Sackville ShopSack Medium

We wanted a bag that fits into a basket and blows the doors off paper bags or the semi-reusable $0.99 to $4.99 open-top store-promo shopping bags that make you look like a hobo anytime you have one in your hand and you're not at the grocery store. (Not a hobo-knock, just a fact.)

Then we thought:
(1) Why not make it in the town Annie Leibowitz grew up in?
(2) Why not make it in the town where the Timex museum still is?
(3) Why the heck not make it out of fabric made where Donovan P. Leitch was born, and the same fabric used for rain and sun protection for Range Rovers?

It seemed impossible to tie all those requirements together. They seem so probably mutually exclusive. But somehow we pulled it off, and the Sackville ShopSack was born.

The Sackville ShopSack is a better shopping bag than anything you can buy at REI or at the checkout counter. It's wider than tall, so it's way easier to load, and things don't pile up as much and get squished so easily. It has handles made of the best U.S.-made military spec webbing that will never, ever crap out on you, and a zipper to hold everything inside, inside.

There is a small zippered pocket good for small things.

There's no zipper guard, no shoulder strap, no leather, no mesh water-bottle pocket. There's no feature surprising, excessively thoughtful, or clever. It's just a shopping bag that works with a basket (or without) and will last twenty years.

We know from experience that it also works great as a tote bag, a camping/touring bag, and a briefcase-type thing.

Two sizes. The medium ShopSack fits the medium Wald basket, and the big one fits the big Wald. If you have another basket, it may not fit it. Too small for the basket is no problem--not even a tiny one. Too big is a problem only if the sack is full.

Outside of a basket, your ShopSack is a nice tote, great shopping or beach or camping bag or carry-on.

OUTER FABRIC: All Sackville saddlesacks are made from Scottish cotton that is more tightly woven than any waxed cotton made in America. The gaps between threads are so small it hardly needs any wax, and with less wax, it stays much cleaner. Normal-common-American waxed cotton is more coarsely woven, so needs a heavier coating of wax. The extra wax on the coarse fabric isn't as waterproof, and picks up and holds dirt, so after a couple of years, it looks like an old railroad tie coated with creosote.

Note: Shopsacks used to have carabiner loops on the sides for clip-on basket attachement, but the carabiners rattled around and we prefer a basket net instead, so these new Shopsacks no longer have those loops. The net allows you to load stuff on top of the bag too.


Flat Dimensions:

Large ShopSack - 28" x 13.5"

Medium ShopSack - 21.5" x 10.5"