San Francisco

Women’s handbags have become the mainstay of the luxury industry, generating well over $10B a year in revenues. San Francisco has no dearth of companies designing, and sometimes manufacturing, bags locally, but most have an urban, not luxury sensibility. We have more manufacturers than any place with the possible exception of Australia. To mention but a few (ones I have bought bags or pouches from are highlighted with the backpack emoji 🎒), and those that actually make their bags in the US have the US flag emoji 🇺🇸, with those actually made in San Francisco getting their bonus SF emoji 🌁:

• 🎒 🇺🇸 🌁 Waterfield Designs (motto: No mass production or overseas workforce. WaterField bags are designed and made in San Francisco, where rent is high, labor is expensive and competition is intense. We wouldn’t go anywhere else!)
• 🎒 🇺🇸 Chrome (Note: moved to Seattle in 2019)
• 🎒 🇺🇸 🌁 (some lines) Timbuk2
• 🎒 Hlaska
• Mulholland
• 🇺🇸 🌁 April in Paris

There is a newcomer to this list:

• 🎒 🇺🇸 🌁 Rickshaw Bagworks

Update (2012-07-13):

Add to the list:

• 🎒 🇺🇸 🌁 Glaser Designs
• Acme Made
• 🎒 🇺🇸 🌁 Peasants & Travelers
• 🎒 🇺🇸 Mission Workshop

Update (2013-08-07):

And some more:

• 🎒 🇺🇸 DSPTCH
• Archive
• 🎒 🇺🇸 Triple Aught Design
• 🇺🇸 🌁 Zugster

Update (2019-05-22):

It never ends:

• 🎒 AER
• 🎒 🇺🇸 ARKTYPE
• 🎒 Octovo
• 🎒 Peak Design
• Basil Racuk
• 🇺🇸 🌁 Heath + Stein
• 🎒 Black Ember

Update (2021-09-11):

I didn’t realize Baggu is also SF-based:

• 🎒 Baggu

No wonder the SF Independent School District is in such trouble…

From the Reddit list of questions to xkcd author Randall Munro:

At the EFF organized reading tonight in San Francisco:

One of the best values in San Francisco dining, their $8.50 scallop galette (Breton for buckwheat crêpe).

Update (2012-07-13):

Sadly, it closed a few months ago.

A 33% hike in Muni fares was announced today. This will hit the poorest people in the city first, and to add insult to injury, this is accompanied with cuts in service.

San Francisco has a budget of over $6B, about the same size as much larger cities as Chicago or Paris, and exceeding the budget of 20 of the US states. It also exceeds the entire GNP of countries like Mongolia or Georgia (in the Caucasus). San Franciscans get little to show for it in services.

One reason why: SF has over 8,000 city employees making over $100,000 a year (the head of Muni is one of them, making $325,000, or more than US Cabinet ministers who make $191,000). The share of the city budget spent on those high flyers is over $1B…