Several years ago, I started using a homemade luggage tag to keep other travelers from grabbing my bag off of the carousel at baggage claim.  It’s a photo of Alec Guinness as Jedi Master Obi-wan Kenobi, using the Force to get people to back off because “This is Not the Bag You’re Looking For.”

As I loaded up my luggage yesterday in Florida for the trip back home, I snapped a photo of the tag and posted it on Twitter, tagging Mark Hamill a.k.a. Luke Skywalker. 

When I finally opened Twitter again after a long day’s travel, I had a bunch of notifications, because Mark Hamill “liked” the tweet, and a bunch of his followers (of which I am one, of course) ended up re-tweeting it.

The comments have been very positive, and several people said, “I’m going to do that!” so I decided to go ahead and upload a pdf template that you can print out and use.

Note: My tag is printed on plain paper, and laminated with a heat laminator (I used the 5ml thickness laminating sheet for durability–so far so good). My business card is on the flip side of the Obi-wan photo, but for the purposes of the pdf, I added blank lines where folks can write their name and contact info.  You can print it out and cut it horizontally, folding the lines back behind the photo, or trim it vertically if you just want the photo and caption. I used a hole punch after laminating to feed a ribbon through. The tag itself has held up quite nicely, but I do end up switching out the ribbon every few trips, because it starts to fray.

If you’d like to print your own version, here’s a LINK to the free pdf file that you can download.  I’ll just have to keep using a unique ribbon to tie it to my luggage, in case these start popping up at baggage claim from here on.

May the Force Be With You!