Cochinoman tech, sushi, poker
While playing at a tournament at the Bicycle Casino, I noticed the lady sitting next to me had an interesting looking cushion on her chair. When asked, she promptly told me that she is the co-owner of Quad Queens Inc, the company that makes the backpack slash poker cushions.
Denise, who happens to be the President of the company, gave me a full demo right at the table during the break, and I bought one from her on the spot, literally out of the trunk of her SUV. As you can see from the pictures from their website, the cushion basically looks like a flat backpack. It drapes over chairs that are open sided.
The picture above shows the cushion opened up, showing the straps when you are using it as a backpack. The back also has a mesh for magazines or an iPad.
The picture below shows the 3 clips that keep it closed when being used as a backpack. I’ve found that unless you have it stuffed with heavy items, you can get away with just using the one in the middle. That way, it’s a lot quicker to open it up when you get moved to a new table.
Both of the flaps have an inside area for items, and also areas on the outside for smaller items. The picture below shows the case for my Blue Shark glasses inside one of the compartments.
As you can see below, there is also a netted visible pocket for small items. I keep my hand sanitizer there for quick access. You can never have too much hand sanitizer at a tournament with all the dirty chips.
Denise told me her backpacks are made in China and one of the zippers seems to be a little iffy and I suspect after some use, it might break. But otherwise, the manufacturing process seems to be acceptable and the backpack is water resistant in case you are outside in the rain with it.
The last picture below shows a slight problem if your water bottle is large. The pictures shows the small sized sparkling Voss glass bottles in one of the 2 water bottle pockets. As you can see, since the pockets are made to be on the outside when the backpack is closed, the bottles are on the bottom when it’s open as a cushion. It’s not a big problem because I had both a Voss bottle and sparkling juice on the other side and it still draped over the chair. However, it’s probably a good idea to take the bottle out before setting down the cushion if you want quick access to your water.
Finally, the actual cushion itself is soft enough to be comfortable but firm enough to allow for long hours of sitting. The cushion material is enclosed with a zipper so it can be replaced if you want to put a different one in there.
The only problem I had with this clever backpack was the security. When returning on day 2 with my new cushion, I was stopped 3 times by security before I could get to my table. I guess having a camouflaged backpack looks like I’m bringing in some military equipment.
Otherwise, I recommend this cushion for anyone that had to walk all over the casino looking for a cushion, or at the WSOP where there are no cushions.
Quad Queens Inc.
1125 E. Broadway #39
Glendale, CA 91204-1315
(323) 255-3046
quadqueensinc.com
