Disney Dining package

[Victoria]

Mary,

Thanks alot for posting how you did your plan. It's helped out alot! I'd like to ask a few more questions.

Can you order anything off of the menu, even if it expensive?

I'm going to the Teppanyaki DR @ EPCOT and it seems pretty expensive. I could just order anything? You get $35 a day. If you order well over $35 at the Table Service, do you have to pay out of your own pocket? Say that you already used your counter service and it was around $10, do you only get $25 for dinner?

Sorry for the questions, I just want to be really clear before I go. I know that Disney gives you a card and it's taken off that. Do they go by how much you have a day? Or that you have 1 CS, 1 TS, and 1 snack a day? As long as it's on the dining plan. This is confusing me! :veryconfu Sorry!

Thanks, Sheena

The Dining plan costs 35$ a day but you can spend as much as you want as long as your meal consists of an appetizer, entree, dessert, and beverage (table service). Disney isnt keeping track of how much you spend...just how many table service, counter service, and snacks you order. The entire time we were there we never paid for any food outside of quick grab-and-go breakfast stuff. We did leave extra cash as a tip for some of our servers though. If service was above and beyond we would usually leave an additional 5-10$ on top of the 15% gratuity that is included. It is definetly worth getting the plan if you intend to do a lot of table service. We paid next to nothing for the plan as part of our MYW package but I'd defintely pay the 35$ next time. Additional word of advice....go easy on the drinks! I quickly realized that just bc we didnt have to pay for the food it didnt mean we should order 100$ in alcohol (learned this the hard way at Whispering Canyon Cafe)!!! :hurl: Disney drinks are definetly expensive...and the more you drink the less you care how expensive they are :slurp: Hope this helps.

 

[DarkImage4]

As long as the dining plan is available, we'll never go back and NOT use it.

Last trip on our first day there, we had our snacks (water bottles), lunch for 3 at Columbia Harbor House, and the topper, dinner at Le Cellier.

Each of us had a drink, 2 cheddar cheese soup and a seared sea scallop, 2 surf and turf (over $40 a plate here), a maple glazed filet mignion and 3 of the super sampler desserts ($12 bucks a pop).

The bill would have been well over $200 dollars for that meal alone.

I just hope Disney keeps this plan around for a while!

 

[Victoria]

To echo what everyone else has said, the Dining Plan is an enormous savings. However, I am still trying to crunch the numbers in my head to figure out how Disney is still making a profit on the plan. Anyone have any ideas that I am just not seeing? They would have to be making a profit somehow otherwise they wouldnt do it...Disney World is not exactly known for giving things away. Anywho, I sure hope they keep the Dining Package going for quite a while. Im not sure i'd even care if they raised the price a little...i'd still feel like I was stealing food from Disney.

 

[Main Street USA]

I'm assuming this dining package is only available to those staying on-site, and purchasing a package in general. Is this correct?

 

[DarkImage4]

I'm assuming this dining package is only available to those staying on-site, and purchasing a package in general. Is this correct?

Correct...

It must be booked as part of a "package", even if that package is only room, tickets & dining plan.

 

[mrsatta]

I was wondering when you get the dinning plan do you get vouchers or is a card you get? I am planning on taking advantage of the plan.

 

[Buried20KLeague]

To echo what everyone else has said, the Dining Plan is an enormous savings. However, I am still trying to crunch the numbers in my head to figure out how Disney is still making a profit on the plan. Anyone have any ideas that I am just not seeing? They would have to be making a profit somehow otherwise they wouldnt do it...Disney World is not exactly known for giving things away. Anywho, I sure hope they keep the Dining Package going for quite a while. Im not sure i'd even care if they raised the price a little...i'd still feel like I was stealing food from Disney.

They're treating the food as a loss leader. They're not making money on it... They're probably breaking even when a guest purchases the plan. And obviously, those of us who got it for free when they offered it for free are even happier!! :sohappy:

Their reasoning behind this it twofold... First, it's simply to boost park numbers and hotel occupancy. You know... Break even on the food, and still get a family to stay in a hotel for a week, buy park tickets for a full week, souveniers, incidental expenses, etc...

