Hmph! I worked in a hotel for two and a half years and never ONCE saw a Gideon, or anyone else bringing a fresh supply of Bibles. I was best friends with the manager who was an athiest, and I think he would have found the Bible restocking amusing enough to tell me about it, given the irony of someone “stealing” a Bible. As I recall, we had a few spares in the supply room, and I don’t remember ever having a Bible stolen from our establishment. Nor did our books have a sticker asking that they be left for the next patron.
The only time we ever replaced the Bibles was if they had something spilled on them, or became, er . . . sticky. (Don’t ask.)
I don’t think I saw the answer to how they all get in there in the first place. Does a guy come in off the street with a handtruck and ask for the keys to every room in the hotel? Surely not; it has to be done by hotel staff. Seems like a strange practice for a business to engage in. I wonder if the front desk has a wide selecton of religious material in the event a non-christian happens to stay in the room.
Though I never saw a Gideon, I’d assume that the Bibles would be delivered the same way our other supplies were: a delivery person would come to the front desk and ask how many we needed, and then Housekeeping would deliver them during their rounds.
We had no other religious material, other than a by-request list of local churches. I think the Bibles in motel rooms are more of a custom and tradition at this point, rather than a requirement. (Our housekeepers had to check off its presence on their inventory list after a customer checked out, however.)