Dear Housekeeping:
Your hotel, like nearly every single hotel I stay at, has a little sign in the bathroom that says “in an effort to conserve water, if you hang your towel, we will not replace it. Leave it on the floor and we will exchange it for a fresh one.” Much like this one.
So, just like the sign says, I hang my towel.
Honestly, I hate hanging my towel. I’m on vacation or exhausted from traveling for business. The last thing I want to do is make the effort to hang up my towel.
But, like a good little environmentalist I follow the sign. Sometimes I hang the towel on the back of the door. Sometimes I hang it wrinkled on the rack. Lately I’ve gone a step further.
I don’t just hang my towel. I carefully fold it into three parts, just like my mother taught me. It looks oh-so-neat-and-clean folded and hanging on the towel rack.
But guess what.
You take my towel anyway.
You take my once-used, nearly-clean towel. And your hotel wastes millions of gallons of water washing my towel and towels like mine as you replace my nearly perfectly clean towels with perfectly clean towels.
Most days I try to remember to put up the “privacy please” sign on the door so you don’t ever enter my room. But lately it’s become a test; will you take and replace my towel even though your sign says you won’t?
I’ve thought about calling the manager of the hotel. I’ve thought about hiding the towel – perhaps hanging it in the closet. I’ve thought about bringing my own quick drying msr towel
But frankly, on vacation, I’m too forgetful for these things. And I know you’re just doing your job. So, I’ve come up with a solution:
The “Don’t Change My Towel Sign.” Next time I visit your hotel I will print a copy (on recycled paper with soy-based ink, of course) and hang it with my towel. Hopefully this sign will make it clearer. I really do want to save the environment – one towel at a time.
Here’s to a green future together,
Elizabeth
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Good article, but remeber to have your sign in Spanish,Chinese and Russian just in case
Cute sign! Also, I just came across these tips on Green Guide about finding a green hotel:
http://www.thegreenguide.com/blog/tow/832
ew…honestly, you dont mind using the same towel from the night before, when you were all sweaty and gross??or if it was after a shower you already wiped off the remaining dirt….ew…and just think if you share a room with some1, you may get their towel…im sorry but thats nasty…i really dont meant to offend any1 im just making a point
Well, if you want to “go green” by tring to save some water, you make want to think about how much you are poulling the earth when you travle…Plane ride, bus, cars, ect…. the last thing you are worried about is washing a towel…
@ Jaylene – Generally that I find after I take a shower and use the towel the towel doesn’t get especially dirty because I’m using it to dry my clean body. I guess people may use their towels differently…
@ Karen – We definitely realize that travel pollutes the earth. But, we created this site in order to focus on ways to lessen in impact while traveling. Every little thing counts.
What a lovely surprise to find people who think like we do! we have info in our guest info pack asking guests to hang up and air their towels to help save the environment as we will only change them after 2 -3 days of use unless specifically asked. Most of our guests comply willingly and we hang up towels to maximum advantage for drying for them if they have folded them just in case they dont dry well enough for another use.
Only ahd one person complain so far, after one shower they were appalled to find their towel hung up for them! cant please every one it seems!
Keep saving the world one towel at a time!
Haha .. I like the heading! Great read!
I will never understand why people do not have the habit of hanging a used towel after taking a shower. Even more, many use the towels to clean the bathroom floor, to clean their shoes, even though they have everything for cleaning in a self catering vacation rental. It is expected some spots in a white towel but it is incredible the way they leave it. Some times I think they do not use it after taking a shower, but before that … I even offered a client to pay for telling me what was the logic behind that behavior. I am still waiting for an answer. Maybe a child trauma?
Honestly, we really don not want to take your towels, but our boss tells us too. We may have those signs, yes they say one thing, but hotel Managers tells us another. Most of the time, when we do take the guest towels, they call and complain. So we do apologize for not staying green. Just doing our jobs to keep guest happy and our jobs.
@Room Attendant Thank you for sharing that perspective. It’s unfortunate that some hotel managers think washing towels daily will keep customers happy, when just the opposite is often true. That also speaks to how difficult it is for hotel chains to enforce their environmentally friendly policies. Perhaps more training is needed for managers.
I stumbled onto this article searching for ideas on how to be green and I never thought twice about something like hotel towels! Great point, I will definitely try to reuse my towels on vacation.
If you would like, check out my entry in this Earth Day photo contest http://tinyurl.com/yhggfcu
Good post and very interesting comment thread. Thanks for sharing.
I am currently staying at a hotel with the nice “save the environmwnt, hang up your towel” and they still gave us new ones. This makes mad. If the hotel mgr wants to wash all towels daily then take the signs away and dont pretend you care about saving water.
Im a housekeeper Im being reading all this.. but who understand people?
you really dont know who is the person in the room..People like to
make complaints about everything so they can have a discount.Yes is true. So sometimes we (housekeepers) dont know what to do.One of the hardest jobs in this planet is being a housekeeper.
People leave mess nasty rooms they dont appreciate our job.Im an excelent housekeeper and I love my Job but You people have to learn how to be more considerate with us..thank you
hi,
I am working in the hotel business and also travelling a lot (Europe/North Africa). I think by now ALL hotels do have their own “Do not change towels” signs but it is hardly respected.
Two reasons:
- star ratings for hotels depend on various things among which the towel (and linen) change in the room. Example: (generally) in a 2 star hotel, towels need to be changed only every 2 days, from 3 stars and more daily towel change is required. For 5 stars it even means (in some regions/countries) that towels should be changed twice a day (immediately after use…). So no hotel manager will risk a star by not changing towels. Once I participated in a hotel inspection for star rating; the inspector asked: “how often do you change the towels and do not answer me When the guest throw them on the floor”…
So I get upset if I hang my towels back and they are changed anyway. But I never get angry and that is what the management wants.
But people who wanted fresh towels and have to use the previous once another time, can really get angry a the reception of a hotel… No hotel manager wants this…
I know this by experience
- the various ‘housekeepers’ who replied are right. Guests invent all kind of (false) excuses to claim (part of) their money back. Also here it is the same: hotel managers prefer to change the towels instead of giving money back because towels were not changed…
Nice to see this being aired (sorry). It’s a start and attitudes will change over time.
omg i am a housekeeper for a hotel in Arizona and i just found out that the hotel i work for there house keepers dont change the sheets on a vaccant room
as a hotel maid sometimes we change the hanging towels anyway cus peple will complain we never changed their towels. eventhough they read the sign. basically they complain if we change the towels pluss if we don’t change the towels. lol