Like many, I go to a lot of conferences and events. And many of those events have decided that they should give everybody a bag. Most commonly it's a canvas laptop sized bag, though sometimes it's a backpack and at cheaper events just a tote. Some of the bags are cheap, some are quite nice. Some come with just the logo of the event on them, and others come festooned with many logos from sponsors who bought a space on the bag.

The bags are too nice to throw away, so I've kept most of them, usually tossing them in a storage crate. I decided to get the bags from the last decade out and lay them out for a photo. I'm guessing a lot of people have similar collections. We're undergoing a serious bag spam problem.

I have used some of these bags but of course the vast bulk have either gone unused entirely, or were just used at the conference or just on the day they handed out the bag. Making the conference logo visible at the conference is pointless, though perhaps with the sponsored bags, all they want is to plaster their logo at the conference. It's actually risky to use the conference bag at the conference, especially for things like your laptop, as it's way too easy to mistake your bag for somebody else's.

I don't see other people using these bags much either. Sometimes on the flight back from the conference. Or if the conference is an invite-only conference that has some cachet to its sachet. It's very rare to see people walking around with a bag with 6 sponsor logos on it. We conference-goers aren't the type that like to be seen as carrying around somebody's advertising, or being too cheap to buy our own briefcase.

This isn't even the whole collection, there's 50% more out there. I have actually used a few bags if I happened to particularly like their design, or they came from places I actually worked at. Messenger bags which wear comfortably on the body seem to meet my approval over yet more laptop briefcases. And I have disposed of or given away a few, or they weren't in the crate I put bags into.

If you're getting ready to hand out a conference bag, here are some things to consider:

• Realize that almost everybody you give a bag to has a box full of bags at home. Being a really nice expensive bag might help a little but it's costly.
• Face it, unless you are TED, the vast majority of the bags you give out are going to sit in storage. Consider something else. Just don't do it.
• If you feel you have to have a bag, also have an alternative schwag that's just as valuable people can pick instead of a bag.
• Consider the bold move of putting the logos on the inside flap of the bag. That gives up the exposure you were never going to get much of anyway, and makes it more likely I will use the bag, and be reminded of you every day -- and possibly even remind some of the folks I meet with who see me open my bag.
• Forget about putting 6 logos on the bag unless all you want is to plaster those logos around your show floor. You can't even give those bags away.
• If you must have a bag, go cheap with a tote, and make it a zippered tote. We can always find uses for those, they make decent reusable grocery bags, for example. Then I'll keep them in the trunk and remember you on grocery trips. Or go fancy and make it an insulated grocery bag.

This is not to say you could not impress me with something clever, perhaps for a short time. For example I would not mind a bag that integrated a universal power supply and had retractable cords so I did not have to take it out. Or one of those new photographers sling backpacks that you can pull around to access stuff without removing the straps from your shoulder. But if you do that, soon somebody else will have it too and I'll have a box of them.

So what other schwag can you give out? That is a challenge of course, and there's a whole industry trying to sell you stuff. It varies with the time, and it has to be something new so that I don't have a box of them at home. Consumable stuff (chocolate bars etc.) are always welcome but you fear that this means your logo will be forgotten. But it's better than being in a crate. Travel stuff is usually a hit but duplication is again a risk -- retractable cables etc. Or spend your money on a nice mobile schedule for your event, one that doesn't suck (most of the ones out there suck) and put some logos on that.

I am told that homeless shelters like donations of backpacks and other useful bags. I suppose if we all did this, and companies found their logo hanging from the shoulders of homeless dudes, they might think twice about giving out so many bags. A system to arrange donation to poor folks in Africa might also be good.