I give the pens to a teacher who brings them to class for students who forget theirs or possibly can't afford them (inner city).

Yes, I do take them. My kids donate everything to a battered women's shelter.

I used to take them but then I had so many, I ended up throwing them out with the trash. Wish I had thought of donating them.

Now I just carry an extra toothbrush with me in case my portable electric one runs out of juice.

That's a pretty good idea too!

I can give you one, my local shelters and food pantries love these items, too easy to donate and it is very very appreciated.

Yeah, I like the idea about donating pens to teachers, too. I've usually passed on the pens, but may start collecting them for that purpose.

I've donated shampoos and soaps to shelters, too. But has anyone else left them in city parks and other places where it's clear that homeless people will find them? Does anyone else think this is a good/bad idea?

And I still have some Hermes orange-scented shampoo that I haven't been able to bring myself to try -- I mean, if I use it, then it'll be gone!

I once collected a whole month's supply of soaps etc whilst at the Grand Hyatt in Hong Kong. I put them in the room safe.

At school we had a donation drive for the Christina Noble Children's Foundation for a shipment to Mongolia. I donated the whole lot, several boxes worth and felt really good doing it.

Gift Boxes Add Value
 

I collect all the soaps/shampoos/vanity packs I can.

I love those cute little mini soaps in the shower which make your muscles look really big in proportion :D .

With my surplus, I give them to my grandmother, who groups them into brands and buys cheap wicker baskets and tissue paper - she then makes up quite a few of these miniature gift boxes and gives them to be sold by whatever charity is holding a Christmas fair in her village.

They sell for about 5 pounds (about $8) each, so twenty or so of these can make 100 pounds ($160) for a charity, so they can buy their own shampoo where useful and still get some much needed cash donations on top.

And someone still gets to use these otherwise wasted products.

Everyone's happy!

We went through the stage of collecting them at the office and giving them to a women's charity. By no means all the ones we took made it through to the office collection box, and it it was really a trivial amount of very mixed items that were passed over.

Then we just approached a hotel supply wholesaler and paid for whole cartonfuls of the soaps etc to be delivered to the charity. They're very cheap and it's much better received and a better way to do it.

I think that's a really good point. Charitable organisations, though no doubt grateful for whatever comes their way, are rarely mom and pop organisations these days (with notable local exceptions), and there is a potential liability in accepting unsealed toiletries from an unknown source.

The bulk purchase as a corporate donation sounds like a great idea! Otherwise, best to use/give to relatives/sell on behalf of charities what you have and help in the best way you can by giving time or donating cash (which is tax deductible in most cases) and will actually assist the charity directly achieve its goals.

Okay, I'm going to risk revealing my dementia here ;) , but I admit I checked to find out if anyone was selling hotel amenities on eBay. Not because I wanted to buy them, but because it seems like the endless variety in bottles and shapes and sizes and fragrances and all would make just the perfect kind of thing for a collecting obsession, and I wanted to find out if I could sell any of them. I figured Hilton Neutrogena or similar might not be such a collectible item, but I was a bit surprised to discover that some of the more specialized, higher-end, possibly discontinued things were not already becoming collectors items. Maybe obsessive collectors are not as loony as I'd assumed.

Did you search for Hermes - those sell on ebay for about $15.00 for a set.

For all of you who donate these items to various needy people/organizations - THANKS! I have a ton of that stuff and never thought about it. Thanks again fellow FT'ers.

Of course I take them, I pay for them after all!

One more "take-able" item- notepads with the hotel name. We're in the Budapest Hilton (thanks to all the people heer who recommended it- so far we love it!) and the notepads have a line drawing of the Danube view with the Parliament building. Perfect for clipping to "please handle this" notes back at the job that pays for the plane tickets.