8 Cleaning Secrets from Hotel Housekeepers

Walking into a hotel room and seeing a freshly-made bed and sparkling clean surfaces can be so calming. Bring that relaxed feeling home by learning how to clean your house so it shines like a freshly-cleaned hotel room, with these eight tips from professional hotel housekeepers.

Create a Cleaning Plan

Hotel housekeepers follow an in-house cleaning plan that helps them maximize efficiency and keep things sanitary. This includes leaving the bathroom for last (to prevent bringing bacteria into other rooms) and cleaning clockwise so that nothing gets missed.

Having a cleaning plan at home can keep you on track, especially if you add projects to tackle on top of your regular cleaning. For example, you could come up with a monthly schedule of tasks that get done once a week—such as scrubbing baseboards or cleaning windows.

Multi-Task

Spray surfaces that need time to soak (like bathtubs or toilets) and move on to another task while the cleaning products do their work, before returning to scrub.

Make Your Bed

A freshly-made bed can instantly make your bedroom look cleaner. To get that crisp and neat hotel bedding look, Hilton New Orleans Riverside Director of Housekeeping Johanna Martin recommends using wrinkle-resistant linens. “First, clear everything off your bed, spread your linens and go around your mattress to ensure all the linens are tucked in,” advises Martin. “Spread your comforter or blanket and finally fluff your pillows and place them nicely at the top of your bed.”

Mark the tags on your fitted sheet (write top left or bottom right) so you know with a glance which corner goes where, to end the struggle of putting a fitted sheet on the wrong way and save time and frustration.

Clear Clutter

Before you tackle cleaning and sanitizing, clear the room entirely of clutter. Put everything away in its proper place so that you have empty surfaces to clean (and aren’t tempted to wipe around objects rather than cleaning properly). 

Clean Downwards

Dust first and then vacuum so that you’re not dirtying your newly cleaned floors with dirt or hair. Likewise, scrub downwards on surfaces like shower walls or tile to prevent drips or streaks. 

Sanitize Properly

Focus your sanitizing efforts on high touch areas. When it comes to sanitizing, Estefania Rivera Gonzalez, Hygiene and Wellbeing Leader, Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe Resort, Spa and Casino, recommends, “Sanitize high-touch areas more frequently in your home—remote controls, door handles, kitchen tables, light switches, and even floors. When sanitizing and disinfecting surfaces, consider using mini timers to ensure proper dwell time for disinfectants to make sure it’s completely sanitized.”  

Don’t just give those surfaces a quick wipe and consider it sanitized. “Using large quantities of sanitizing product does not guarantee effectiveness,” advises Sandra Neri, Hygiene Manager, Hyatt Regency Mexico City. “It’s important to take the time to read the labels and understand the amount of product to use, as well as understanding the wait time prior to wiping it out. These products often require a certain surface contact time to completely sanitize and disinfect the area before it’s wiped away.” 

Organize Your Products

Take a cue from a hotel housekeeper’s cart, and keep all of your cleaning supplies organized in a basket or bin that you can easily carry around as you clean. With everything you need to clean in one place, you won’t have to keep running around for things like paper towels or sponges that you forgot you need.

Dust Your Lightbulbs

As light bulbs get dusty, they can make a room look dirty or dim. Giving them a quick dusting is an old hotel housekeeping trick to help rooms look bright and inviting.