As Everyday Carry for Men confirms, men carry the basics with them. What they carry usually fits into their pockets or clips to their belts. Women, on the other hand, tend to carry a great deal more with them on a regular basis.
What Men and Women Have in Common
Men and women have some of the same items that they carry every day in common with each other. For example, most carry a wallet or some version of a wallet and the usual contents like a driver's license, credit cards, money, etc. Most also carry a cell phone and their keys.
Most women also carry a highlighter and/or pen, gum, and lip gloss or lipstick with them. Beyond these items, women not only carry vastly more than men carry, but what women carry varies a great deal from one woman to the next and even from one day to the next for a woman.
A One-stop Destination
A woman's purse/handbag, it seems, is more than just a carryall for necessary items. It serves as a one-stop destination, kind of like the mall. A woman's purse, in addition to being a convenient way to carry the essentials, also sometimes serves as a:
- Coffee Shop. One woman claims to carry the makings for coffee along with the creamer and sweetener necessary for her to enjoy her coffee. She did not say if she carried a cup to hold her coffee too.
- Medicine Cabinet. From a variety of painkillers (Motrin being the most popular) to Kleenex to contact supplies to antibiotic ointment, many women carry the just-in-case items often found in a medicine cabinet. Interestingly, the items considered essential and worth always carrying are not the same for every woman.
- Convenience Store. Everyone has stopped at a convenience store while traveling and grabbed something to drink, a snack, and perhaps a magazine. Some women have decided that carrying these items with them is more convenient. It's definitely cheaper than buying these items at most convenience stores.
- Beauty shop. Most women always carry lip gloss or lipstick with them. In fact, many usually have more than one color choice with them. In addition, women also carry a variety of other beauty-oriented items such as a nail clipper or file, mascara, lotion, floss, and a brush or comb.
- General Store. When children are babies, a diaper bag serves to carry many items they might need. When children grow out of diapers, some of those items make their way into mom's purse. For example, some women regularly carry a change of underwear for their little ones, wipes of some sort, and toys to occupy the kids.
Many women also carry items such as a book, reading glasses, sunglasses, and a hand-held fan. And not to leave out the men, some women carry items that their husbands might need but don't want to carry. In fact, one woman said she always has a pair of reading glasses for her husband. Note that the men did not admit to carrying those with them regularly. Another woman said that her husband wants her to carry a "mom purse" (i.e., a large purse or bag), so she can have more items with her that he thinks are everyday carry items.
Women carry an amazing number of items with them regularly, and the variety of those items is certainly intriguing.
Even More Everyday Carry for Women
Even with the large number of items listed above that many women carry in their purses, there are quite a few items still not mentioned. Those include:
- Larger electronics like an iPad for example
- An inhaler
- Jewelry
- Note pads
- Business cards
The large variety of items that women carry in their handbags/purses seems rivaled only by the different sizes, shapes, and colors of handbags/purses available. A woman’s carryall has gone well beyond being just a convenient storage place for the bare necessities.