The other MAJOR factor behind this is Disney's effort to monopolize tourists' vacation times. For example... My family will be down there in less than a month, and I honestly can't think of a good enough reason to leave Disney property. Plain and simple. Yeah, I'd LIKE to go to Sea World... Or IOA for the day... Or even the BEACH for cryin' out loud... But with the FREE Magic Express service to and from the hotel from the airport (including delivering my luggage right to the hotel so I don't have to mess with it!!!), the FREE transportation system on property, and in my case the FREE food... Why would I leave?? I'd instantly have to spend money on a car or cab, tickets to another park plus parking, I'd have to spend money on food if I were gone any length of time (which would also mean I wasn't using my dining credits up), plus gas and all those little other things you find yourself forking money out for.

So yep. They got me. Hook, line, and sinker. :lookaroun

But that being said, my family of 4 is spending 8 nights and 9 days at Port Orleans Riverside worshipping the mouse for a total under $3,000 INCLUDING AIRFARE AND THE DINING YOUR WAY PACKAGE, and I should have little to no out of pocket expense on the trip. So I'm not going to complain. It's one heck of a deal.

 

[Tiggerluver]

Thanks to eveyone who cleared up a lot of questions about the Dining Plan. I still have one question that has never been answered by anyone on this site:

Can 2 people share a TS meal on the Dining Plan?

 

[shoppingnut]

Just came back with my brother's family who used the dining plan and it was excellent. We used counter service for breakfast everyone morning and the TS for dinner each evening. Since the little one (4 years old) didn't eat breakfast we bought her a box of cheerio's to eat and I used her meal at the food court. I had a separate room at the AP rate so didn't get the package. Some tips on using the dining plan at counter service.

1. It is definitely worth buying the kids or adults a mug for their drinks on the bar because they have the slurpy things, coffee, hot chocolate and our two made the most of having slurpys all week long. This way at breakfast, when you are entitled to a drink you can get a bottle of juice, chocolate or strawberry milk, regular milk or water for later on.

2. At breakfast you are entitled to a bakery item in addition to the plated meal, which you can eat later at night when you get back from the parks. If you don't get it now with breakfast you have to use a "snack" option later on to get it.

3. At le cellier the kids can pick an appetizer off the adult menu because there are no kid appetizers. They didn't tell us this in chef de france which would have been nice to have an extra item to sample.

The craziest thing we ran into using this plan at the counter service places was that some CM's wouldn't give you a particular item as part of your meal and others would, so it seems that everyone is not on the same page with this plan.

 

[Main Street USA]

- Do meals carry over to the next day if you don't use them? I guess what I'm asking is this...is there basically just like a big book of vouchers you can use whenever you'd like, or is it a "you get a certain amount for each day" type of thing?

 

[shoppingnut]

- Do meals carry over to the next day if you don't use them? I guess what I'm asking is this...is there basically just like a big book of vouchers you can use whenever you'd like, or is it a "you get a certain amount for each day" type of thing?

All the credits are put on your room key and you use them any way you like. You can do two sit downs one day and two counter service another day, you can use them any way you like, there are no restrictions that you must use them each day in a certain order. Also every time you get your register receipt when you use the plan it will tell you exactly how many CS, TS or Snack you have left to use. However, note that when you get the register receipt after using a snack for instance, it only lists how many snacks left, not everything in the plan.

 

[shyviolet]

To echo what everyone else has said, the Dining Plan is an enormous savings. However, I am still trying to crunch the numbers in my head to figure out how Disney is still making a profit on the plan. Anyone have any ideas that I am just not seeing? They would have to be making a profit somehow otherwise they wouldnt do it...Disney World is not exactly known for giving things away. Anywho, I sure hope they keep the Dining Package going for quite a while. Im not sure i'd even care if they raised the price a little...i'd still feel like I was stealing food from Disney.

