Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/03/10/how-hotels-recycle-soap.html
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I’m glad to hear they don’t waste the leftover soap. Does this mean they can start making the bars bigger?
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Good lord, I just assumed that they melted then down and pressed them into new bars, and that they had a little machine in the basement to do it.
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I’m a bit disappointed that they’re using plastic bags for distribution. It would be nice if they had a fully recyclable packaging.
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I think this is great bit I’ve always wondered why hotels don’t use liquid soap dispensers. Maybe a good reason.
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Funny. I thought they sent all of them to my mom. I swear she has 10,000,000 bars and bottles of hotel soap and shampoo in her “travel sundries” basket.
I also think she hoards all the splenda packets from every diner in America.
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I’ve read that more hotel chains are switching to wall-mounted, refillable soap dispensers.
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Ha! Apparently we are siblings.
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who remembers finding seven pillows on the bed and wondering
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Time to post this again, then.
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And unused or gently used paper napkins, right?
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BTW, where does non-recycled soap come from?
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Not entirely satisfying. I wanted more details on the part they glossed over, saying, “… it’s first surface-cleaned before going through a sterilization process that eliminates all pathogens.” How are they surface-cleaned? What is the sterilization process and what does that look like?
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The video actually addresses the fact that some hotel chains are switching to bulk toiletries.
I use to have to travel a lot for work, and I’ve seen shampoo/conditioner dispensers in some hotel showers as far back as the early 2000s. I suspect the reason it’s not more common is because replacing the single-use toiletries is faster than periodically cleaning the dispensers, and hotels depend on housekeeping being able to get a lot of rooms ready in relatively short time.
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It’s, um, soap, isn’t it by definition clean?
Do they clean it with more soap?
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Plenty of soap and hot water for a minimum of 20 seconds.
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…while humming the theme to your favourite soap opera.
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At least in my experience (primarily UK/EU), most do. Though I tend to use ‘budget’ chains and B&Bs, not 5-star resorts. 
Mine too. She takes them Because They’re There then stores them for decades. It’s like carbon sequistration, but for stearates.
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Well, nominally clean, but lots of people might object to finding somebody else’s hair attached or embedded.
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Disney has moved to soap dispensers for all but their high end resorts.
People would collect the ‘mickey soap’ it had a nice box with a bar embossed with a mickey…
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