When you book a hotel, you expect clean sheets, friendly service, and maybe chocolate on your pillow-not pests. Pests don’t care if a hotel is five stars or two—they’ll settle in wherever they find food, water, and shelter. What may begin as a minor pest sighting can quickly damage a hotel’s brand and reputation, resulting in lost business and hefty pest control bills. Here are the most common offenders:
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1) Bed Bugs
Have you ever noticed that this notorious hotel pest is usually whispered when mentioned? It’s almost admirable how fast a sighting can turn into a full-blown bed bug crisis, resulting in angry guests, bad reviews and lawsuits; A hotel’s reputation can easily go downhill doing cartwheels. This tiny, blood-sucking true bug is a master hitchhiker, hiding unseen in luggage, backpacks and pillows on its way to new destinations. Bed bugs are a challenge to control and impossible to prevent from showing up. The best bed bug management programs consist of well-trained housekeeping and maintenance employees that seamlessly dovetail with a proactive professional pest control management program.
As a hotel guest, what options do you have? First, check your hotel room upon arrival. Focus on the mattress, headboard and the back of the nightstand. Look carefully along seams for any evidence of bed bugs. If you have any doubts, bring your concerns to the front desk and ask for a different room. Also, get in the habit of checking your belongings after all travel with particular attention to the seams and crevices of suitcases and bags. If you do find a bed bug, don’t panic. Forty-five to 90 minutes in a hot clothes dryer is enough to kill all bed bugs that may be hiding in your clothing, a satin pillow or your child’s blankie.
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2) Cockroaches
For most hotel guests, and your esteemed author, roaches are a serious deal-breaker. The presence of roaches in a restaurant raises multiple red flags about the establishment’s pest control and sanitation practices.
Roaches are remarkably resilient insects that can survive in the most unsanitary conditions. It is no surprise that they can pick up 33 different types of bacteria and as many as 6 unique parasites. Unlike bed bugs, the presence of roaches can be a clear sign of uncleanliness. The rumor that a restaurant must be clean if pest management employees eat there is true; Buildings with roach populations are quickly detectable by anyone with a trained nose. Effective cockroach management requires vigilant sanitation and exclusion practices. Without these fundamental measures, pesticides alone will be ineffective. My advice? Check a restaurant’s local health inspection scores before eating out and if you spot even a single roach, eat elsewhere.
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3) Ants
These tiny invaders can easily find their way into everything. A few ants should not set off alarm bells, they may simply be passing through with no intention of staying inside. The presence of a full trail of marching ants, however, suggests that cleanliness, sanitation or building maintenance may be an issue.
Sanitation practices, such as keeping food tightly stored away are helpful, but keeping manicured landscapes around a building’s exterior is more important. Exclusion, the practice of preventing entry altogether, is the ideal way to prevent ant infestations. Look and see how well doors, windows and pipe penetrations are sealed because the smallest gap in weather stripping or caulking might as well be the Holland Tunnel for ants. Once established inside a building, a good ant bait is a vital final step to banishing ants from a structure. To prevent reinfestation, botanical ant deterrents will bring extra peace of mind.
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4) Mice
They show up uninvited, chew on everything, and will probably leave a mess behind. Whether you think mice are adorable or are scared to death of them, you certainly don’t want them inside a building. A hotel’s primary concern should be protecting the health of its guests and employees. Mice can easily contaminate food because they drop 50-75 pellets of feces per day.
Second, they have impressive physical abilities. Mice can walk up any rough vertical surface and squeeze through holes as small as a dime. Finally, they spread numerous diseases and can trigger asthma attacks. The diseases may be region specific, such as Hantavirus, while others, such as rat bite fever, salmonellosis or tularemia occur nationwide. Consequently, eliminating mice from hotels is a crucial public safety requirement.
Rodent control methods can be controversial. Live traps must be closely monitored to prevent mice from dying inside them. Unfortunately, mice are highly territorial and will aggressively attack and kill competitors. Releasing live mice outdoors does not guarantee their survival if they are released in an area with established mouse colonies. Snap traps are considered inhumane by some, and rodenticide baits are under extreme scrutiny due to their potential effects on non-target animals.
Pests in hotels aren’t just an inconvenience—they’re a serious threat to a hotel’s business and reputation. A bad review about pests can ‘bug’ a hotel forever. With the relatively newfound power of social media and travel review sites, preventing pests in hotels has never been more crucial. In fact, a TripAdvisor 2019 study found 79% of travelers book a hotel with a higher rating when deciding between similar properties. Therefore, it is mandatory that a hotel ensures its customers have a clean and pest-free stay.
A pest management program starts with a proactive approach. Carefully documented housekeeping and maintenance staff training is a necessity; employees should know what to look for, such as pest droppings, where to look, and how to report any issues. Hotels must work with licensed pest management professionals who understand the specific needs of hospitality businesses and can implement the most effective strategies possible. All parties must adhere to scheduled preventative inspections before problems arise, in addition to mandatory follow-up inspections after treating existing issues.
Bed bugs, cockroaches, ants and mice are all on a travelers’ radar. The good news is, with the right pest control strategies and precautions in place, a hotel can remain clean, comfortable, and critter-free. Regular inspections, proper staff training, and collaboration with professional pest management experts are the key components to protecting a hotel’s reputation and leaving the pest-inspired horror stories on the big screens in Hollywood where they belong.
