Is the dining plan worth it?

[kafermom]

Hello!:wave:

The last time hubby and I were at Disneyworld they didn't offer the dining Plan. We are planning to take our kids (shhh it's a surprise!) 12 & 8, in January 2012 and we are wondering if the dining plan is worth it. If so which one is the best for your money??

I am a long time Disney lover and have been to Disneyland (used to live in So Cal) every year since I was 2 (that's 35 years for those who are counting).

Thanks for the help!

 

[Zummi Gummi]

There are lots of threads on this if you do a search.

People have all kinds of opinions about the DDP, and answers are going to run the gamut, so don't expect a consensus to emerge. Some people swear up and down it saves them money, others believe it's the worst thing since the invention of Fastpass.

The easy answer to this question is that the DDP's value really depends on your eating habits.

 

[CAPTAIN HOOK]

Look on the DDP as a way of paying for your meals before you go and thus being able to manage your cash better when you get there.

If your chosen plan has to be supplemented by additional meals / snacks while you're there then its not worth it for you.

Sit down and analise your eating habits before you commit to a plan and work out costs.

 

[Monty]

Many swear by DDP because it's convenient to pre-pay for your food. As for value, it can be a cost savings if you consistently order the most expensive entrees on the menu at TS restaurants and use all the credits they give you.

I personally prefer to pay out of pocket and use the Tables in Wonderland discount card [available to Florida residents and Annual Passholders]. I am not concerned with whether I pay in advance or after my trip and I'm not a fan of quick-service food.

Have a look through menus and figure out what you would likely eat and then do the math to see if it's worth it for you based on your own preferences.

 

[disneynut4u]

we always use the DDP for 2 reasons: we don't have to worry with cash or other form of payment once we are at WDW. We just give them our room key and it's deducted. The second reason is that this is the ONLY way I will do Cinderella's Royal Table & Hoop Dee Doo. Both of those take 2 credits each, but in regard to money amount, it's worth it. We just plan our itinerary to take advantage of the benefits of DDP.

HOWEVER, if we are not taking any kids with us (we usually take a niece or nephew) we do NOT do the dining plan. There would just be me, my dad, my sister, and my 17 y/o son. It's cheaper to split meals since portions are so large anyway. At counter service, we can order kid meals.

So, in MY opinion, it depends on the restaurants you want to do. If you want more character meals, it may be worth it. If you just want quick meals, it might not. If you have picky eaters, or light eaters, you might want to just pay for your meals. Good luck with your decision!!!

 

[HouCuseChickie]

We got the dining plan for free last trip. While it is certainly convenient, you really have to order the right things for the right meals to save $ while doing it. i.e. I'd rather pay OOP for the food I want vs eating the most expensive things at specific places for specific meals to get value out of the plan. And while some signatures are worth burning 2 TS credits, CRT is not. i.e. when you determine the avg cost of TS credits (i.e. subtract the cost of a snack and CS meal from the cost of DDP pp per day) vs the cost OOP makes it better for you to hand over your credit card on this one. Character meals like Crystal Palace's breakfast are a complete waste of your dining plan credits. i.e. when you compare prices, paying OOP is totally the way to go for this. Great meal- just don't burn credits on it. On the flip side, if you book A LOT of dining and opt for the deluxe dining plan, I've come up with a significant savings going that plan route.

 

[JIMINYCR]

We have used the dining plan in the past and found it worthwhile to do. We have gone on line to the sites that feature menus and prices and priced out what we would be ordering and comparing the totals it shows a savings by using the dining plan. It isn's a major amount of money but any savings at Disney is worth it. The money saved on meals can go towards something else that we want. I also found that it helps keep us in line with our budget. Without the DDP we would often find ourselves spending more on snack items more often. The DDP helps keep in mind what and when we are using a choice and keep track of it.

 

[lighteningqueen]

I look at the menus for each place that we go. Add it up... Keep in mind when you are not on the plan you MUST pay for any beverages you drink and must pay for any deserts and apps. So if you are on the plan..your beverage and meal and apps are included. So yes if you are going to drink eat and dessert it is more expensive paying out of pocket. PLUS the meals in our opinion have gone down in size. The portions are not that big anymore and or unless you eat a spoonful to survive on everyday every meal most men and women eat more than that.. For example Teppon for a steak and chicken or shrimp meal is about 24-29 dollars. Each. but you get two choices. plus your dessert and drink. So that is at least $60.00 for the two people that meal and you have not eaten lunch or something for breakfast or a snack if you choose to for the whole day. So to us it is worth it. We do not go for the most expensive meal but what we will put in our mouth and actually eat and not waste.. So 42.00 a day is A DEAL. You can get good big counter service meals at Wolfgangs Express downtown I got chicken alfredo for the QS plan and it was huge.. 15.00 plus got to get the drink and dessert which you can take with you if you are not ready for it. So weight those differences and also check allears.net and look at the menus and prices of all the places to eat.

 

[ggauthier82]

We had free dining last time we went and enjoyed it. Not so lucky this time, so I sat down and went through the menus on allears.net and wrote what each one of us were likely to order. I made it very realistic - for example, I only drink water, therefore I didn't include any drinks for me. And not choosing the most expensive items on the menu...

