The HBB Story

Like many of the best ideas, the Healthy Back Bag® was inspired by necessity. Margery Gaffin was recovering from back surgery and found traditionally shaped bags and rucksacks uncomfortable. She and her husband Irwin, a designer/leather craftsman since 1970, collaborated with a doctor and chiropractor to develop a one-strap bag that would be kind to the back, and the resulting Healthy Back Bag, the first of its kind to address weight-stress and health issues, was patented in the USA in 1995.

This feat of ergonomic design works hard, not just for people with back concerns but for every back, including the most healthy, to keep them that way. We all need to carry stuff, and it makes sense to use a bag with a sound medical rationale that looks good too.  A two-strap rucksack, fitted and worn correctly, is acknowledged as the best way to carry weight on your back. However there is a great temptation to use only one strap – the worst thing you can do, as the weight pulls away from your body – and many people don’t like rucksacks, for aesthetic or convenience or security reasons.  A Healthy Back Bag is a one-strap alternative; comfortable, safe, secure (the main zip is always against your back) but accessible without taking the bag off, whichever way you wear it.

The bag hangs asymmetrically, so weight is distributed throughout the length of the bag, and doesn’t pull from one point on the shoulder, thereby reducing stress on the shoulders, neck, and back. This makes carrying the bag more comfortable, and makes it feel significantly lighter because the more places a bag touches you as you are wearing it, the lighter it feels and the less it adversely affects your posture.

The intelligent patented design also gives you the choice to carry your bag whichever way suits you best: on either shoulder, or across the back either way, and suits left-handed and right-handed people equally well. Every Healthy Back Bag features smart and inventive details - clever interior compartments to keep you organised, key hook and branded zipper pulls, through to the non slip strap, and the signature silver lining to ensure stress-free rummaging.

The Healthy Back Bag Company was established in 2004 as the European subsidiary of AmeriBag Inc, and from our HQ in North London (and our warehouse in Cornwall) we look after Healthy Back Bag sales in the UK and 10 European countries.