BauBax 2.0 Travel Jacket
The BauBax 2.0 has no less than 25 features designed to make travel more tolerable.Meagan West
What do you do when your travel jacket is the most popular travel item ever funded on Kickstarter? Apparently, you do it all over again, but this time, you add another 10 features to the 15 that made it famous in the first place.
Founder and entrepreneur Hiral Sanghavi and his partner, Yoganshi Shah, a user-experience designer, were motivated by their own long-distance romance and all the travel their relationship required. They couldn’t believe there was nothing on the market to make travel easier. They also had the perfect marriage of skills to bring the BauBax to life. “We had an amazing response to the original jacket – 45,000 were preordered, with $5-million raised,” Sanghanvi says. Over time, they started to get feedback from their biggest fans: “They asked us things like: ‘Could we get a better eye mask, a detachable hood? How about a blanket, a footrest, a water bottle?’” To which Sanghavi and Shah responded: “Why not?”
The media called the original BauBax “the Swiss Army knife of jackets” and “the travel jacket with enough gadgets for James Bond.” The BauBax 2.0 has no less than 25 features designed to make travel more tolerable, including a built-in neck pillow, travel footrest, eye mask, travel blanket, detachable gloves, battery-charger pocket, drink pocket holder, microfibre cloth and bottle opener. Pledges start at $156 for one windbreaker; estimated delivery is August, 2018. (baubax.com)
Nomatic Travel and Messenger Bags
The highly functional backpacks and travel bags by Jon Richards have raised more than $5-million through crowdfunding.
“It’s been a fun ride,” says Nomatic’s Jon Richards, whose highly functional backpacks and travel bags have raised more than $5-million through crowdfunding. Richards and partner Jacob Durham began their entrepreneurial journey with a simple travel wallet, moved on to a notebook and then travel bags. Their latest products are innovative messenger and laptop bags, designed with features such as cord pass-throughs for connecting to music and chargers, movable organizer panels and magnetic shoulder straps. Their next venture will be stylish but uber-functional rolling luggage. After that? “We want to develop a very unique product that disrupts the market again, super functional but also aesthetically pretty.” Starting at $156 for one laptop bag; estimated delivery is August, 2018. (nomatic.com)
Mu One - 45W USB-C International Charger
The briefcase-friendly, super-thin Mu One packs a big punch, delivering 45W of energy in its 14mm frame.
Running out of battery life is one of the biggest inconveniences for travellers, so this tiny but mighty charger might just be the ticket to an unending energy supply. The briefcase-friendly, super-thin Mu One packs a big punch, delivering 45W of energy in its 14mm frame, which is 70-per-cent smaller and lighter than the Apple 29W MacBook adapter. A dedicated chip for identifying iOS, Android and other platforms ensures it won’t blow out your cellphone with the wrong power setting and three interchangeable converters make it compatible the world over. Starting at $83 for one charger; estimated delivery is September, 2018. (kickstarter.com)