Healthy Living and Travel Tips

What do we mean by Healthy Luggage?

Healthy Luggage in my mind is any kind you can push versus pull and any kind of bag that can move fully upright, not slung over the shoulders.  Healthy luggage we believe can save the wear and tear on both your back and shoulders.

If you are like me and the many other road-warriors out there traveling full-time, you have probably used several different types and sizes of suitcases.  This may not be the norm, but in my 14 years on the road, I am now on my 12th bag.  This is for many reasons–some cases I just didn’t like, they weren’t functional and so were abandoned.  Some were damaged beyond repair by the airlines and for my last two bags, I traded up for the healthier “Spinner” type bags.

You may have seen one of these suitcases being wheeled around in airports recently–they operate on 4 multi-directional spinner wheels which means they can be fully upright and pushed versus being pulled.  And because you can put that shoulder bag on top of a spinner case and push them both rather than pull from behind, well it’s almost heaven compared to pulling and slinging luggage.

I didn’t actually seek out healthier luggage though.  I over-packed a carryon bag 5 years ago and the zipper broke while I was trying to get to a gate in the Minneapolis airport.  That’s an airport you can walk a great distance in, so while struggling to keep that broken bag together, I took a look at new cases in the airport luggage shop.  Not the cheapest place to buy you know, so I decided to only window shop unless there was a great deal.

That’s when I saw my first spinner and was I skeptical.  I was having a hard time grasping the concept but the salesclerk demonstrated the push versus pull method, assuring me that once I switched to a spinner, I would never go back.  Well . . . against my better judgment (the bag was a red cloth Samsonite 21″ spinner on sale for $100 off but still very expensive) I purchased on the spot.  A red bag is just not typical business travel attire but that’s all they had. I really didn’t want to fuss with my broken suitecase, so I left the store that broken one and rolled out of there repacked into a new red spinner.

Wow, was that salesclerk ever right!  Before I could even reach my gate, people had started stopping me wanting to know where I got that bag.  They got the concept much quicker than I did in the store.  You see they saw me pushing that case upright with ease, my shoulder bag resting on top of it.  I was no longer hunched over and off-balance.  That first spinner case made such a difference in my travel experience, that there was no way I would consider choosing a 2-wheeled bag again.

So when that first spinner was damaged beyond repair by an airline 2 years ago, I was so sad.  Thank goodness there were more spinners to choose from so my need to have another one was easily filled.   Not only were there single spinner bags (like I first purchased 3 years before), but every major supplier had expanded their luggage sets to include spinners.

With so many options to choose from, I purchased the smallest spinner I could find–the 17″ Brookstone carryon.  This time it was silver polycarbonate because that red cloth bag became very dirty over time.

Brookstone carries a 21″ spinner, but by opting for the smaller spinner I not only saved some money plus there is less room to over pack.  Less is more (and healthier) when full-time traveling.  To see a comparison of small spinner carryons, check out our product review page on spinner luggage

One more thing if you are not convinced by the health aspects to try a spinner the next time you need to purchase luggage.  Spinners move down the aisles of the buses, trains and airplanes more easily because you can turn these bags sideways and push them ahead of you.  No more bumping into the seats or worse yet into people already in aisle seats.  No more getting your luggage straps caught on the arms of seats either.  So let us know if you have had the pleasure of traveling with spinner luggage.

P.S.  That last spinner was damaged recently by another airline but since it is silver in color and polycarbonate, a couple of strips of duct tape has allowed me to still use that case.  Does this mean that duct tape is also healthy?