If you’re a percussionist, chances are that you’ve seen the Mike Balter MBMB Mallet Bag.  You may even own one yourself.

A couple of years ago, I bought one as a cheap ($25) option for storing a large number of mallets (though back then I didn’t own very many).  And this bag is good at doing that, having a high volume for its size factor.  It even opens up at both ends so you can find the right mallet no matter which way they are facing in the bag.

However, mallets never stay organized in this bag.  Sometimes, I’ll just want to quickly grab a set of mallets from my bag.  But because everything is mixed up, it takes a while just to find three and I’ll struggle to find the last one because I can’t even see it.

Me fishing around in the bag for that last mallet can’t be good for my (expensive) mallets.

But it gets even worse!  Sometimes, the shafts of the mallets will somehow interlock so that I’ll have to shift the mallets around for a while until I can free one mallet.  Repeat 3 more times to get out a set.  Once again, this can’t be good for my mallets.

I really want to get my mallets organized.  One of my options is to purchase a new bag.  But any mallet bag that can hold the same number of mallets will be bigger and more expensive.  Being on a budget this semester, I needed a cheaper option.

Solution?  Custom divider inserts!

This is made of black poster board, costing me $0.32 at the local Target.  I designed this so that it would divide my bag into 4 equal sections.

This is version 1.0 and there are some issues with the design, like not fitting perfectly. But for less than $1, I’m pretty happy with how it improved my mallet bag.  Mallets stay organized and I can quickly find what I’m looking for.

I’m going to test out this design for a couple of weeks.  If it holds up, then that’s that.  But if it fails, I’ll come up with a 2nd version.

Wish me luck!