GroundSupportWorldWide.com |

Higher baggage fees charged by major airlines are opening the door to companies offering the convenience of shipping fliers' bags from door to destination.

Anything Anywhere Packing and Shipping in Pittsburgh and Boston's Luggage Forward offer baggage pickup and delivery. The companies say their services eliminate the need for fliers to take luggage to an airport -- and then waiting at a far-away airport's baggage claim and hoping their bags made the trip.

In the last two weeks, major airlines, including American, United, Delta and Continental, said they will charge the industry's highest fees to check bags at airports.

"Whenever the airlines raise baggage fees, we experience a spike in our business," said Zeke Adkins, spokesman and co-founder of Luggage Forward, a five-year-old shipping company.

Luggage Forward operates under various names -- Baggage Quest; Luggage Advance; Luggage Express; Sports Express; and Virtual Bellhop. The company outsources its shipments to various carriers to hold down costs, Adkins said.

"People are happy to know there's an alternative to having to take their luggage to the airport and stand in line to get it when they get to their destination," said Mark Tarshis, owner of Anything Anywhere Packing and Shipping, on Banksville Road near the Dormont-Mt. Lebanon border.