What's My Bag?

Something completely different today: bags.

Over the years, I've hung onto small plastic bags from stores, mostly media stores that sold music, movies, and books. The main reason I kept these to begin with was to "reuse" in the Green sense (Reduce/Reuse/Recycle), to have something on hand if I wanted to carry small items with me, but keep them clean and dry. The bags are a compact and convenient size for loaning out a handful of CDs, a book, or a movie to a friend, and to protect my electronic media, paperback books, or other small items in transit.

But after I had a handful of these bags, I realized they looked kind of cool with their often bright colours and interesting graphics, not to mention a bit nostalgic if the purchases I made were from special places and times.

I'm certain I had some more neat bags from faraway stores, like in the UK and the States, but they must have gotten tossed or lost long ago.

To start off, I'll talk about the HMV bag in the photo above. HMV is a UK-based retailer established in 1921 (!) that expanded and enjoyed global success until the 2000's, when it saw serious decline in sales and had to shut down its overseas (and some UK) operations, including in Canada in 2017. HMV was a semi-regular haunt for my music and movies for many years until that time, and while it wasn't my favourite place to shop, they did have frequent sales and even regular prices were often very good. I sort of miss it. So the couple of HMV bags I've still got are rarities - possibly collectible for the oddballs on Ebay. But I'll hang onto them. That big bold pink logo is eye-catching and sometimes gets some attention and remarks when I carry it around.

Next, The Strand Bookstore, an independent business established in 1927 and located on Broadway in New York City. A very historic place, really. This bag was the wrapper for a gift I was given by a family member who lived in NYC for a while. The bright yellow, red and white colours make it really pop.

Then there's Steve's Music store, which has been a long-time (established 1965) Canadian chain dealing in music equipment. My bag came from the  Ottawa location, though when I lived both in and near Toronto many years ago, I used to frequent that downtown store. As a sort of casual hobbyist guitarist, I'd bought the odd guitar accessory (strings, picks, straps, cables, effects pedals) there, which meant my purchase was handed to me in a tidy little bag. I have one story to tell about Steve's: when I was in the downtown Toronto shop back in the early to mid-80's, I saw the guitarist from Hamilton punk rock band Teenage Head noodling around on an axe. The hair was a dead giveaway. I'd seen that band play at one of my high school dances back in the day.

The next bag, from the NBC Store in NYC, means something to me. This was wrapped around a couple of fun gifts my daughter gave me for... it might have been one Father's Day, or birthday? The gifts were merch from my favourite TV comedy (on NBC, of course) of all time, 30 Rock. A crazy Tracy Jordan fridge magnet and a 30 Rock logo t-shirt. Love 'em!

Next up is my National Gallery of Canada bag. Nothing too special there, since I can visit this place any day I like, living in the nation's capital, Ottawa. I try to visit the gallery at least once a year, and if there's a special exhibition on that I'm interested in, I might get over there another time or two. But that's the exception to the rule. I've been to our gallery many, many times ever since I moved Ottawa in the 1980's.

And now on to the Empire State Building bag, in which I got another neat little gift from New York City - a King Kong atop the Empire State Building fridge magnet. The gifter knew I was a fan of the original Kong movie and that I had a small but growing collection of fun fridge magnets. It's not a dazzling bag design, a bit boring, in fact, but I'm keeping it. So there!

Then the Indigo Bookstore bag. There is an odd history with this store: the location I usually shop at is actually called Chapters, which came about in the mid-90's after a merger of two other bookstores. Chapters became the largest book retailer in Canada, later merging with Indigo in 2001. Chapters operates as a subsidiary of the Indigo corporation. More history than you asked for, eh? I've shopped at various Ottawa locations for decades, though there's a very convenient one just a short walk away from home. And you must be wondering about the IndigoKids logo on the bag... the children's section of the store has their own special brand and bags.

On to my beloved CD Exchange bag. I used to buy/sell/and trade there all the time, before these stores vanished from the face of the Ottawa in the 2008. This independent Ottawa business chain lasted ten years, but found the challenges of surviving in the growing internet downloading world too much. Like I said, I frequented two of their locations regularly, sometimes to sell or trade CDs and DVDs, other times just to browse for that special album I'd been wanting, or a bunch of them. Again, a bag from a defunct store... rare and collectible, if you can call it that. But the bright orange and distinctive logo and image make it a flashy mini carry-all. Friends have enthusiastically and nostalgically commented on the bag when I loan them movies, music or books tucked inside it.

Lastly, there is a bag that I found just shortly after first publishing this post... so I scrambled to photograph it, write some thoughts on it, and re-post. Rogers Video was my neighbourhood movie rental store for many years. I was in there at least once, sometimes twice, a week. There was always the Friday night stack of videos to see me through the weekend, but occasionally I'd grab something on a weeknight just for kicks. It was just so convenient, and along with your movie you could also grab drinks and snacks. And if you wanted to browse the clearance bins, you might even find a used DVD to buy for a great deal. I certainly stocked my home movie collection shelves early on with a lot of Rogers bargain bin purchases. Sadly, Rogers Video met with the same demise as every other video store, maybe holding out a bit longer than the rest, but finally succumbing in 2012. Anyway, isn't this bag a gas? I love the references to all the wacky movies that I grew up on. Fun, fun, fun.

You might think I'm loopy for hanging onto bags like these, but whatever... don't we all hold onto and even actively collect odd things? I don't seek out bags. If they come into my possession and I like them, I hang onto them. Reuse.