Everyone’s Launching AI Apps. I’m Still Fixing a Zip.

I started working on 58Miles in 2023 with a simple thought. Let’s make a better bag. Something I would actually want to use every day. A bag that works the way we live and move.

It’s now 2025. Still working on it. Still tweaking. Still not calling it “done.”

Everyone is launching apps and lots of AI apps, and I am launching a bag. Not because the world needs a new one, but because I couldn’t find a single one that worked for me.

Most bags either look good but don’t function, or they’re white-labeled, mass-produced pieces with designs that make no sense. Jahaa dekho, wahaa cool bags and good looking bags, they are like black holes. Too many zips. Random compartments. Loud branding. All show, no soul.

And pen compartments. Pen ke compartments me kaun pen rakhta hai.

I wanted something built for people like us. People who work on the move, who travel for work, who dump things into their bags and still want to stay sorted. I wasn’t trying to create a fashion statement. I just wanted a bag that works.

So I started making one. Here in India.

At first, I thought it would be quick. A few prototypes, a couple of months, and we’d have something good. But it never played out that way. Every sample fixed one problem and introduced another. The laptop section would feel too tight. The strap would lean weird. The bag wouldn’t sit right when placed on the floor. The zip didn’t feel smooth enough. These were small things. But they mattered.

40+ samples and 2 years, all these for little things no one notice but feel.

It’s hard to explain why this took so long. The truth is, I didn’t want to carry a bag that I had to explain. I wanted something that made sense the moment you used it. The kind of product that gets out of your way and becomes part of your rhythm.

I wanted to build for the people like us, who work, travel for work, build, create, hustle, messy and still organized.

Picture abhi baaki hai mere dost.

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This post is part of Slice of Startup Life on eChai Startup Stream — where founders share the unfiltered version of their journey, as it’s happening.