Black Friday Sale LIVE use BF20 at check out & FREE Standard Shipping on all orders!!

Simplify Your EDC Here's our 5 Essentials

by Daniel @HolsterCentral on June 24, 2020

Estimated 5 Minute Read

simplify your edc with our 5 essentials 

Once you start Concealed Carrying and embracing the EDC (Every Day Carry) Lifestyle, you can get a bit carried away with thinking of all the things you will need to add to your EDC set up!

You may start to look at other people's pocket dumps for ideas and inspiration and then start carrying everything but the kitchen sink! 

If you let this happen, your pockets get very full, you start to lose track of things and lose items and it can get very complicated and expensive!

What one person needs for their EDC may be totally different from yours!

For example, one person might be a mechanic and need a Leatherman and use it every day on the job, but you may work in an office and may never use a Leatherman if you carried one.

Someone else might need a big knife for processing meat and cutting thick materials, you might only open Amazon boxes!

If you work nights you may need a flashlight every single night that needs a huge throw, lots of lumens, and very long battery life, whereas if you hardly ever leave the house at night you just need a small flashlight to find your wallet under the car seat from time to time. 

Before adding any item to your EDC we suggest you ask yourself a few questions.

  • Do I really need this / is it essential?
  • How often am I likely to need to use this? 
  • Where / How will you carry it?
  • Will it take up much space/weight?
  • Is it easily replaced if lost?

If you run any item you are thinking of carrying through this filtering process, it may save you time, space, and money.

It's so easy to think, "oh this is cool" I will add it to my EDC! Then your pockets are stuffed and your belt is too heavy, you have a huge collection of crap to transfer from outfit to outfit and things are getting lost falling through the cracks.

I find it's fairly easy to keep track of 4-6 things. Once you get past 7 items it gets really hard to keep track and keep a count of things and that's when you start losing things.

That's when I decided to scale back to a more minimalist set up.

There was stuff I was carrying that I never used and the likelihood of needing to use was way under 10% so I decided to filter my items and take my chances!

Here are The Essentials

phone wallet keys

#1-  The basics - Phone, Wallet, Keys. 

Well, this is really 3 items but it's the standard and essential 3 items that basically everyone carries so we'll count that as one.

You can get a bunch of added benefits from carrying your keys, for example, I have a small SOG key knife on my keys which is awesome to have, it looks like a normal key but actually has a little folding knife inside the key. 

A little LED flashlight on your keychain is also great to have and you could even add a little fire starter or bottle opener/striking device to your keys to get the most out of that must-carry item.

I also have a TILE tracking device on my keys and in my wallet. I also wear an Apple Watch but I don't count that either as that is on my wrist. 

#2 - Your Gun And Holster. This is your lifesaver, yes this is technically 2 items but they are basically 1 item worn together. 

#3 - Your Knife - for cutting and opening things and possibly self-defense but depending on your lifestyle a little one on your key-chain might be just fine.

#4 - Flashlight - Super useful and can be used for a variety of things, from finding things in the dark to signaling and even blinding an attacker or striking them with the bezel. Again if you are rarely out at night a small light on your keychain may be fine for EDC.

#5 - Number 5 is where you can get a bit more personal and customize your carry to suit your lifestyle.

As mentioned above depending on your job you might need a Leatherman or a heavy-duty knife and if you smoke you may need a lighter.

After the essentials, here are some other recommended EDC items to consider...

    • An EDC Stabby pen: these are super useful if you need to write a lot and it's a weapon that doesn't look like a weapon, so if you need to get through security, you will probably get away with it! A lot of EDC pens also double as a glass breaker if you needed to break a window e.g. to escape a car after a car accident. 

CAT Tourniquet

 pepper spray

    • A Pepper (OC) Spray: this could be used in a number of situations, for example:
      • to fend off a group of attackers who want to rob you or cause you harm. You can't exactly shoot 4 people who haven't presented a deadly threat but you can hose them down and run off!
      • to protect yourself from a rogue dog off its' leash that may be coming to take a chunk out of your leg and you don't want to shoot it!
      • to stop someone kicking your car door in during a road rage incident- they aren't a deadly threat so you can't shoot them but they are damaging your property so you could use your pepper spray to stop them.

As noted before, you really need to be selective before adding any more than 5 items to your EDC and only add items that you need regularly in your own daily life. 

Hopefully, this article gave you some food for thought, let us know what are your 5 main EDC items? 

Thanks for reading!

LEAVE A COMMENT

Please note, comments must be approved before they are published


BACK TO TOP