We have many character dinings this time, and the price of a kid's meal for those dinners is almost the same price as the dining plan for the whole day.

The bottom line is that it is worth it for my family.

As for which dining plan to choose, I suggest the regular one where you get 1 QS, 1 TS and 1 snack per day. In my opinion, more than 1 TS meal per day is a waste of time, especially if you have kids.

 

[ob1thx1138]

We did deluxe dining last summer on our first trip and we did only choose what we wanted to eat not the most expensive. We kept the receipts and added them up when we got home and it ended up saving us $1700.00 over 8 days. Now having said that we ate a LOT of food. We did Hoop Dee Doo, Spirit of Aloha, California Grill, and Brown Derby. Most days we ate a Character Breakfast and only on a couple days did we actually eat 3 meals a day.

If you like Signature dining then this is the way to go. We plan on doing this again but we will cut out the Character breakfasts (except 1900 Park Fare) and depending on how that works out we might end up going with the standard DP. I have just hot sat down and worked out how that would add up, because we also plan on doing all of those signature places again with the exception of the Spirit of Aloha.

Now here is the question, even though the dining plan saved us money. Would we have eaten as much as we did if we were not on the dinning plan. I would say, no we would not. We would have probably skipped a few of those meals entirely. But having said that we REALLY enjoyed the dining experience and the kids talk more about what restaurants they liked and want to do again and some that we did not do and they want to try than they talk about which attractions they want to go on again.

 

[Tomi-Rocket]

Yes.

 

[disneygirl76]

Hello!:wave:

The last time hubby and I were at Disneyworld they didn't offer the dining Plan. We are planning to take our kids (shhh it's a surprise!) 12 & 8, in January 2012 and we are wondering if the dining plan is worth it. If so which one is the best for your money??

I am a long time Disney lover and have been to Disneyland (used to live in So Cal) every year since I was 2 (that's 35 years for those who are counting).

Thanks for the help!

I believe that it is. Not only is it a savings, but also, you can pay for it as part of your package so you have less out of pocket expenses while at WDW. We like it for both of those reasons.

 

[lbrad]

We do NOT do the dining plan unless it is FREE!
It is just as easy to hane over a credit card as it is to give them your room key.
With our credit card we rack up points/cash ...$$$$
We eat what we want when we want :slurp:
Not an Annual Passholder YET or we'd do TIW

 

[lilclerk]

So if you are on the plan..your beverage and meal and apps are included.

Just a little nitpick here, appetizers are only included on the deluxe plan. The regular DDP is just entree, dessert, drink.

Everyone seems to have summed up the pros and cons here. For me, I'll only use it if it's free because that's usually the best discount for a value resort. But I don't usually eat enough to justify it. Plus, I also hate most of the counter service meals in WDW, and it seems like every time I find something I enjoy, they've taken it away by my next trip :shrug: I'd rather snack my way through the parks and get one TS meal a day out of pocket.

We do NOT do the dining plan unless it is FREE!
It is just as easy to hane over a credit card as it is to give them your room key.

You can also have your credit card hooked to your room key for charging. That way, you can still just hand over your room key and put it on your credit card.

 

[happymom52003]

I agree that it depends on your family's eating habits, the type of food you like to order, and where you want to eat. I once calculated what we would spend without using the dining plan to see just how much it would save us, and for my family the savings were minimal (based off of the way WE eat...for example, we rarely order dessert, and also we do not like to eat a table service meal every single day). The savings were not worth it to me to give up the flexibility of not being on the plan. On just about every trip, we've ended up canceling a reservation due to various reasons, and we've also had a few times where someone was sick and had to miss a meal (last summer my poor husband got really sick at WDW and pretty much stayed in bed for two days hardly able to eat anything). With the dining plan, you don't get your money back if you have unused credits. If we'd had been on the dining plan on our trip last summer, we would have definitely lost money on it.

 

[sbkline]

On our most recent trip, we used the dining plan, as we have done on our previous trips. This time, I determined to keep track of the dollar amount of all of our food covered by the dining plan. I wrote the dollar amount on the back of the receipts so I could add it all up after we got home. Due to some kind of allergies or sickness or whatever, we ended up leaving a day early and missing our last TS meal of the trip, so we wasted one set of credits. This meal was to be a breakfast at Crystal Palace. We had already eaten supper at Crystal Palace on our previous Magic Kingdom day.

When we got home, I added up all the totals, and based on the dollar amount total of our Crystal Palace Supper, I added that number twice so as to account for our missed breakfast, and it still didn't look like we did much better than breaking even. Maybe a small amount of savings, but nothing like I expected. I concluded that the convenience of having it prepaid must be the primary benefit, as it didn't seem to save us nearly as much as I thought it would.

