I've decided to discontinue the Outback bag. The last batch shipped last week (November 2021), and I made a few extras for one last gasp. So for now, so long to this bag.

The most recent incarnation of the Outback.

It sort of breaks my heart to make this decision, even though I know it makes the most sense in the long run. This bag is so labor intensive, and for years I've been fooling myself about how much time it actually takes me to make each bag. Labor-wise, I haven't allotted myself a reasonable wage for the Outback, maybe ever. It was easier to dismiss this when I was making batches of 5 or 8, but with requests for 15-20 bags each batch, I just can't. Blame it on the proletariat in me, but raising the price to reflect the labor (to $400? $500?) isn't in me either. I want the things I make to be accessible.

Letting go of the Outback is hard. As my only customizable product, each bag felt very precious and personal. Clients would share with me that they'd been saving up for months for an Outback, diligently waiting for the pre-order to open. Sometimes people would email me photos of their bike and ask my opinion on selecting colors, or share photos of their bag loaded up for an epic bike tour. I'll miss the intimacy of making a bag that in my mind is going to Julie in Bellingham for a trip she's had planned for 6 months.

There's a silver lining, of course. Cutting out this huge quarterly labor-suck will allow me to focus on all that's been on the back burner. I've wanted to design a greatly simplified version of the Outback for years, but the demand for this brand staple was so great I just kept plugging along with the classic look. I want to keep up with smaller and more affordable pieces that I've been ignoring for some time, like tool rolls and the Hangdown (both have been sold out for like a year, oops). I want to follow through on all the prototypes I started but never brought into production. I have so many ideas, and so little time to dedicate to them!

The Outback Saddlebag has been discontinued :(