The Douchebags Carryall 65L duffle bag is an unfortunately named, versatile, cavernous bag that is solidly built. It is a little over-engineered and has some small design defects that make it difficult to justify the $199 price tag, but its durability and multitude of handles redeem it slightly.
What is it?
The Douchebags Carryall is a 65L duffle bag that fills the gap between a large suitcase and a standard airport wheeled carry-on. Packed conservatively, it will easily work as a carry-on. Jammed with clothing and accessories, and with the shoulder straps utilized, it works great as a long weekend getaway bag. It’s described as an “active duffle bag” that could be used for work or the gym, but it’s a bit too big for everyday carry in reality.
Technical specifications
- Width: 36 cm / 14.7 in
- Height: 60 cm / 23.6 in
- Depth: 30 cm / 11.8 in
- Weight: 1.6 kg / 3.5 lbs
- Volume: 65 liters
- Outer Shell: Polyester 600D / TPE 500D
- Inner Lining: Polyester 200D-PU
- EVA back panel
- Thermal formed 1680D ballistic polyester underneath
- Interior mesh pockets
Design and features
Before I get into the design and functionality of the Carryall, let’s first address the stunningly offensive and crass name of the company, Douchebags. Nowhere in the About section of the company’s website is the name ever addressed, which says to me that this choice was made without irony. It sounds like a name two fratboys would come up with after a night of binge drinking and objectifying women.
“Bro, we should totally start a company making backpacks and call it ‘Douchebags’!”
“Epic, Bro… epic!”
As a constant reminder of how proud they are of this sophomoric innovation, the initials of the company are emblazoned on seemingly every surface, zipper pull and panel of the Carryall like a childish inside joke. The name is so offensive and crude that it negatively affects my perception of the brand and, by extension, the product. I, personally, would never give money to this company for any product regardless of its functionality. I don’t want to use this bag after the review.
Phew, ok, got that out of my system, so now let’s talk about the design and features of the Douchebags Carryall.
The Carryall is a really good duffle bag, with some great added features. It takes a bit of exploring to figure out the best way to open and load it to your liking. The feature I like the most though are the deep pouches on the top and bottom of the bag.
The pouches for these pockets extend deep into the bag. So if the bag is fully packed you can still find ways to cram more stuff into the pockets. Or, you can load these pockets first and then pack the interior. The top pocket also has a useful mesh pocket in the lid.
Access is key to a great bag and the Carryall has a really good setup.The access for the interior is at the top of the back panel when using the Carryall in the backpack configuration, with the deployed shoulder straps.
The back panel unzips fully to give you full access to the interior. This is a little backward compared to traditional backpacks which would have the zipper and access to the interior on the top front of the bag. The interior of the back panel has a sectioned zipper mesh pocket as well.
I loved having full access to the entire interior of the bag and it made packing a lot easier as compared to top-loading bags. Another great aspect of the Carryall is that there are handles on the top, bottom, and sides of the bag. Every time I went to reach for this bag, I was able to easily find a handle.
The shoulder straps are conveniently stored inside the back panel and easy enough to pull out, but it’s a bit difficult to lock them into place.
Two hooks on the ends of the straps need to be slid into corresponding loops on the bottom of the bag. It took a bit of wrangling to get the hooks in place, and once they were they felt really secure.
The problem is that to adjust the straps, you have to pull up on loops on the bottom of the straps. This was impossible to do while wearing the bag. Typically, the adjustment straps for backpacks sit about midway up the strap. You can adjust them easily by hiking your bag up on your back and pulling the straps tight.
This does not work with the Carryall straps. The only way I was able to get the correct adjustment was to take the bag off, adjust the straps and then put the bag back on to check the adjustment.
It’s not a deal-breaker, but while wearing the fully loaded pack, I found myself constantly trying to tighten or loosen the straps to no avail.
One other design flaw I found was that when the top pocket wasn’t zipped completely shut with the zippers pushed to the back of the bag, the top flap would unzip and open if the bag was picked up by the top handle.
This happened to me several times. The best way to secure the top pocket and handle would be to put a small travel lock through the zippers on the top pocket, but that negates the convenience of having the pocket in the first place.
The hooks used to fasten the shoulder straps show up elsewhere on the Carryall but have no real function other than aesthetics.
When filled to capacity, the Carryall is pretty unwieldy and difficult to carry without using the shoulder straps, but it’s manageable. The overall large size of the Carryall, even when empty, is the main reason it wouldn’t be useful as an everyday carry bag.
Positives
- Handles everywhere
- Fits very comfortably with shoulder straps once properly adjusted
- Holds a huge amount
- Top and bottom pouches very useful
- Full access to interior
Negatives
- The name
- Expensive
- Shoulder straps very difficult to adjust once deployed
- Top and bottom pouches can unzip when using handles
The Douchebags Carryall 65L duffle bag is a decent bag with great capacity and some unique design elements. It functions well as a weekend travel bag, but some flaws like the difficult shoulder strap adjusters and the top flap opening if not secured properly, take away from its overall usefulness.
Plus, that name is just horrible.
The Carryall comes in black, white, and green.
Price: $199
Where to buy: Douchebags
Source: The sample of this product was provided by Douchebags