As an Airbnb host, there are plenty of things that you need to learn how to do to provide the best possible experience for your guests. One extremely minor detail that can make a massive impact on the quality of the stay is the bed in your Airbnb. Many guests look forward to sleeping in an Airbnb bed, getting an excellent night’s sleep in their home away from home.
So how can you make your Airbnb bed like something they’ve never slept in before? Here are a few of the essential tips on how to make a bed for Airbnb guests that will truly elevate their experience in your vacation rental.
Warm Welcome: Creating a Cozy Bed
Before we dive into all of the important elements of your mattress that will contribute to the overall experience, it’s important to first talk about how to create a cozy bed for your guests. Learning how to make the perfect Airbnb bed can be a bit tricky. You want to ensure the ideal balance of comfort and aesthetics in the presentation of the guest bed. To help you with this goal, here’s a checklist for how to make a bed like a professional.
- Figure Out Your Style: You want your guests to feel right at home when they enter their short-term rental, and the best way to do that is to make sure that all elements of the home match each other seamlessly. Ask yourself, how should I style my bed? What type of bed frame do I have, and how can I make sure I find the style of bedding that matches that? Should I add a bed skirt to the mix? Am I a headboard person or do I like to keep it simple? When you figure out your style early, it makes it much easier to make a bed that looks great and appeals to your guests.
- Tackle Each Layer With Precision: Take your time when you’re making the perfect bed. Apply a comfortable mattress protector, stretch the fitted sheet over the mattress tightly, apply the top sheet and carefully tuck it underneath the mattress, add any covers you want to the bed, and then add the pillows. Keep in mind that there are many ways hosts will approach this process to make their beds look unique. Consider the result you’re looking for and what you need to do to make your bed look that way.
- Add Some Flair: A cozy bed is more than just a well-made bed. Hosts get quite creative with what they add to their beds to make them more inviting. Some may go with something simple like adding calming herbs on the pillow. Others may have a tray there with a welcoming card and some candy. Think about how you can make an impression when your guest arrives.
- Make Sure Guests Have Additional Bedding in the Bedroom: It’s always good to make sure that there’s extra bedding in the bedroom in case guests need to change it or even if they’re booking your property for a long-term stay. This is an essential tip that you may not think about until a guest brings it up.
Fresh Linens: Importance of Clean Sheets
Sheets are the foundation of your bed, regardless of the amount of sheets per bed that you use in your short-term rental. You want your sheets to be vibrant, comfortable, and, most importantly, clean.
When guests are staying anywhere, the first thing they look at is the cleanliness of the sheets (as well as for bed bugs and other potential problems), which will determine whether or not they can get a good night’s sleep. The good news? Keeping bed sheets clean is far less difficult than you might think. Here are a few tips for keeping sheets clean and comfortable.
- Always consider the type of fabric that your sheets are made from. Not all linens are made from the same material, and washing them incorrectly could cause colors to bleed or prevent them from looking their best.
- Wash and dry your sheets gently (and use a gentle detergent). Too much washing and drying can result in pilling and affect the look and feel of sheets, which is not good if you want your guests to love the bed in your short-term rental.
- Don’t add any fabric softener to the mix. Fabric softeners can often have a detrimental effect on sheets because they build up and prevent sheets from becoming fully clean.
- Take care not to overload your washer. If sheets cannot spin around, they’re not getting as clean as they should be. The less you throw in with your sheets, the better.
- If you have white sheets, wash them regularly, and don’t be afraid to use bleach. Some people are hesitant to use white sheets, but many argue in favor of them. It all ultimately boils down to personal preference.
Perfect Pillows: Providing Comfort for Guests
Pillows can make or break the sleeping experience in a short-term rental. You don’t want your guests to go to bed only to be met by pillows that don’t hold their shape and form or even contribute to neck pain and other problems that guests can experience while drifting off to sleep.
The first thing to look for when you’re shopping for pillows is how comfortable they stay long after they’ve been purchased. Take care to scour through the customer reviews offered online to learn more about various pillows and what they think of them. Some pillows initially appear comfortable but quickly become uncomfortable and end up being discarded and replaced. This is costly, which is why you should take care to do your research and find pillows that guests will love.
