Although the stand is light enough to carry without a bag, as a gigging musician I like my equipment to look good on stage, stands get scratched on route to gigs. The bag looks after this, it won't stop dents but it will make sure it looks good on stage. It has a shoulder strap or hand straps both feel extremely sturdy. There us a zip pocket on the outside, ideal for spare parts or a few leads, apart from that I'm not sure what this would be for. Over all a great bag to hold your AX-48 stand or in fact any stand within this range. We'll worth the money!