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Inspired by what I (and many others) thought this question would be about:

What happens to all the half-used (or more likely 5% used) soaps in hotel bathrooms?

You check into a hotel. You open a soap that's big enough to last you a fortnight. But you're only staying for two nights. What happens to it when you're gone?

Is it simply binned? Do the maids (and other staff?) take it home and never have to buy their own soap? Or is it recycled, melted down with all the other leftovers and used to create new ones? ("Melted" is almost certainly the wrong word, but "dissolved" sounded boring. And I don't make soap so I don't know if neither word is correct.) Is the International Maids Union secretly hoarding them all with the plan of one day unleashing them on tiled hotel corridors and making all the guests slip over?

(I'm almost certain they just get binned. But that's less fun than the alternatives.)

AndyT
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    This is one reason why I bring my own soap with me when I travel. It allows me to work through a large bar of my own choice without feeling bad that I barely touched the soap from the hotel. – Peter M Jan 29 '19 at 19:48
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    You can of course also take the soap with you when you go. – Tom Carpenter Jan 29 '19 at 21:29
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    Damn you're staying at fancy hotels that give out 14 nights worth of soap. I usually barely get one night's worht. – Azor Ahai -him- Jan 29 '19 at 22:40
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    @AzorAhai You use way too much soap! I agree the shampoo and body wash is good for ~1.5 uses, all the soap I've seen should be good for at least 5 days. – user71659 Jan 30 '19 at 00:52
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    @user71659 I was thinking of shampoo and body wash and hand soaps when I commented; not necessarily hard soap – Azor Ahai -him- Jan 30 '19 at 00:58
  • The last hotel I was in explicitly invited people to take the soap with them as it would just be trashed. – Simon Richter Jan 30 '19 at 01:45
  • @AzorAhai - I'm talking the bar of soap for hand washing. My fortnight might have been an exaggeration, but it definitely lasts a single person at least 5 nights. – AndyT Jan 30 '19 at 10:24
  • I cannot remember the last time I saw a hotel offering a bar of soap, even the tiny sample sizes - the ones I've been to use refilable liquid soap dispensers for hand wash, and tiny bottles for shampoo, shower gel and other moisturizers. – rumtscho Jan 30 '19 at 12:07
  • @rumtscho In the US it's about 75% all single use with bar soap and 25% all dispensers in my experience. I understand the environmental aspects but hate the dispensers, I've had midrange hotels where the stuff is contaminated by water, one ripped off the wall and as I tried to use it, one place filled two shampoos and no body wash... – user71659 Jan 30 '19 at 16:41

1 Answers1

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In most cases it's just trashed, but there are some charities that do recycle hotel soaps.Telegraph CNN BBC

liftarn
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    Many locales have regulations that require hotels to dispose of any partially-used consumable toiletries for sanitary reasons. That's why hotels have gone to the miniature rolls of toilet paper and everything packaged in its own individual bag/box. Waste minimization. If you opened it, you might as well take it home with you. – bta Jan 29 '19 at 23:09
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    @bta They often leave it by the sink where even the unopened packages get splashed. I guess they also toss these? – Keith McClary Jan 30 '19 at 02:08
  • @bta possibly. though a plastic bottle of shampoo may just be wiped off. – jwenting Jan 30 '19 at 06:04
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    I believe a lot of hotels these days have moved away from disposable soap containers and instead have large soap pumps and shampoo bottles that are attached to the shower wall, both as an environmental measure and a cost savings measure. – Nzall Jan 30 '19 at 12:41
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    @Nzall - I definitely see that in budget hotels, less so in medium/normal hotels. – AndyT Jan 30 '19 at 15:56
  • Good thing I checked - I misremembered that individual packages were required for two stars and up, in fact it's only mandatory for five stars, at least in Germany. (https://www.hotelstars.eu/fileadmin/Dateien/GERMANY/Downloads/Files/Deutsche-Hotelklassifizierung_2015-2020.pdf item 193). – Ulrich Schwarz Jan 30 '19 at 17:10
  • Can you provide a reference that it is trashed in most cases? – guest Feb 02 '20 at 15:52
  • @guest It's in one of the sources provided, "these toiletries are scooped up by chambermaids, thrown into bin bags and sent off to landfill sites". – liftarn Feb 10 '20 at 08:35