
I like products that just work and seem to have exactly what you need and nothing that you don’t. The Arkel Shopper falls into this category. Made in Canada of robust materials and lots of love it’s the nicest shopping bag style pannier I’ve used.

The Shopper mounts via two hooks to just about any rear rack. The bag is attractive and the colour scheme I have is nicely understated - although they offer two other brighter colour options - orange and green.

You can easily fit two regular sized shopping bags worth of groceries in this pannier.

There is an extension collar that can be used to over stuff this bag if you’ve got a mega load to carry. I would recommend only putting light items up that high, but it’s ideal for that 12 pack of TP you need to get home. One thing I really like is that this collar can be removed using a zipper. Often we don’t really need these features, but we have them in our way making getting in and out of the bag a pain. Kudos to Arkel for giving us the choice.

Note the drawstring closure to keep stuff from falling out and the carry handles that make hauling the bag easy.

The shoulder strap is comfortable and lets you wear the bag while you shop. It hides behind that flap at the top of the bag when not needed. It’s also removable if you don’t want to use it.

The hook system works well and is easy to use. Note that there is no bottom hook. I don’t find this has any negative impact when using the bag, but I don’t mountain bike single track with a bag like this either!

The flap shown above drops down over the rack hooks to keep them out of your way when carrying the bag.

The Shopper features a stiff plastic back plate and a metal reinforcement strut. You’ll hardly notice these features when using the bag, but they are critical! I have friends that own shopping panniers without these features and they bulge and sag when used making them less than awesome to load up.

This pocket is handy for small items like keys, coins, cell phone, etc… You can also stash the extension collar or shoulder strap in there if you don’t want them at the moment, but prefer to keep your options open.

Here is the bag in it’s folded up mode. This keeps the bag up close to your rack for less air resistance. You can also wrap the velcro tabs that tuck in the bottom of the bag around your rear rack struts so that it doesn’t bounce around. One of my few criticisms of the Arkel Shopper is that the folded bag looks untidy at the top and doesn’t fold as flat as I’d like. A second set of velcro tabs up higher would solve the problem at very little extra cost. Not a huge deal, but it would be nice.

With the bag folded like this it’s easy to leave it on your bike so you can carry those spur of the moment items you end up needing to carry home and don’t necessarily have any place to put it. I find about 1/3rd of my loads weren’t planned. I should also point out that this bag isn’t just for shopping. It could easily be used for bike commuting or light touring. Just add a removable rain cover if the weather turns ugly.

The bag’s volume [without extension collar maxed out] is 25L [1500 cu inches] and it weighs 1.4kg [2.5lbs]. MSRP is about ~$90CDN.