Please make "fragrance-free" a filter

[Brian450]

There is now a HUGE number of people who are fragrance-sensitive or have MCS. I'm one of them.

The odours of conventional cleaning products, air fresheners, dryer sheets, etc. make me sick. They give me headaches, burning eyes, feelings of tightness and tingling, respiratory irritation, heart palpitations, nausea, dry mouth and many other symptoms. I've had more than one vacation ruined by fragranced bedrooms that were making me ill. Surveys indicate that about one-third of the population in the US and other countries is fragrance-sensitive or has MCS or prefers fragrance-free spaces.

Please AirBnB stop ignoring this incredibly large group of people. You currently have filters for 13 different accessibility features. Could you PLEASE add another one, "fragrance-free"? Fragrance-free properties actually exist, it's just that you can't easily find them, at least not on the airbnb site itself. (Google search can be used as a workaround, but it's far from perfect.) Thanks!

[Anonymous]

@Lisa6844   Like most major companies based in the US, Airbnb refers to the ADA for guidance on which disabilities are protected and what features are necessary to accommodate them. So if you're campaigning for systemic change to have this condition formally recognized as a disability, that would be the place to start:  https://www.ada.gov/contact_drs.htm

As far as filters are concerned, the list of special needs and preferences that people have requested a filter for is endless, and I'm afraid you're overestimating how effective the existing filters are to begin with. One feature that would actually unite all of these different wishes is a keyword search. Why not lobby for that?

[Brian450]

Andrew i"m sure you mean well but people with MCS have been trying for decades to get MCS officially and generally recognized under ADA, without success, even though individuals have succeeded in getting themselves recognized.

General recognition is not happening anytime soon. An explanation would lead into politics, and far away from the topic of this thread, so I won't go into it. 

There is an untapped market here - a large group of people who are mildly to moderately MCS, would like to travel, but can't, or only rarely, with great difficulty, plus people who just feel better when they're not being pickled in Tide, Febreze and Fabuloso.  Businesses like AirBnB don't need to wait for the government's permission to tap new markets and make money.

What I and many others like me are trying to tell the travel industry is: please take our money. All we want is air that's not polluted by fragrances. The exact same thing already exists, and has existed for a long time, for people who don't wish to breathe cigarette smoke. We have "smoking" and "non-smoking" rooms in the hospitality industry.  There is no reason why the same distinction cannot be introduced between "fragranced" and "non-fragranced". All it takes is industry power to make it happen.

It makes no sense to me why we should have to individually contact and negotiate with countless potential hosts, only to be turned down by almost all, while my neighbor Joe gets to find what he wants simply by checking "BBQ grill" and "Hot Tub".

It's true that the needs of the environmentally sensitive are varied, though I would hardly call them endless. If these needs and the corresponding filters/features/amenities are too much for the existing service, then create a spinoff service. How about CleanAirBnB? Again, untapped market. There is no commercial service in existence right now for marketing "healthy" short-term rentals. This needs to change.

[Cheryll7]

Great idea!

[Morgan559]

VERY well put Brian.  I Love it.  I can't say it better than this.  pretty much EVERY air BnB I have ever experienced was DOUSED with toxic chemicals and FAR from a healthy environment for people OR the planet.  Same with hotels yikes.  It's a toxic **bleep**storm at these places, that's the NORM. and the NORMIES don't even notice or care.   The muggles don't know any better, and they wonder why they have severe allergies..

This is a revolution and it's growing FAST, and it's not just annoying old lady health "nuts" anymore...it's young and old alike waking up to these health hazards that are ALSO incredibly bad for the planet at the same time. 

This is no longer a small 'freaked out" or "paranoid" niche group, it's an EXPLOSION of people waking up to these truths.  EVERY second someone is realizing, oh wow, that air freshener is nasty AF...wow, I never realized it before!

CIgarettes used to be VERY commonplace just like these air fresheners, and were never seen as a health threat, but over time...truth has a funny way of spreading (fast).

[Andrea5643]

@Anonymous I like your keyword search idea!

Also, just fyi, I believe MCS is already formally recognized as a disability in most places in the US at least, however, the ADA doesn't actually have a list of formally recognized disabilities. From what I read on their site, the ADA defines disabilities based on their impact to the individual, but doesn't specify which conditions are disabilities and which are not.

