Hotel key cards: How clean is the first thing guests touch on their way to their rooms?

Many studies have found that the cleanliness of hotel rooms has a great impact on hotel guest satisfaction. Relatively little attention, however, has been given to the comprehensive guest experience related to cleanliness. This study focuses on the cleanliness of hotel room key cards as a source of contamination for guest hands and assesses the contamination of hotel key cards collected from 25 hotels using an adenosine triphosphate meter, a way to rapidly detect actively growing microorganisms. Results expand knowledge about hotel cleaning practices and appropriate handling of hotel room key cards. Implications and suggestions for practitioners are discussed.