Incidentally, I can't help but wonder if this is why the final result is always all zeros on your receipts. At the counter service and snack locations, I had to look at the total on the register and write it down before it disappeared, because when we got our receipts, it was all zeros, rather than the dollar total. And at the TS restaraunts, I had to write down the dollar amount from the initial receipt before paying, because after paying, they give you a receipt with all zeros. I can't help but wonder if this is, in part, to discourage people from adding up the numbers to see if the DDP is worth it or not. :shrug:

 

[ob1thx1138]

On our most recent trip, we used the dining plan, as we have done on our previous trips. This time, I determined to keep track of the dollar amount of all of our food covered by the dining plan. I wrote the dollar amount on the back of the receipts so I could add it all up after we got home. Due to some kind of allergies or sickness or whatever, we ended up leaving a day early and missing our last TS meal of the trip, so we wasted one set of credits. This meal was to be a breakfast at Crystal Palace. We had already eaten supper at Crystal Palace on our previous Magic Kingdom day.

When we got home, I added up all the totals, and based on the dollar amount total of our Crystal Palace Supper, I added that number twice so as to account for our missed breakfast, and it still didn't look like we did much better than breaking even. Maybe a small amount of savings, but nothing like I expected. I concluded that the convenience of having it prepaid must be the primary benefit, as it didn't seem to save us nearly as much as I thought it would.

Incidentally, I can't help but wonder if this is why the final result is always all zeros on your receipts. At the counter service and snack locations, I had to look at the total on the register and write it down before it disappeared, because when we got our receipts, it was all zeros, rather than the dollar total. And at the TS restaraunts, I had to write down the dollar amount from the initial receipt before paying, because after paying, they give you a receipt with all zeros. I can't help but wonder if this is, in part, to discourage people from adding up the numbers to see if the DDP is worth it or not. :shrug:

Wow that is NOT what our experience was like. I Just went through our receipts and about 80% of them have dollar amounts on them here is what our expenses looked like

Hoop Dee Doo Review $231.96
Donalds Safari $94.75
Yak and Yeti $144.88
1900 Park Fare $94.75
Resturant Marrakesh $132.44
Coral Reef $159.73
50's prime time $103.19
Sci-Fi Dine-in $149.59
Ohana $88.96
Le Cellier $169.61
California Grill $268.45
Chef Mickey's $109.66
Spirit of Aloha $231.96
The Crystal Palace $94.75
Tonys $138.74
Raglan Road $137.66
Brown Derby $209.88

For a total of $2560.96
Cost of the Dining plan @$1800.00
Total savings $760.00

 

[lighteningqueen]

You are so right. When you have 5 of you there is no way you dont save.Even if you didnt order desserts. Drinks and with refills especially when it is hot outside. QS you do not get a refill and almost all places, with exception of Back lot express and there may be others Starring rolls etc.. Is that tips included as well on your totals?? If not, even not on the plan you have to pay a tip and at 20%. I do think it is a savings and we dont order the moist expensive things off the menu..I agree the breakfast buffets are cheaper and really do not give good value for money but they are really good and filling for longer hours in the day. We did the plan our first year and not the second and spent way more money the time we were not on the plan Also servings have gone down in size so you really cannot share if it is your main big meal of the day.

 

[Missymoe4]

I'm going to join into the group of "it totally depends."

Last year I received a pin code for free dining. I booked and upgraded to the deluxe dining plan....paying the $30/day/person (or so) more.

For us, it worked out awesome. I don't eat a ton, but I do enjoy trying a lot of different food. My brother (who I took to Disney for his college graduation present) can eat a steak at every single meal (a college athlete himself). In all honesty, we were in Disney 10 days and I think he ate some 15 steaks. In that regard, it worked out beautifully. I also enjoyed having so many choices--we both got our own app, entree and dessert. It was nice to have different things and to 'try' each other's food. The servers we encountered were also oddly excited that we had the deluxe menu (why? I don't know--maybe a larger tip?).

Also, as two 20-something year olds, I liked having all of our food prepaid. Since it was my surprise present for my brother, I also didn't want him paying. It was really enjoyable being able to vacation without worrying about how much money we have left for food (drinks...a whole other issue...LOL).

Although we didn't use a lot of snacks throughout the majority of the trip, we were able to exchange some in for candy and treats we could bring home as souvenirs. We also were able to use our snack credits for funnel cakes and some breakfast sandwiches (so always ask what credit you can use at a QS location).

I believe it all depends on how much your family eats and of what. Like I stated earlier, my brother ate his way in steaks throughout WDW (I'm still amazed at his 3 in LeCeiler with the same server all 3 times we dined there).

Good luck! And no matter your choice, everything will work out wonderfully. :sohappy:

 

[ob1thx1138]

You are so right. When you have 5 of you there is no way you dont save.Even if you didnt order desserts. Drinks and with refills especially when it is hot outside. QS you do not get a refill and almost all places, with exception of Back lot express and there may be others Starring rolls etc.. Is that tips included as well on your totals?? If not, even not on the plan you have to pay a tip and at 20%. I do think it is a savings and we dont order the moist expensive things off the menu..I agree the breakfast buffets are cheaper and really do not give good value for money but they are really good and filling for longer hours in the day. We did the plan our first year and not the second and spent way more money the time we were not on the plan Also servings have gone down in size so you really cannot share if it is your main big meal of the day.

No I did not add tips in there, but I also did not add in the money we saved on snacks. I figure we saved more on snacks than we tipped.