This was published 5 years ago
Taking toiletries from hotel rooms: There's a good reason to steal them
Taking those bottles with you can be a good idea.Credit: SHUTTERSTOCK
What does your hotel do with those half-empty bottles of shampoo, body wash, mouthwash and the barely-used bars of soap that housekeeping staff routinely collect every day? If it's anything like a typical hotel, they toss them. First they'll go into the housekeeper's all-purpose garbage bag, then into the hotel's bins. From there they'll most likely end up as landfill, and those little plastic bottles that once held shampoo become part of the 250 million tonnes of plastic that is used once and dumped each year around the globe.
Not so fantastic plastic
Current figures for plastic consumption are alarming. How about this: a million plastic bottles bought around the world. That's per minute.
The world is creating monstrous amounts of plastic waste.Credit: AP
About 10 per cent of all plastic will end up in the oceans. According to the America's Science magazine, about 12 million tonnes of plastic washed ashore in 2010 alone, enough to see every metre of coastline on the planet strewn with junk.
On average every person on our planet dumps over 30kgs of plastic per year. For developed countries that figure is several times higher.
You don't have to travel far to see the mess that plastic is making of our little planet, and particularly in parts of the Third World where rubbish collection is inadequate – or lacking altogether. The roadsides in India are clogged with the stuff, in Bali enormous piles of plastic waste accumulate on the outskirts of villages. Along the island's coast, every incoming tide delivers a fresh cargo of plastic junk to the island's beaches from December to March. One of the most depressing sights I've ever seen was Tiger's Nest Monastery in Bhutan, an icon for the country's tourism industry clinging to its a sheer cliff face, with bags and other plastic detritus snagged on rocks and bushes beneath it.
Hotels initiatives
Many hotels routinely assure us that they're doing their bit as responsible eco-citizens to make our planet a cleaner, greener place. Do they not tell us that we can choose to hang our towels rather than having them freshly laundered every day, thus saving energy and detergents that pollute our water?
But there's a perception issue with toiletries. Guests don't want bathroom products that look less than pristine, and therefore refilling the tiny plastic bottles of shampoo and body wash is out of the question. But some accommodation providers make a determined effort to limit the amount of waste they produce as part of an overarching green strategy.
At the Narrows Escape Rainforest Retreat in Montville in Queensland's Sunshine Coast hinterland, owner Mark Skinner uses 500ml bulk dispensers for bathroom products.
"Some hotels use recycled plastic for their shampoo and soap rather than single-use containers," says Skinner, "but for many accommodation providers there's no real value in being seen as eco-friendly. Guests are fairly cynical, questioning for example that re-using towels is motivated by concern for the environment, it's more like a money-saver for the hotel."
Skinner highlights the work of Victoria-based Soap Aid a not-for-profit that works to improve hygiene in disadvantaged communities in Australia and overseas. Soap Aid collects soap bars that would normally be tossed from hotel rooms, cleans and repurposes them into fresh, hygienic soap for distribution to targeted communities around the world.
Almost 1.5 million children under five die each year due to preventable childhood infectious diseases. Diarrhoea alone kills close to a million, and something as simple as washing children's hands with antibacterial soap can go a long way toward keeping them infection free. To date, Soap Aid has distributed almost 700,000 100g soap bars around the world, supplying hygienic soap to over a quarter of a million people and saving over 100 tonnes of soap from ending up in landfill.
Soap Aid was an initiative of Concept Amenities, a leading supplier of bathroom amenities to the hotel industry. Concept Amenities has since been acquired by Hunter Amenities. While Hunter Amenities will continue the work of Soap Aid, instead of soap being collected free of charge by voluntary organisations as in the past, Hunter Amenities intends to impose a modest charge per room per annum for the service.
Vikki Done, a member of worldwide volunteer service organisation Soroptimist International, and a passionate recycler in the hospitality industry, fears the charge might cause some of the smaller, independent hotels and motels to abandon their soap collection. So far, Done has collected more than 320kgs of hotel soap on behalf of Soap Aid,
Her fears might be unfounded, at least where the larger, corporate accommodation providers are concerned, if the overseas example applies here. In the USA, global health organisation Clean the World operates a similar recycling program, with an impressive list of hospitality industry partners including Hilton, Hyatt, the Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group and Starwood, and a similar fee-per-room business model.
The problem of those little half-used plastic bottles is more difficult to crack. Even if the contents can be recycled, what do you do with those tiny single-use containers? As Mark Skinner points out, one solution is for hotels to use bulk dispensers for their bathroom supplies, saving those plastic bottles from contributing to the world's plastic junkpile, but there are a few things guests can do to make for a greener stay.
BYO. Refill those little bottles you took from your last hotel stay. Chances are the bathroom products in your home are better quality than those that most hotels supply.
If you've used some of the bathroom products, take whatever remains. Handy for that post-workout shower at the gym or the pool. Wet soap bars are messy but if you've used the shower cap, wrap them up in that.
If you're hotel hopping, take your used bathroom products from one to the next.
And when you're done, put those bottles in your recycling at home.
See also: 'There's a window in my shower' - horror hotel design flaws
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