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?!

Unless they are creams or things that you have to get out by putting your fingers in, they are no more unhygienic than soap dispensers in public toilets. All it is is WAY more environmentally friendly than individual soaps etc. There is always the option to bring your own if you are that fussy,

I can only assume, based on their logic, that these people do not wash their hands with soap after using the toilets in cafés, restaurants etc

Now THAT is unhygenic!

I have an Aesop bottle in my kitchen - inside is Dove 🤣

Not soap but they say the most unhygenic on an airplane is the part you clip your belt together and that little thing you turn to take the tray down.

My DH who travels for work always use sanitizer wipes on those parts as soon as he sits down and people look at him like he is crazy. 😅

But m..the person who handled them... How do you know they washed their hands after doing a poo just before they picked up your "clean" bottles of soap?

I wouldnt like to share opened bottles. What if someone has put something else in?

I’m not imagining anything happened to it. I just don’t like. I’m not scared of germs or worry about anything so I come prepared. If I forget I won’t go into full blown panic. I just prefer my own and bring them with me.

Not worried about anything just don’t like it.

You could answer online anyway, I guess, and say you had a private message to say that's what they didn't like and explain the reason why you do it. Then people who want to bring their own can. And the other 99 per cent of us can enjoy our Aesop toiletries. Sounds lovely!

Most places with toilet facilities have fixed hand wash. Perhaps the air bnb'er never goes. Lol

Poor Op, who has clearly taken great pride in her lovely accommodation and the conversation has turned to these horrors!😅

This is, once again, a perfect example for me about how the social contract is broken these days. People are just bloody ridiculous. Makes me glad that I am far too bloody busy to have to worry about such ridiculous things. The way you do it is perfectly normal and you have been very generous, thoughtful and genuinely gone the extra mile by the sounds of things! You secure the bottles so that discounts the ‘tampering’ issue.

It is not environmentally friendly to supply all those silly small bottles anymore and most hotels now place more importance on environmental responsibility than that and I genuinely can’t see how this could be unhygienic for all the reasons others have stated already above.

You’ve done nothing wrong, you just have to roll your eyes and move on knowing that more people than ever before are look for the minor things they perceive to be ‘problems’ more than they will consider how wonderful the overall experience was! It’s a sad indictment of what the world’s turning into, far less gratitude and focus on enjoying simple things than there used to be and a lot more expectation and entitlement.

Yes just back from 5 star hotel and they had this set up.

It’s fine OP. She’s being precious. I have noticed that very few hotels I have stayed in now give individual bottles of toiletries, and DH travels for work and he used to sometimes bring me back nice mini toiletries but he says hotels don’t usually do those anymore, presumably for environmental reasons, it’s usually refillable bottles. It makes sense really. Sorry about your rating though. Your Air bnb sounds lovely, I want to stay!

I think if someone is that fussy they should take their own toiletries with them.

As for the idea that someone might have put ‘something’ in the bottles …. Well firstly I doubt many people are that weird, but if you start going down that rabbit hole, you could think that about most things that you buy in the shops, and before you know it you would literally have to grow all your own food and weave your own clothes because some factory or shop worker with a fetish might have done something to it 🙄 in fact maybe never leave the house….

I think the guest is being unreasonable. I’m disappointed these days if a hotel provides small plastic bottles. To me your approach is contemporary and environmentally friendly.

Mattress protectors are not heavy... are you thinking of toppers?

so you dont use the soap dispensers in public toilets then ?

Loads of hotels use big refillable bottles now. I wouldn’t have an issue with it.

It was a private message so you don’t need to reply or consider. The one star off is a tiny bit disappointing but then some people are overly fussy.

500ml bottles is standard now when toiletries are provided.
I never use them because they often have SLS or parabens or benzoates in them. I hate when hotels bolt them to the wall as I can’t even read the ingredients. So I always take all my own toiletries.

Many people are more weird than we can imagine. Because we don’t do it we can’t imagine people doing it or even thinking it will happen but a lot of people are fucking weirdos

You clearly haven’t watched the Friends episode where Joey asks Chandler to think about what he washes first and what Joey washes last…

We stayed at the Langham in Boston over Easter for a week. They had bottles that they just refilled for their hotel guests and it’s a 5 star hotel. It’s good for the environment too.

Keep seeing this mentioned, but who is spending so much time in public toilets with soap dispensers that actually have soap in them to dispense.

No matter what you do there is ALWAYS one.

In your trade, that’s having to deal with idiotic people I’m afraid.

@loislaneloves, 4.8 stars wouldn’t stop me booking anywhere. Once anywhere has had over a certain number of reviews it is just statistically likely that some fussy bugger has come along and docked a star for something silly, as has happened to you. People will still be able to read all the other reviews giving you five stars for cleanliness, so it will be obvious the four stars is an outlier. I get that you are disappointed, and agree it’s unfair, but this is the nature of dealing with the general public. I reckon you’ll still get lots of happy customers!