With school scheduled to open in a couple of weeks, children’s backpacks with good back support and spine protection are proving to be a popular item, retailers said.
Packed schoolbags should not weigh more than 1/10th or 1/20th of a child’s weight, Lee Wei-chiang (李偉強), director of Taoyuan General Hospital’s physical therapy department, said in a report by the Chinese-language Mandarin Daily News on Tuesday.
For example, a child weighing 30kg should not carry a bag weighing more than 3kg, Lee said.
The straps of a backpack should be pulled tight until the bag fits snugly into a child’s back, he said.
Prices for backpacks vary greatly, from just a few hundred New Taiwan dollars to several thousand, the report said.
Children often select bags based on cartoon designs, the report quoted a store manager in Taoyuan as saying, with the princess in the Disney film Frozen currently the most popular among girls and boys going for Iron Man or dinosaurs.
Changhua County student Tsai Ya-chin (蔡雅蓁) said that her classmates’ preferred characters from Frozen and Minions, another Disney movie, the report said.
Ting Chiu-tung (丁秋冬), a parent, said she is more pragmatic and chooses products based on their function and utility.
Schoolteacher Liu Yu-hua (劉育華) said that drawstring bags are also popular at his school because they are lightweight and considered cool, the report said.
Angel Wings, a popular line of backpacks authorized by Disney, are sold online through Rakuten.
Made of high-end artificial leather, the manufacturer claims that the bags are anti-bacterial, odor-resistant, breathable and offer back protection.
With adjustable straps, students can use the same bag from grades one to six, it said.
An Angel Wings bag costs more than NT$10,000.
Yu Kuan-wei (游冠緯), a business consultant employed by Rakuten, was quoted by Central News Agency as saying that backpacks that offer back or spine protection are increasingly considered a must and that Rakuten sells more than 10 Angel Wings bags each week.
Rakuten officials said that the company expects a 50 percent increase in profits with the start of a new school year.
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