It’s crunch month for all of us on the road who have to pack in business meetings, hit deadlines, live in strange hotel rooms, and sandwich in shopping for loved ones, colleagues or clients. Sure, you might be able to hand over the chore and a credit card to a PA or a devoted spouse and avoid the Christmas rush and crush. Smarter yet: Cybershop while relaxing with a chardonnay or a rare Scotch.

With a planet of online retailers vying for your attention and cash, and most looking as cluttered as a Macy’s basement store, where do you start? I recently, accidentally, discovered On The Fly (http://www.onthefly.com/), a well-organized emporium offering what it describes as “solutions for the modern gentleman.”

In fact, the site—and a retail store in a century old warehouse in a San Francisco alley—house a collection of luxury goods and gear including luggage that could satisfy anybody’s wish list year round—not just GQ gents during the holidays. You’ll find everything from clothing to grooming to good wine, fine cigars and lots of cool toys for girls or boys. There’s even a rare Indian motorcycle on the showroom floor but it’s eye candy and not for sale.

I ran across On The Fly (http://www.onthefly.com/) while searching for an El Casco solid-brass vintage stapler to replace one I borrowed from a friend. El Casco, European designed and crafted, is sort of the Bentley of desk accessories. A two-hole punch ranges from $124 to $161. A brass letter opener is $78. The large brass stapler I was looking for is $250. An art-deco ashtray for cigars, that looks straight out of the “Thin Man” whodunits of the ‘30s, fetches up to $398. El Casco is not for the Office Max crowd.

On The Fly’s founder is Ami Arad, described by his friends as a “renaissance man, raconteur, male chauvinist pig.” He apparently has a sense of style along with expensive tastes. Working in a Berkeley, California haberdashery, he was twice named a regional finalist in Esquire’s “Best Dressed Real Man in America” competition. Most recently, Arad was selling enterprise software and admits he’s “ridden the rollercoaster” in the tech boom and bust cycles. He does have a good sense of humor. For this venture, he’s assembled a quirky team of managers and advisors ranging from a director of operations to a “man of leisure” to a full-time golf pro.

From his vast inventory, the luggage and other travel goods caught my eye. On The Fly is choosy on what it carries for carry-ons and check-ins. No Samsonite or Tumi here. Only three brands of luxury travelware and accessories are sold—Aaron Barak, Mullholland Brothers and Morgan Grays. All are dramatic in their simplicity and design, impressive in their craftsmanship and steep in their pricing. (Shop elsewhere if you’re looking for luxury at a discount. Neither the Web site nor the retail store undercuts the brands’ suggested prices or takes a hefty markup.)

Aaron Barak is actually a 21-year-old student at New York University named Elija Bernard who started designing functional and fashionable full-grain cowhide leather goods when he was 19, found a financial banker, and launched the brand (www.aaronbarak.com) and a line a year ago. Aaron Barak is Bernard’s Hebrew name.

A star of the Aaron Barak collection is the Aviator, a leather weekender that looks like a 19th-century doctor’s bag with a push-button log, large interior zip pockets in a size that’s allowed on-board a plane today and fits in an overhead bin. The price tag reads $1,075. The Satchel is just as handsome and a bit smaller with an interior divider and zip pocket for $875. On The Fly also features an Aaron Barak Monticello leather backpack with all sorts of compartments for $875; bring it to the negotiating table and it will command attention. The all-leather Laptop, a sleek computer case with two vertical full-length zipper pockets, triple layered padding and a removable, adjustable shoulder strap, is especially eye-catching at $575.

But then the Mulholland Brothers garment bag fashioned out of farm-grown American alligator skin is eye-popping and so is the $9,615 price. The snappy looking bag comes in Lariat leather, first developed for saddlebags and saddles used by Pony Express riders. On The Fly carries a sizeable part of the Mulholland Brothers line including a rolling garment bag for $825, a wheeled duffel from $345 to $775, and a collapsible shave kit for $135. The Longhorn and Shorthorn weekend bags come in 10 colors and can handle a week’s worth of clothing for the disciplined packer—from $480 to $850.

Morgan Grays (http://www.morgangrays.com/) luggage and accessories are designed and handmade in America with a decidedly English influence. The leather Cavarly Duffel Bag is inspired by the duffels issued by the U.S. Army to soldiers fighting in the Mexican American War. Price: $1,125. The Weekender is reminiscent of the Navy canvas duffels popular in 1949. The Bogart Line, no surprise, is fashioned after the film styles of the ‘30s and ‘40s including Bogie’s classic, The Maltese Falcon.

Arad has a clever line that touts the luggage lines On The Fly pitches and conjures up visions of the good life: “Travel Like the Rat Pack, Not a Pack Rat.”

No Go on The Logo. While you’re tapping into your memory bank, remember when it was so verrrrrry chic to carry bags, luggage, scarves festooned with logos of luxury goods makers like Ferragamo, Yves St. Laurent, Louis Vuitton, Hermes, Gucci, Pucci. It was so ‘80s to be walking billboards for everyone’s brand. That’s fine if you’re a Grand Prix or Indy race driver or pro-golfer and you’re paid to sport ads from head to toe. But most of us don’t have endorsement deals; the payoff is you’re considered cool because you have the taste and cash to carry or flaunt that pricey mostly European gear. Then along came knocks and global affluence and those monster prices net you scant prestige. Now the height of luxury and style are goods with the name and no logo, no trademark, nothing that even hints at ostentatious. The Italian leather goods giant, Bottega Veneta is one of the first to strip its logo off its line, but it hasn’t lost its cachet or customers apparently. BV’s Ebanao Cobat crocodile bag is about the price of a BMW 7 series, $75,000. That’s not a typo and it signals a trend. Japanese shoppers are the nuttiest over luxury logos but Time Magazine recently reported that $300,000 in logo-less Bottega Venetta bags were snapped up in Tokyo in less than two hours…

Chris Barnett has reported on great saloons and bars worldwide for 25 years for the Los Angeles Times and the in-flight magazines for United, TWA and PSA, and has been a contributing editor for Frequent Flyer magazine for over 10 years. Chris also specializes in travel strategies that save business travelers time, money and anxiety, and he is the creator of Frequent Flyer's On the Road With column that chronicles how celebrities and high-profile executives travel and the magazine's Baggage Beat, which showcases hot new luggage products and innovations in the baggage industry. He's based in San Francisco. Chris can be reached at cbarn@aol.com.