I’m having a… philosophical disagreement with a friend of mine.
We have been discussing the small toiletries that are provided by motels for their guests: small bottles of shampoo, conditioner, bar soap, and the like. One of us claims that a guest is totally within their rights to take any unused bottles / bars of soap, etc when they check out. Indeed, motels expect this–thats why housekeeping carts are stocked with them. They contend that, like condiment packets at Taco Bell they’re there for guest use, and the motel / hotel rolls the cost of those toiletries into the price of the room. Ergo, the guest is paying for those items anyway.
The other claims that taking those items is stealing: like towels they’re provided for guest to use in the room, not to take off with them when they leave. Half-used bottles go in the trash but unopened bottles are left for the next guest. Thus, taking them is theft.
Since I’ve never heard of a hotel that tracked bathroom amenities on a per guest or per day basis, I assume that, to the hotel, they have no value. How can you steal something that has no value and is, in fact, abandoned anew each day?
Finding a housekeeping cart and grabbing dozens of them would be stealing. Taking the one-a-day that they leave in your room is not. They put them there for your use. If you use them in the hotel, or later at home, you are still using what they gave you.
The price of the room isn’t calculated as “base plus cleaning plus toiletries plus water…”; bulk amount of toiletries is split into different parts of the hotel’s income points (different hotels will allocate it to “rooms” or treat it as a general cost, chains will usually work at the whole-chain level rather than at individual-hotel level). You’re entitled to take them as well as to use them; how much people do both will eventually affect the price point.
If the staff discovers a partially used tube of shampoo or lotion left behind, it will be replaced with a fresh one. Some of them, at least, will donate them to a women’s shelter or the like. Ditto for those bitty bars of soap.
Another piece of evidence that the hotel doesn’t consider the toiletries to have any value – I’ve noticed that more often than not if I’m staying in a hotel for more than one night, and I leave a bar of soap in the shower that I’ve only used once, the next day the maid will throw it out and leave a new bar. I actually find this so wasteful I’ve started hiding the partially used soap so the maid can’t throw it away.
Consider the following two scenarios where I’m staying in a hotel room for two nights:
On the first night I use one of the bars of soap. The next day the maid throws out the partially used bar of soap and leaves a new one. On the second night I use the new bar of soap. After I leave the maid again throws out the partially used bar of soap and leaves a new one for the next guest.
On the first night I use one of the bars of soap. Before heading out the next day I hide it in my luggage so the maid can’t throw it away. The maid leaves a new bar of soap. On the second night I re-use the partially used bar of soap. When I leave I take the unused bar of soap with me. The maid leaves a new bar for the next guest.
In both scenarios the hotel uses just as many bars of soap.
Something I’ve noticed in hotels outside of the US, many hotels will provide a big pump full of liquid soap/body wash and a pump full of shampoo fastened to the shower wall rather than bar soap and individual mini bottles. When they do that you can’t take them with you.* I figure if hotels really wanted you to only use it in the room they would do something like that.
*I suppose serious cheapskates could bring an empty bottle and fill it up from the pump to take home, but that would take some planning.
Of course you can take them with you! The hotel will just throw away the unused portion of any partially-used ones if you don’t, so why wouldn’t you? (Also, if the hotel doesn’t want you to take them, they can always put non-portable, refillable soap and shampoo dispensers in the bathroom; I’ve seen this setup at hostels and at more eco-conscious hotels.)
Most of the time my room service doesn’t replace the soap, but what I do is only open the bath soap and use it for both my hands and body, and leave the bar of hand soap untouched, since even when I am there for 3 or more days I won’t run through a whole bar of soap, and if I do then I can open the hand soap.
It works out well for me because since the room service I get doesn’t replace the soap a lot, I feel better using only 1 bar total.
There are several companies that recycle hotel soap into new product. So if you don’t take it it doesn’t mean it goes to waste.
Personally I take all the soap they will give me. I haven’t bought a bar in decades. If you stay at more upscale hotels they give you bigger bars of custom soap as well.
Soap, body wash, pens, note pads - home use
Shampoo, conditioner, razors, toothbrushes, toothpaste, swabs, cotton balls, combs, brushes - into a bin in the garage for regular donation to various local shelters.
Sewing kits - distributed to my debate team for use as needed, which is often.
