blog till you drop!

  London’s first superloo opened in the West End last year – with a price tag of £5.

The superloo, a multi-million pound powder room on Oxford Street, is aimed at women who want to relax as well as use the toilet. The powder room features oversized, air-conditioned toilet cubicles for changing, deep seating, large mirrors, as well as ambient lounge music. Toilets are sterilised and sealed after every use and each cubicle comes with towels, soaps and hand creams.                                                                                            

WC1 is the place where stressed out shoppers and women on their way to a meeting or to dinner can relax, revive and be pampered.

Interestingly, it looks like the concept is spreading around the globe: Angelbe, which opened in December 2006, is a powder room operated by the West Japan Railway Company and located in Osaka’s main railway station. Like WC1, the space was designed to resemble a lounge, with chandeliers, soft curves and gentle lighting. Besides spotless bathroom facilities, Angelbe features make-up booths with comfortable chairs and well-lit mirrors, changing rooms and a separate smoking room. Since this is a perfect setting for relevant tryvertising, it’s no surprise that several companies have their products on offer in Angelbe: women can sample Shiseido cosmetics and use an array of hair dryers and straightening irons by Matsushita.

Point WC on the Champs Elysees in Paris are the first “luxury” public toilets featuring a toiletries boutique and “wellbeing” services. Disinfected by staff after every visit, they guarantee optimum cleanliness. Each cubicle is different: in “design”, “ethnic” or “chic” styles.

There’s no doubt that women across the world would welcome an inviting place to recharge while on the go, and they’re likely to take notice of brands providing the service.

 WC1 (London)                      Angelbe (Japan)                Point WC (Paris)

 I am currently on business in Manchester and decided to blog about the bathroom experience in hotels as I travel regularly. I have to say that I have been very impressed by the Manchester City Inn –  fair enough it’s a four star hotel. I have had far too many times bad hotel bathroom experiences – dirty bathrooms, not enough water pressure, not enough freebies such as shampoo and soaps, no hairdryer. The whole point about staying in hotels is to feel at home… well for the first time in my life, I do feel good in a hotel room!

Here’s my bathroom and a drawer that includes a toothbrush, toothpaste and mouthwash! Pretty cool, huh? Oh, I also have a bathrobe!

Click images to enlarge

And here’s my room! I love the imac (check out my crappy work laptop!)

Good night everyone!

A post by Anna Farmery about an engaged toilet attendant  inspired me to blog about not so engaged UK Toilet Attendants!

Toilet Attendants could only be found in extravagant restaurants and bars a few years ago but have more recently begun to appear in mainstream bars.

A Toilet Attendant’s responsibilities include: turning on the tap, providing soaps and towels as well as offering perfume, mouthwash, chewing-gum, deodorant and lollipops – well not necessarily in that order!

If you go to Asia, they may even provide a massage or a hot face towel! In the UK, you’ll probably get melted chewing gum and dodgy perfume.

I’ve been to a number of hip as well as mainstream bars in London and Toilet Attendants aka Toilet Ladies always make me feel uncomfortable. What is their purpose apart from making you feel guilty when you don’t leave them a penny? The worst thing for me is when they talk to Mr Toilet Attendant with the bathroom’s door wide open or half hearteadly hand over a paper towel whilst talking to her mate on the phone!

I personally think that bars and restaurants should rethink the hiring of Toilet Attendants or train their staff on political correctness.  Toilet Ladies can damage your brand; I now make a point in avoiding places with Toilet Ladies – they can ruin a night out in less than a couple of minutes!  

So what do you think – are Toilet Ladies friends or foes?

 A couple a funny bathroom experiences I’d like to share with you to kick off the Bathroom Blogfest.

Funny bathroom experience #1

Ping Pong seems to be the new hip restaurant in London. It hasn’t been open much more than a year, but Ping Pong already has a keen following among the young and fashionable. There’s no booking and queues can stretch almost to Liberty’s department store down the road. Inside, the dramatic decor is very 21st century, with stools ranged around curving counters and a huge glass wall looking on to a Japanese-style garden.

Enough about the restaurant, let’s talk about the bathroom. The bathroom is very 21^st century like the rest of the restaurant.  The sliding doors are very stylish and open after pressing a button as if the bathroom was in another world.

However as I was washing my hands, I saw a male pair of hands coming from the other side of the wall! You can indeed see into the guys toilets (right where the sinks are) and vice versa! There are cubicles for the ladies however the same cannot be said on the men’s side!  I didn’t take a picture – I didn’t think it would be terribly appropriate!

Funny bathroom experience #2

I was in Poland earlier this year and discovered a pretty funky bar in Lodz called Kaliska on Piotrkowska Street with one-way mirror loos! Very strange feeling when people seem to stare inside the cubicle while they in fact they are looking at their reflection in the main bar area.

 No news, good news! Life has been a little hectic lately and I have had no time for blogging! I started my new job 4 weeks ago and I love it; the accounts are challenging and I am really enjoying myself despite working American hours!

As some of you may know, the bathroom blogfest 2007 will run Sunday, October 28 through Friday November 2. During this week of madness, we will post about the best and the worst bathrooms experiences or talk about bathroom products directed at women.

And this year’s contributors are:

• Kate Rutter—Adaptive Path 

• Iris Shreve Garrott—checking out and checking in 

• Susan Abbott—Customer Experience Crossroads 

• Maria Palma—Customers Are Always 

• Becky Carroll—Customers Rock!

• Toby Bloomberg—Diva Marketing 

• Stephanie Weaver—Experienceology 

• Linda Tischler—Fast Company Now 

• C.B. Whittemore—Flooring the Consumer 

• Ed Pell—K+B DeltaVee 

• Helene Blowers—Library Bytes 

• Claudia Schiepers—Life and its little pleasures 

• Katie Clark—Practical Katie 

• Sandra Renshaw—Purple Wren 

• Reshma Anand—Qualitative Research 

• Marianna Hayes—Results Revolution 

• Carolyn Townes—Spirit Women 

• Sara Cantor—The Curious Shopper 

• Anna Farmery—The Engaging Brand 

• Dee McCrorey—The Ultimate Corporate Entrepreneur  

• Katia S. Adams—Transcultural 

  … and we also have a group blog right here.  

Stay tuned!