Travel gadget: Smiley tags

A neon yellow smiley face baggage tag. Photo / Martin Sykes

Have you noticed that almost everyone in the world now has a black travel bag? I came to a belated awareness of this the other day as I was waiting for our luggage to come off the airport carousel.

As it happens my suitcase is brown and is further differentiated from the masses by a luggage strap with red tikis on it. However my wife's is black and therefore indistinguishable from all the others.

If it wasn't for the fact that we had cunningly left on a couple of brightly coloured tags from previous trips I'd have had to join the many other punters who were forced to pick up every passing black bag, scrutinise the label, then put it back on the carousel.

But if you don't have access to any garish labels then a good alternative is one of these Smiley tags - happy, smiling faces in a range of luminous colours, 7.5cm in diameter, and very easy to pick out amid the mass of black luggage.

They cost $6 each - plus $4 freight, so you might want to consider buying something else as well - from globaltravelproducts.co.nz.

Then you've just got to hope everyone else doesn't get the same idea.