01/09/2026
Gray Man/Concealed Carry Bag Use
LESSONS LEARNED
Some classic mistakes vis-à-vis being the gray man and having a bag gun. What can we learn here? You can't be a try-hard!
Now, if it weren't for a couple of crucial details, these guys would fit in with the locals in any number of U.S. cities. It's those small details that matter, though. You *must* sweat the little s**t.
Yes, they’re dressed the right way (well, maybe not for a rodeo or a B**M dungeon), but look at those gun bags! They’re a dead giveaway. It’s unfortunate, but we can learn from them.
There’s more to the mission of a gun bag than just being innocuous.
Grunts: INNOCUOUS. /iˈnäkyəwəs/ (adjective). Not likely to attract attention, evoke a strong reaction, or offend. Inoffensive and benign.
It’s similar to the “nothing to see here!” vibe that really good shammers from the E-4 mafia understand. Like the VERTX pack you see there. It's the only one that works the right way.
Bottom line? You have to do more than hide the gun (or at least put off a Schrödinger's gun sort of vibe). You also want it to contribute to your blend-in-the-crowd anonymity.
Because of that, your gun bag needs to be as “unremarkable” as you. It can’t be the sort of pack that draws attention to you.
And that's where these guys failed.
Don't be like these chucklef**ks. Don't make it obvious. That SpongeBob pack ain't fooling anyone. Neither is the Mickey Mouse bag – the use of which is doubly egregious because he's wearing it in the front instead of the back. Or maybe he’s using it as a sling back, like all the real low-profile operators do. At least the ones who operate operationally. That's a dead giveaway.
And don't get us started on the guy who has little red tags all over his pack. He might as well be carrying a neon sign saying he's got a gun.
Please don’t get us wrong. We're not impugning every bit of these guys’ urban fieldcraft. Honestly, if it wasn't for their choice of backpacks, they'd all have nailed it.
Well, the visuals anyway.
It’s hard to know without being there if there are olfactory considerations. That’s an undercover/low-profile/clandestine/wet work consideration that is ignored.
Seriously – if you’re posing as a homeless guy or an outraged white liberal lady in the midst of performative activism, you can’t be smelling like you showered or used deodorant. It’s a dead giveaway. It won’t take long for the People Who Know to clock you, even in a crowd.
But, we digress.
The bottom line is, your concealed carry backpack needs to provide reliable internal retention for secure firearm access (but not so secure you can’t deploy your goodies rapidly).
That retention should ideally be segregated from the rest of the bag in a designated area that will keep your firearm separate from the assorted thingies, floaties, pogie-bait, extra phone charging cords, Skoal/Copenhagen/Zyn cans, cough drops, nail polish (we won’t judge you), flashlight, fleshlight, duct tape, ski mask, etc. etc. etc.
And *THAT*, nasties, is why they should have read our article about bag guns and gun bags. It's not too late for you, though.
YOU CAN STILL LEARN!
Oh yeah. And you should definitely have a decent gun, too. That’s probably important to mention.
Anyway, you can find the link to our article below.
