Necessity is often the Mother of invention. And thus it was with Oregami Luggage. It was 3:00am, pitch dark and a brisk 17 degrees. Outdoor enthusiast and inventor, Rick Christen was perched on the steep slopes of Crater Lake preparing to cross country ski around its circumference in a single day. He pulled out his large duffel bag with all of his gear. He began frantically searching for his headlamp. He started digging thru the bag. Everything was mixed up in the one large compartment of his gear bag.
Frustrated, and running low on time, Rick started taking everything out of the bag and making piles in the snow. Gloves, here, goggles there, food and water in a third pile. He finally came across the missing headlamp! It was this aggravating experience that led Rick to start thinking, “there has to be a better way to organize the contents of a duffel bag.”
It was 3:00am, pitch dark, and a brisk 17 degrees.
Rick began working on some initial concepts and came up with an ingenious design for an organizing system that would artfully fold open for packing and accessing his gear, then fold back up on itself in a compact and convenient form. Rick decided to share his idea with Dave Kao, a friend of over 20 years. Dave was an experienced and successful sales and marketing professional, and Rick thought that Dave might have some contacts who would be interested in his idea. Boy was he right.
Dave took one look at Rick’s invention and knew immediately that it was something special. After researching the luggage business he put together a plan for developing his friend’s invention and asked Rick for his blessing. That’s how Oregami Luggage was born. In 2011, product development began in earnest. Dave assembled a team of design and production experts to work out the many facets of materials, production and assembly for this new kind of luggage.
Dave’s vision was not to simply get the bag made, but to also find a way to do it locally. Though contrary to conventional wisdom, this idea resonated with the Oregami team, and together we’ve been working on designs and on manufacturing methods that will yield as small a carbon footprint as possible, and employ people in our own community and region as much as possible.
Along the way, we discovered the conventional methods for making luggage didn’t really suit our needs, so we set about to invent our own. We didn’t come specifically from a luggage manufacturing background, so we didn’t feel obligated to stick with the status quo. This open-mindedness began to permeate our entire approach to the project, and led to other creative innovations, like our equally unique Zip-Off Garment Cover, as well as our innovated compression-molded luggage trays.
As the development process matured, Dave asked Jamie Dull, his friend of over 30 years, to consider partnering with him in the project. Jamie brought years of experience in photography, videography and media development to the table, and they agreed that the unique qualities and features of Oregami Luggage could be shared most effectively by marketing and selling the products on the Internet. Jamie decided to contribute his time and energy to this work and entered into a partnership with Dave to develop and share the Oregami story.
This website is a key part of this work. We plan to sell Oregami Luggage products exclusively online because we believe that it is the best way to show you how Oregami is different than other luggage, and show you how using it will improve your traveling experience. Also, via online, you’ll be able to personalize your Oregami products with different looks and colors. And soon you will be able to expand the versatility of your luggage with some innovative Oregami Accessories designed specifically for your bag.
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