The next important thing to look for is to determine whether or not they hold their shape. There are so many great pillows that are fluffy when they come out of their packaging, but it’s not long after that they become extremely flat. This doesn’t just look bad after you’ve made the bed; it’s hardly comfortable to try to sleep on a mountain of misshapen pillows. Look for durable pillows or even consider more ergonomic options that are designed to conform to the body yet remain firm enough that they bounce back.
While we’re here, it’s also time to talk about pillow preservation. Pillows can be ruined rather quickly if they’re not taken care of. Much like you use a mattress protector, consider using pillow protectors so that these bedding essentials don’t easily get stained or damaged.
Fluffy Duvets: Adding a Touch of Luxury
Beds are supposed to be a comfortable reprieve from the day’s stresses. As such, you don’t want just any covers for your bed. More often than not, you’re going to want to go with a duvet. Duvets are extremely soft comforters filled with equally soft materials that guests will be able to sink into at the end of a long day. The only thing you’ll need to consider when shopping for duvets is the type of materials inside them.
Duvets can be filled with a wide range of materials including down, wool, feathers, cotton, or synthetic materials. When you’re in the store looking for a duvet, you can feel all the different duvets to get a better sense of what you and your guests will likely find the most comfortable. Once you’ve found a duvet that you think will be comfortable, you just need to find the right duvet cover to keep it protected and accentuate the style of your space.
Extra Blankets: Ensuring Warmth for Every Season
If you live in an area where autumns and winters can become especially cold, you’ll need to think about the comfort of your guests. Having extra blankets on hand will ensure they can cover themselves up as much as they need until they’re warm in their beds. That being said, figuring out how many blankets or how to arrange them can be just as much of a difficult process as anything else on this list. Here are a few considerations that will make the above easier for you.
- It’s important to have different types of blankets for your Airbnb guests. Because no two guests will fall asleep in the same way, a solid selection of blankets will make it easier to create the perfect comfortable bed on their own. These include weighted blankets, quilts, fleece blankets, and more.
- Where will you store them? Some may style their beds with extra blankets, while others store them in a storage ottoman or tuck them away elsewhere. Consider whether or not your additional blankets could add something more to your room.
Extra blankets might not be the first thing you consider when setting up the perfect Airbnb guest room, but they can be extremely useful should guests need them.
Decorative Throws: Enhancing the Bed’s Style
Decorative throw blankets can add a dash of style to any bedroom, even if guests aren’t going to use them while they’re sleeping. Look for throws that will help you enhance your bed’s style. With throw blankets, you can drape these across your bed or even fold them toward the bottom, adding a dash of color or a unique pattern that guests will appreciate.
Thoughtful Touches: Adding Accent Pillows
Accent pillows serve to enhance the space around them by adding different designs or textures to mix things up to make sure that everything isn’t too uniform. For example, during the bed-making process, you might notice that all of the different elements of your bed might match too well. A uniform navy blue might not be the right look, something that especially becomes more notable if you’re in a room that’s practically that same color.
Shaking things up is almost always desirable. Consider the function that an accent wall plays. When you add something fresh and new that still matches the surroundings but doesn’t look the same, it truly pops and offers something more compelling. In the same way, accent pillows can add something fresh and exciting to a room. Whether the pillows have striped patterns, unique textures, or even additions like tassels, make sure to add these items to your bedroom checklist. Your guests will be sure to notice!
Final Flourish: Arranging Decorative Cushions
The best Airbnb properties don’t contain just a few pillows at the front of their bed. They know that maximalism can offer so much more, especially when it comes to making a bed and decorating it in such a way that the Airbnb community will be wowed when they walk into the room. Decorative cushions add something more to a bed’s appearance that people love. You should arrange decorative cushions on your bed to create a comfortable and inviting space. Start with the larger pillows on top, then gradually work your way down to the smallest pillows on the bottom. Take care to make sure that the pillows match with everything else as well. Nothing is worse than a collection of decorative pillows that look so disjointed it ruins the design of the bed and the design of the room around it.
Learning How to Make a Bed for Airbnb Starts With Understanding What Guests Want
Your goal is to impress your guests. Every other aspect of your house matters, but the bed is often one of the more important focal points. If making a bed or figuring out how to design it to match your space has been a pain point in the past, the guide above illuminates exactly what’s needed to make sure that you nail the process every time. With practice and direction, you’ll be able to make a bed for Airbnb guests that’s worth showing off!