This is my main source for my claim about MCS being recognized as a disability: https://askjan.org/disabilities/Multiple-Chemical-Sensitivity.cfm

I don't believe there is a truly "official" list anywhere though. I searched, and this site was the best I could find.

I have no idea how the ADA applies to businesses, though. So, I'm not sure if businesses are even required to accommodate. Nonetheless, I feel like whether or not a requirement exists or even if MCS is officially considered a disability is moot. The root of the matter is, will adding such a search function make hosts and Airbnb more money, lol. Happy guests = more bookings = more profits (for the most part).

[Lana913]

How would you know if she’s over estimating how effective the filter would be when you obviously don’t have MCS yourself?! As someone who needs to stay in hotels constantly it would be awesome if they had a couple of rooms separate for people like us. Or safe Airbnb’s. But there’s  practically none for us! Are we just supposed to camp out? No matter what the weather is? In the middle of a city? 

[Lana913]

That’s what baffles me! That there’s the market for it and that they are missing it! Assuming all the other companies also don’t have a filter for fragrance free listings, they would already be standing out!

[Chris16834]

I recently stayed at “The Flower House” in Red Lodge, MT and the host was kind enough to remove fragrance diffusers and refrain from using scented laundry detergents. I’m not severely affected by chemicals but my reactions are substantial. The absence of those things made the stay immensely more tolerable and I was super grateful. I would love a fragrance free filter! 

[Brian450]

Lots of examples like these suggest the existence of a "dark market" for fragrance-free properties. Properties where air fresheners and scented laundry products are not used, or at least not used on request, but this fact is not advertised. 

This makes life unnecessarily hard for would-be travelers who want or need fragrance-free spaces. Literally everything else is advertised and disclosed. There is no reason why use of fragrance in properties cannot be routinely disclosed as well, the same way smoking/non-smoking is always disclosed. 

There is no practical reason why this cannot be done. The problem is lack of awareness. AirBnB and other big players in the hospitality industry need to realize that a need exists. 

[Morgan559]

fragrance is disgusting.  Even if you do NOT have MCS, these are very toxic chemicals that people just accept as normal, but they are FAR from normal (or healthy).  I think this is a very reasonable request, and not just for people with MCS, far from it!  a LOT of people are sick of stinky chemicals taking residence in their nostrils...it's a huge issue, not a small issue.  It's important to provide this filter option, and really ask people.  The people who are aware will know about his issue, the people who are profoundly ignorant will not even understand why the question is being asked.  You might have a dropdown with these options. 
1-we do NOT use air fresheners or fragrances in this space, this is a fragrance free home.
2-we DO use air fresheners and fragrance
3-we don't understand the question,  huh? we spray fabreze all over everything is that bad?

[Brian450]

you raise a good point.. by making the issue invisible, AirBnB is preventing market mechanisms from working. Steinemann's surveys suggest that about half of the population would prefer fragrance-free accommodations if given the choice. 

[Gordon0]

Stick to the facts, @Morgan559, and you might garner some sympathy, but throwing around phrases like 'fragrance is disgusting' (something that's nothing more than your opinion) isn't helpful. Likewise,  your average Joe isn't spraying 'toxic' chemicals around their home.

[Brian450]

Whether fragrance is disgusting is clearly a matter of opinion, but that quite a few people like Morgan559 experience fragrance as disgusting is a fact. 

Every hotel and every AirBnB host wants guests to be comfortable, so opinions and perceptions matter. Surely if you stayed in a BnB where you were disgusted by cockroaches in the kitchen, you would not be happy if the host told you to "stick to the facts" and dismissed your complaint with "cockroaches being disgusting is nothing but your opinion."

Opinions matter when they are the opinions of paying guests. AirBnB hosts who spray Febreze with the best of intentions, to make their guests more comfortable, or wash the laundry with Tide, because they falsely believe that all guests will love the wonderful fresh scent, need to reconsider their assumption that everyone reacts in the same way to these kinds of products. 

[Lana913]

If they are using anything with the word fragrance in it. They are! Do you know how many chemicals are in the word fragrance? 500-1,000! How many of those have been study? 5

how many of those have been study in combination? None 

[Jane3704]

I join the request for a fragrance-free filter on your site. So many of us would find this valuable! This would actually increase the traffic to your site once word got out.