How to fly without all the baggage

First there was the scrutiny: Checked luggage must have a Transportation Security Administration-approved lock, or no lock at all. Then came the lost or rifled-through luggage: The U.S. Department of Transportation's 2007 statistics on travel notes that 7.03 of every 1,000 passengers reported mishandled baggage. Now come the charges: Most major carriers, Northwest among them, now charge $25 each way for a second checked bag. It's enough to make a person want to fly baggage-free. And, increasingly, many do.

Businesses that pick up luggage from your home and ship it to your destination are growing. The number of bags shipped by New York City-based Luggage Free has grown 200 percent each year since its founding five years ago. At The Luggage Club, headquartered in Oshkosh, Wis., sales have made "great gains," according to owner Todd Kempinger.

Bill Buth, a Woodbury resident and a retired president of a real estate trade association, sent his golf clubs ahead to Arizona twice this winter. No lugging the bags onto parking shuttles and through the airport; no confusion at the luggage carousel over identical black bags. "It made the whole trip for me because I didn't have to wrestle around with all that stuff. I wasn't tired when I got there and I wasn't tired when I got home."

The downside of moving through the airport without the heavy clubs: A heavy price.

Buth shared the cost of shipping several bags of clubs with friends, and the round-trip, three-day service cost him about $140. A search of various luggage services found costs between $175 and $230 to ship a single bag of golf clubs ahead using the economy service.

Price varies, of course, according to the number of bags, their weight and how quickly you need them shipped. We've compared prices of several luggage services, which pick up your bags, arrange delivery to your destination, track the shipment and provide insurance, typically up to $1,000. We also checked the cost of shipping yourself, via UPS and FedEx. What we found (see chart at right) proves that packing light is priceless.