When it launched a decade ago, Away captured the hearts of millennials with its colorful, affordable suitcases with ridges. Those original customers are now in their thirties and forties, traveling around the world with their kids—many of whom are entering their tween years.
Away wants to equip the entire family for their trips. This week, it launches a new collection called In-Between, aimed squarely at tweens and teens. The products were carefully designed with focus groups of young people, and a new marketing campaign offers a glimpse into the way they live and travel.
The Bags Tweens Need
Away’s new line includes the brand’s classic carry-on in two new colorways—purple and blue—chosen by the focus group. It also includes three products designed from scratch around how tweens spend their days.
There’s a tote and a backpack, both made from an ultralight material that’s machine-washable and water-repellent. Each has a laptop sleeve and internal organization pockets for school, plus a luggage sleeve for longer trips. There are packing cubes, too.
“You’re starting to pack more by yourself when you’re going on a trip,” says CEO Jessica Schinazi. “You can take these bags to school and load it with your textbooks, but it’s also going to serve you on the weekends for sports, hobbies, and traveling with your family.”
There’s also a transparent backpack, built for the clear-bag rules a growing number of schools now impose. “There are other transparent backpacks on the market, but many use a very thin layer of plastic,” Schinazi says. “It’s not going to hold to the endurance that you need for a tween product. Their stuff gets banged up.”
The tweens who tested the bags immediately made them their own, Schinazi says. “We want to foster that independence. . . . You’re putting your own touches on it,” she says. The campaign leans on that: Tweens came into Away’s offices to help shape and film it.
Why Tweens Are on Brands’ Minds
Last year, Away relaunched its kids’ collection. It sold well, Schinazi says, and largely to existing Away customers. The same pattern is showing up in early demand for the tween collection. She believes part of the reason the collections are doing so well is that so little else exists for this age group.
“[The market] was super polarized between character-driven products serving those young children and then luggage for adults that’s not designed for those young travelers in mind,” she says.
But the reasons are cultural, too. In the 1990s and early 2000s, the mall reigned, and it was a tween wonderland. Then e-commerce pulled shoppers away—tweens included—and foot traffic at tween-focused retailers collapsed.
Since the pandemic, though, parents have been eager to get their kids off screens and back out into the world. That means malls again, but also sports, hobbies, concerts, and travel—which gives brands somewhere to show up. Away, for instance, is in Dick’s Sporting Goods, where many parents shop for their kids’ sports gear.
“Now there’s a resurgence into time spent in person, in real life,” Schinazi says.
The Long Game
Away’s new tween collection is part of a broader expansion. Schinazi joined the company 18 months ago and has spent that time pivoting from a direct-to-consumer-first brand to an omnichannel presence. In addition to Dick’s Sporting Goods, Away products are available at Nordstrom and Amazon.
The company is also pushing out new products at speed, including a soft-sided suitcase released a month and a half ago, designed with a top opening for travelers navigating small hotel rooms and cruise cabins. It sold out faster than the company could restock.
But as Away looks at its next decade, it’s thinking generationally. It wants to lodge itself in the minds of today’s tweens now so that the brand feels nostalgic by the time they’re buying their own suitcases for college or a first job.
“Nothing makes me as happy as talking to customers who have a first-generation suitcase that has taken them from their early twenties to now their late thirties,” Schinazi says. “We’re a suitcase that’s going to stay with you through different chapters of your life.”