backpack strap area.

I wear whatever suit jacket and use the Absolute strap cross body without any significant wrinkling.

I've gone from one end of O'Hare to another just to realize that the flight was moved to somewhere on F - and I have a squished L4/5

Significantly faster than a wheeled bag (I have a few B&R bags which I like if I have to bring multiple suits) and I've NEVER been asked to gate check it, while I have been asked to gate check a very small rolling bag - much smaller than the TS that I was also carrying at the time.

Shirts in the folder come out slightly creased, but hanging them in a shower for a bit makes them look sharp again (I usually do heavy starch).

I've never had any damage to suits wearing the bag cross body with the snazzy strap but I absolutely detest the backpack straps. I'm considering removing them and using that compartment for papers - a Freudian slip (the office insert for the TB bags) should fit in there nicely.

I've also used just a Super Ego for an overnight, with the brain cell and a packing cube in the main compartment.

One advantage of these bags (TriStar, SuperEgo) is that they look like office gear and not "luggage" so I can carry it to a meeting and not have people think that I'm rushing from there to the airport - even if I am.

Ama_J

I use packing folders by Dot&Dot to pack my business clothes. I observed that there are less wrinkles or sometimes even wrinkle free when packed right.

Mellonc

some suggestion: if you use the briggs bag be sure to learn to fold your suit. I don't do that cuz I just don't know how to do it right. but I use a drycleaning bag every time I pack a suit.

if you end up going with tom bihn stuff (or any other soft bag), you need this:
http://www.tapplastics.com/product/p...abs_sheets/524

You can use it to make the sides sturdier. (make sure to get rounded corners).

finally if you are not using the stretchy shoulder strap that Tom Bhin sells, I'd recommend something like this:

http://www.amazon.com/Domke-725-310-.../dp/B00009R86L

Otherwise the shoulder carry thing gets old really really quick.

cparekh

I use my Air Boss almost exclusively for weekly business travel. I nearly always pack one (and sometimes two) suits in it. If I use the bundling method from onebag.com, my suits / dress shirts / ties come out less wrinkled than any other method I've found, including roll aboard suitor, garment bags, dry cleaner bags, rolling, or even wearing it on the plane.

For me, it hold three days worth of business travel before it gets over 20 pounds (one suit, blazer, jeans, 2-3 shirts, change of shoes, toiletries, socks / undershirts / underwear). If I need to pack more than that, I use my Briggs roll aboard, but that requires me to gate check on RJ travel.

lostinohio

I regularly travel with suits and my MEI Executive Overnighter. I'm 6 foot 2 and 210 pounds, so I'm not sure that my suits would fit in the Tristar. On business trips I'm also usually carrying a Tumi expandable organizer brief. I carry one on one shoulder and one on the other with shoulder straps. If I'm in a really crowded area (like the subway in NYC), I will carry the lighter bag using the hand straps so I take up less space and cut through the crowd more easily. I have found it easier, particularly on shorter trips of just a few days, to travel this way than with the traditional roller bag plus briefcase option.

SFOPhD

Maybe I'm out of shape, but when I travel with a full Tri-Star, I find it very stressing to carry without either a shoulder strap or as a backpack. So stressing that I've stopped doing it and returned to a small wheeled carry on.

Wmichael

I fly often from the cold north to hot south for casual and formal business events up to two weeks- and cram my TriStar full of my clothes, shoes, and tech. It gets heavy at times but worth the trade for no checked bags, waiting for wheeled bags to be unpacked from under the plane, or where to put a wheeled bag in the rest room. I would not go back to a wheeled bag.