What makes a woman's pack a woman's pack? According to Heidi Kessler, chief pack designer at Lowe, the following are areas of importance in achieving a perfect fit for women and require a different design approach than with a man's pack:

• The width, shape and set of the shoulder strap. Men's shoulder straps tend to have a wider "Y" at the yolk whereas women need more of a "V" shape. Women also need a narrower strap that doesn't dig into their body.
• Women typically require a shorter torso length so we make the packs and the pack frames shorter.
• The hip or waist belt needs to feature more of a cant (flare) to it than a man's since a woman is typically curvier. Also, the hip belt needs to be a bit narrower since the space between a woman's ribs and her hips is less than on a man.
• For external frame packs, the pack needs to be mounted lower on the frame so that it best matches where a woman carries her center of gravity.

OK, that makes good sense, but hasn't it become apparent that many women are fitting better into "men's" packs and men, especially shorter torsoed ones and teenagers fit better into "women's" packs?

The fact is, fitting a pack is more a matter of matching pack size and shape to body size and shape. The sport of backpacking is not different because women are involved in it. A woman heading out for two weeks on a backcountry trip has the same support and carrying capacity needs as a man, but try to fit her into a pack designed just for a woman and there is no way you'll be able to meet her needs.

"Volume is a huge issue for me and I'm a tiny person," says ny friend Jackie Lawhon of Wilderness Outfitters in Georgia. "I carry both Dana and Gregory and have found I can fit any person of any size extremely well. First I find a pack bag that will meet the carrying needs and goals and then I match them (the customer) up with a suspension system that will carry the load comfortably based on their size and shape."

So what is most important when buying a women's pack, or any pack for that matter? The following: You must be sure that the pack can carry sufficient capacity to be able to support your carrying needs, be it a weekend foray or a week-long expedition. After that, the most important thing to establish is fit.

Which companies are best meeting the needs of fitting women and smaller torsoed men? During my certainly unscientific survey of both retailers and manufacturers across the nation, I asked either which brands of packs their store carried that best fit women or which brands (from other manufacturers) they felt were doing the best job of meeting a woman's needs. The following is the result.

• Unanimously, Dana led the list with virtually every specialty store carrying Dana and citing that they liked his system if price was not an issue. It must also be noted here however, that while Dana was the most popular, every woman interviewed for this article said they felt Dana could improve the hip belts as they were known for digging into a woman's rib cage more readily than other models from other companies.
• Lowe gained kudos from many for leading the way in the category and this was the brand that played as a dominant one in the chains where women's specific branding and value pricing was deemed most important.
• Gregory (with their adjustable belt and especially as a mid-price point offering with the Adventure Series) and The North Face (especially since they created a line of women's specific packs) gained frequent mentions as popular brands too.
• Osprey, MountainSmith gained several mentions.
• Kelty was the lone frame pack company that every retailer and other pack companies kept mentioning, although JanSport received a few nods due to the microadjustability of the frame and pack bag position.