Essential World Travel Gear for Business Travelers

I'm starting a series of articles on the gear that has been essential and useful in my travels over the years. This post will cover the most obvious item:

First and foremost, my Tumi carry-on bag has been incredibly essential for business travel. I have had two of these bags, and recently replaced the first one after 15 years of dependable service and hundreds of thousands of air miles. What makes this bag so special? The fact that the 15 year old bag is still functional and looks relatively wear free is cause enough to invest in the newer version, which is a marvel of industrial design given that it has improved on the original in all respects. I still use the old bag for "riskier" trips and family vacations.

The newest version of this Tumi roller has a much stronger retractable handle mechanism, accepts standard clothes hangers (as opposed to the old proprietary hanger), and is now expandable in case you need to stuff in a last minute items. It fits in as standard overhead as carry-on baggage on most flights and is durable enough to survive a last minute hand baggage check if necessary. It has enough pockets for toiletries, chargers, ties, training material, and other small items as well as enough room for 2 suits, 4+ shirts, undergarments for 5+ days, and some casual clothes (jeans, tee-shirts, and a pair of shoes). The trick to getting this much clothes in the bag is to roll your clothes not unlike rolling a towel tightly. There are grooves in the bag where rolled up clothes can be stacked tightly and fasteners to hold them down.

The Tumi has enough room for a weeks worth of suit & tie meetings with some business casual and completely casual events mixed in. Quite frankly, if you are going to stay longer, you might as well do laundry for the following week. I only use a larger bag if the trip is longer than 10 days, or I need to bring a coat or several sweaters.

One drawback to the Tumi is that it is not considered small enough to be carry-on bag on certain flights outside the USA. This includes domestic flights within Australia, Brazil, and parts of Europe. Tumi does make a smaller 20 inch version of the bag for these exceptions, but for taller folks like yours truly, the smaller bag will mean significantly less capacity.

I look forward to getting another 15 years out of my Tumi roller. Many of my colleagues over the years end up getting other bags with some frequency, and eventually they spend the extra money and are glad they bought a Tumi.