Is this unhygienic?!

[loislaneloves]

I have an Airbnb on my property. It’s basically a tiny home at the bottom of our large garden with an amazing view. Most people come for the weekend by train and I don’t want people to spend their holiday shopping for stuff like coffee, tea, milk or having to cram suitcases full of toiletries or beach towels so I provide all of those. I also provide a little evening snack (crisps usually) some wine to watch the sun set on the deck with and fruit from the garden and a croissant and jam for breakfast. People love it and I make it quite clear on my ads that these things are provided.
Just got a review from a couple who stayed with us a few days ago. They gave us a good review but took one star off and in her private message to me she said ‘We loved our stay with you but we weren’t very happy that the toiletries are in big shared bottles rather than individual use. This is obviously very unhygienic (we don’t know who has used them!!) so we had to make the trip to buy some for ourselves which was an expense and effort we weren’t expecting’.
To be clear I offer Aesop Shower Gel, Shampoo and Conditioner in the shower and Aesop Hand Wash by the sink in 500ml bottles. They get replaced when empty which is usually about every 10 months
AIBU to think this is not unhygienic?!

We also have a similar Airbnb set up and deliberately stopped using individually packaged toiletries for environmental reasons. We now have dispensers attached to the wall and I would have been equally baffled to get that review ! If I’d been staying my only observation would have been Aesop, how lovely.

I imagine these people also don’t wash their hands when using public toilets or before eating.

Don't worry about losing your perfect 5 star rating, OP. I often don't trust places that only have perfect 5 stars, as I wonder if they've just got friends and family to do a load of fake reviews. Your large bottles are perfectly hygenic and you are going above and beyond to provide Aesop products.

My parents used to run a small B&B many years ago and both DH and I worked there at various times. The issue with dealing with the general public, particularly the ones on holiday, is that a good percentage of them are insane, unreasonable, or both. We had complaints about everything from no separate shower (was a shower over a bath), that we handed out keys to the rooms not key cards, that we only had one wifi for the whole hotel and not room by room (still don't know what they were on about with that one) to the fact that they had to walk upstairs to their bedroom (period building, that there was no lift was clear in the bookings and they could request a ground floor room if they needed access). One person saw the CCTV we had on the outside of the building and left a Tripadvisor review that we were filming guests in the nude(!!?) and we had to complain to Tripadvisor to get that one taken down. We used to try and respond to the more unreasonable Tripadvisor comments and then realised it just made us look defensive so then we stopped bothering.

Just write these comments off as bonkers and move on. The instant coffee people were bonkers too. You don't have to react to every comment.

Many toilets have automatic dispencers and taps so you don’t have to touch anything.

She's being totally unreasonable. I'd be thrilled to have such nice toiletries provided for me. I've just come back from staying in a Mandarin Oriental (ie, considered quite luxury) and my bathroom had lovely diptyque bottles attached to the shower wall like you've done.

I'm struggling to understand how liquid soap and shampoo can be unhygienic, even if previously used by others? Surely soap is antibacterial?

Genuinely curious to know if she caries her own hand soap to use in restaurant or service station toilets too?! What about her own toilet paper? You know, because other people's hands have touched the roll. Utterly bizarre, and makes me inclined to thinks there's OCD or some kind of germ phobia at play.

Real shame she's marked you down because of her own neurosis.

YANBU re the toiletries

YABU to get hung up on someone not giving you 5 stars.

Nobody will be put off because you've got a 4.8 rating rather than a 5.

I only give 5 stars if I think it was absolutely perfect, could not improve, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this. Now you've got me worried that people are agonising over my reviews because there's a '4' here and there.

4 does not = 'shit' , its 'very good'. Just not 'excellent'.

So your bag is essentially public transportation for everything you touch in public toilets.

YANBU. I stay in hotels and airbnbs all the time and this is normal. It's far preferable to those which provide tiny miniature toiletries which run out after a day or so of me and DH using them.

I just take a paper towel to open the door

on a cruise I went on everything was positioned to do so, paper towel, door and bin - it helps prevent spread of virus

Did she misunderstand and think she was in an episode of Channel 4 show 'Four in a bed'?

We have had two guests in our airbnb with a similar moan, both parties left the place in an absolute state, clearly the soap was so unhygenic both parties felt it appropriate to leave poo on the toilet, in one case smeared all over the seat. Both parties also left visible hand food smears on the fridge, cupboard doors and the back of the dining chairs.

Soap moaners are just dirty sods.

That's absurd.

I guess she's maybe thinking that people dispense some shower gel onto their hand then rub their arse crack clean. then maybe use that same hand to pump some more gel out. So you could have poo germs on the hand....though if they've just washed it you'd like to think at least it's clean. And that you when cleaning inbetween people, wipe the bottles over with some form of antibac cleaner.

So I kind of see her point but also know that using large bottles like this isn't unusual even in fancy hotels. I have been on here long enough to remember the MNer who took the large bottles from a very fancy hotel home with her thinking they must be single use!

Hotels tend to do this now. I'd never though about it until an article mentioned what if guests had put the bottle right on themselves/mixed another liquid in the bottle. I did prefer the old mini bottles from a hygiene viewpoint, and they were great to take for swimming lessons etc so I did reuse them. I suppose it's cheaper for businesses to not have them now, and some say it's more environmentally friendly, though as most people say they use them, I'm not sure it makes much difference overall.

She's being ridiculous and indeed, it is so wasteful to provide little bottles! You carry on doing what you're doing, it sounds lovely.

I agree with this, 5* is perfection and hard to achieve!

She’d probably have taken a star off if you’d provided individual bottles as being not green enough!
You can’t win!!

Actually this is a good point. any supermarket or pub loo had a pump dispenser for hand wash and there is no way it is the quality @loislaneloves provides or is as clean. I wonder if she leaves bad reviews at Tesco for this sort of thing.

If you have had a great time at a venue and you can see the owner has bent over backwards to be lovely, no matter the niggle. Leaving off a star is low and churlish. Look at the bigger picture and be nice.

Don't let her re-book E V E R.

I'm sorry but HOW can bottles of shower gel and shampoo be unhygienic? Are they trying to eat them?
What's wrong with people?
What's the deal with this performative hygiene standards? I read recently on MN that SOAP BARS were unhygienic as well. The very thing that makes you clean is dirty.

Do you have a right of reply to reviews? If you do I would clarify that the guest objected to the refillable environmentally friendly toiletries and expected those little bottles that everyone takes home.
To be honest I can't remember the last hotel or rental that did those. Everyone does big bottles now. My only issue would be if there was just one in the shower and not the basin.

Because they can be opened and you don’t know if someone has put something in there I guess..

I have but avoid it if I can.

I would be delighted to have Aesop in my b&b and would feel very special that you provide that level of product!
OP I would be more concerned about someone walking off with them😀
It would be interesting what “hygienic replacement” she bought.
Certainly carry on exactly with what you doing (your place sounds fab) but it is not fair or right to mark you down on stars which are really important for reviews

Oh yes and some people think roll on/stick deodorants are gross too. You apply it to your freshly washed armpit, then replace the cap 🤮🤮leaving the germs from your freshly washed armpit to proliferate.

🤣🤣 won’t be doing that but maybe someone else will.

love a miniature bottle!