Gravel

Gravel's first product exists because a toiletry bag from a grandmother finally gave out. Chris, one of the founders, had carried it for ten years, and every replacement he found was one big pocket where, as the company puts it, your toothbrush rubs up against your toenail clippers. The Provo company has since raised more than $1.4 million on Kickstarter and Indiegogo to keep those two apart.

Chris met his co-founder, Lance, at a Kickstarter party in Utah and pitched the idea. They spent about a year of late nights on research and design, including trips to the Walmart toiletry aisle, and found travelers packing toiletries in ziplock bags or skipping a toiletry bag entirely. The first one went to Kickstarter as "The Best Toiletry Bag For Traveling," a name that left little room for doubt.

The campaign did well enough that both founders moved their families to Vietnam to build relationships with bag manufacturers there. Later campaigns added the Explorer PLUS and the larger Explorer Max, and the line has since grown into packable blankets for planes and campsites.

The name is supposed to be a sound, the one your tires make when they leave the pavement for a dirt road. For anyone who wants to check where the company lives, the footer of its website prints a pair of coordinates that land in Provo.

Gravel does not name its factories, but it says it works with them to cut waste, and it has used minimal packaging since 2018, with one cardboard box serving as both the package and the shipping box. Every product carries a lifetime warranty, and the company says it tries to repair a broken item before replacing it. Lance Cassidy, the CEO, told CXplained that holiday discounts go mostly to colorways the company does not plan to make again.

For about seven years Gravel sold only online. In June 2025 it made its debut at the Outdoor Retailer show to start selling through stores. Cassidy's advice to other founders reads like the toiletry bag's own story: "Create something that a stranger would buy."