Power Pack

You know what this backpack with a power bank reminds us of? When Subway will roll out a ‘new sandwich’ that’s constructed entirely from other stuff they’ve already had. Like, ‘Try the new tuna jalapeño sub!’ Or, ‘Enjoy the all new beef, bacon, and ranch sandwich!’ Same thing happens at Starbucks: some new, seasonal drink will arrive that’s just a different combinations of the coffee, steamed milk, and syrups that’ve always been there.

Likewise, we’ve sold power banks and we’ve sold backpacks. You could easily take one of those power banks and put it into one of those bags. Yes, this one integrates the power bank and allows you to charge stuff via a port on the back of the bag (i.e. you don’t have to take the bank out to hook stuff to it), but is that enough to make you believe this is a hot new product? Probably not.

Yet, it’s bigger than the sum of its parts. It’s not just a power bank and just a backpack. It’s an item with two components that happen to be: 1) a power bank, and 2) a backpack. Which means, you don’t have to think about each component. In your mind, they’ll always be bundled.

And that’s important, because what happens when things aren’t grouped together for you? You get tired of grouping them together yourself. You grow weary of the teen Subway employees’ looks of bored judgement as you explain that, well, actually, could you get turkey, bacon, Swiss, chipotle sauce, and sweet onion sauce, please? Or you can feel the frustration mounting in line behind you as you explain to the team of Starbucks baristas exactly how many pumps of what goes into this macchiato of your own design, and so you cut yourself short. Or, you’re hurrying out the door and you neglect to grab your power bank, even though your phone is in the red, because it’s in some drawer, and you don’t really want to go searching for it.

It’s a relief to point to an item on a menu. It’s so easy to simply speak the name of a latte that’s really just an amalgamation of different flavored sugars. And when your backpack comes with a power bank, even has a special compartment for it, it makes it that much simpler to bring them both along, thus saving yourself from the inconvenience of a dead phone before you even get to your destination.

In other words, it’s not just some backpack with some power bank in it. No friends, this is some backpack with its own power bank in it.

Yes, there’s a difference.