Deuter Essential Bike bag pannier

This classy bag from German luggage masters Deuter is almost the perfect companion for well-heeled commuters. Not so great if you want to stick a laptop in with your sandwiches though.

I was initially sceptical - the bag looked too small to be properly useful to me, but the main compartment extends once unzipped and has loads of space. It certainly passes the 'pair of shoes and assorted gubbins' test.

The main compartment is straightforward with just two large pockets in the side wall. By contrast the large outer pocket, neatly protected by a substantial flap, has a ridiculous number of sub-pockets and stashing pouches. They look great and will probably win you a game of commuter Top Trumps, provided the other chap chooses 'pockets' as a category.

I'm not convinced that having that many pockets is useful or healthy and anyone who actually uses all of them probably irons their socks and arranges their pencils in order of length. That said, the outer pocket does have a lot of usable space and the zipped external pocket is very handy for keys, change and other stuff you want to get at in a hurry.

The one thing lacking is either a padded laptop sleeve or internal padding on the bag itself. It does seem like an obvious omission and as the bottom of the bag is just thin material, I certainly wouldn't trust my laptop in it. Sure you could get a padded sleeve from elsewhere, but the bag already costs £90. It's pretty much the only thing that irked me about the bag though, and if you don't need to lump a laptop around, pretend I never mentioned it and add half a star back onto the rating.

Water resistance for a commuter bag is pretty impressive. I took it on a soggy Glastonbury 100 mile audax, hardly its intended use, and only remembered to deploy the hi-viz rain cover (stashed, oh yes, in another pocket) after we'd been on the road for more than seven hours. Impressively the only dampness was on the base of the bag, not bad considering the bike (Surly Disc Trucker, review coming later this summer) didn't have mudguards and was giving the bag a gentle pressure-washing with every mile. Really the rain cover is more about keeping the bag clean and free from road filth than it is about stopping your sandwiches from getting unpleasantly moist.

Bike-specific fixings are the same as you'd find on a quality set of panniers. Fully adjustable sprung loaded clips on a canted rail (to avoid heel-strike) are coupled with a lower clip to avoid lateral movement. What is clever is that the fixings can be zipped away once you reach your destination, neatly hiding any road grot that may have sprayed onto the back of the bag and preventing your skirt or trousers from having filth wiped across them. It's a nice touch and instantly improves on using a bog-standard pannier. There are various reflective logos and bits of piping but no light loop.

There's nothing flash about the looks, it's definitely office neutral, but build quality lives up to every cliche about German manufacturing. This is a very nice bag indeed, as it should be with such a price tag.

Verdict

Excellent bag for the well-heeled commuter, not laptop friendly though.