I think that Disney makes money because what they pay for the food (ingredients bought in bulk at probably wholesale prices) would be way lower than what they charge us, full price and through the dining plan. Also, they would be guaranteeing that guests will be spending their food budget at Disney.
That being said, this is definitely one of the better ideas that Disney has come up with; it's mutually beneficial!!

 

[shoppingnut]

I think that Disney makes money because what they pay for the food (ingredients bought in bulk at probably wholesale prices) would be way lower than what they charge us, full price and through the dining plan. Also, they would be guaranteeing that guests will be spending their food budget at Disney.
That being said, this is definitely one of the better ideas that Disney has come up with; it's mutually beneficial!!

They are also getting people to try the sit down restaurants that normally eat counter service for there entire stays. This is in the hopes to convert some of those people into doing some sit downs during their next trips which will mean more $$ for disney.

 

[Fantasmic Freak]

They are also getting people to try the sit down restaurants that normally eat counter service for there entire stays. This is in the hopes to convert some of those people into doing some sit downs during their next trips which will mean more $$ for disney.

If that was their goal, it sure worked on me. I'm not sure I could ever go back to WDW and NOT eat at Le Cellier, one of the best dinest experiences I've had.

Additionally, I ate lunch at Cindy's Royal Table but my parents ate the dinner there, they couldn't stop raving about it so now I must go back for their dinner!

-Mary

 

[SheenaXena]

Plus, I don't think that Disney would have done the plan if they didn't think they were going to make some $$ off of it.

 

[Main Street USA]

All the credits are put on your room key and you use them any way you like. You can do two sit downs one day and two counter service another day, you can use them any way you like, there are no restrictions that you must use them each day in a certain order. Also every time you get your register receipt when you use the plan it will tell you exactly how many CS, TS or Snack you have left to use. However, note that when you get the register receipt after using a snack for instance, it only lists how many snacks left, not everything in the plan.

Wow, that's brilliantly convenient. Thanks for the info.

 

[Main Street USA]

As explained above they DO make money off of it, but they make the money in other places, not on the food itself.

It's the same thing as the "Magic Your Way" tickets. These were an incredibly smart move for the company. Their main goal is to get people to spend as much time on property and in the parks, which translates into guests spending money on the things that they make the most money off of, like souvenirs.

Did you know you can get a 4 Day Magic Your Way ticket with park hopping priviledges for $240? Did you know you can get a 7 Day Magic Your Way ticket for only $3 more? Yep, thats right, for $3 more you can get 3 EXTRA DAYS. You think Disney makes money off of the 3 extra bucks guests spend on those extra three days of park admittance. Heck no. They make a ton of money of of them BEING INSIDE the gates. Period. They don't care that you got a deal on the ticket itself.

The exact same situation is the reason they can get away with offering such a cheap meal plan. Simple as that.

 

[magicmom]

Absolutely!!! The longer you are on the grounds of Disney (and not somewhere else) you are going to spend money with or without the plans.

We are going the last week of September. We got the food plan and I still am in shock. With as many times as my hubby and I have been we definitely eat way more than $35 per day. I am traveling with my hubby and myself, our 5 year old and twin 18 month olds. I had to pay for a meal plan for my 5 year old but as long as we eat at buffets the twins are FREE!!!! I don't think they understand how much my twins can eat! They should have charged me for them and given me my 5 year old for free.

___________________________________________
25 MORE DAYS!!!!!!!!! YIPEE!!!!!!

 

[Buried20KLeague]

Thanks to eveyone who cleared up a lot of questions about the Dining Plan. I still have one question that has never been answered by anyone on this site:

Can 2 people share a TS meal on the Dining Plan?

I've seen you ask this question a couple times and not get an answer. Sorry about that. From what I understand, TS meals CAN BE SPLIT, however depending on the restaurant you're at, they apparently could charge you a $5 fee for doing so. But even if they did, you're going to come out ahead overall.