Book everything separately, or DL package worth it?

[DisneyMommy403]

Aloha All,

I am planning a trip to DL next year, and haven't been since 2012. When we went last time, we booked through Disney, and liked the little perks of luggage tags, discount book, preferred seating, etc. But, their package perks have changed and they give you a discount card that, I'm not sure is worth it. What stores are discounted? They also give one ride photo, but if I get PhotoPass+, that doesn't really matter either. Is there a perk I am unaware of?
How do you book your trips? We plan on a Good Neighbor Hotel... 4 kids on an airplane is expensive enough, so we're going to go with a discounted room to save some green.

 

[Aladora]

Aloha All,

I am planning a trip to DL next year, and haven't been since 2012. When we went last time, we booked through Disney, and liked the little perks of luggage tags, discount book, preferred seating, etc. But, their package perks have changed and they give you a discount card that, I'm not sure is worth it. What stores are discounted? They also give one ride photo, but if I get PhotoPass+, that doesn't really matter either. Is there a perk I am unaware of?
How do you book your trips? We plan on a Good Neighbor Hotel... 4 kids on an airplane is expensive enough, so we're going to go with a discounted room to save some green.

We used a travel agent for our first trip but for all of them after that I booked myself online.

 

[Imdboss]

I always book individually. The reason being I tend to book early and watch prices almost daily. If you are flying Alaska Air (which we always do) they'll refund you the airfare difference if you find a lower rate (it goes into an account with them for a future flight). Hotel prices change all the time. Book a room that you can cancel in case a better deal comes available. On our last trip I ended up saving appx $30 per night on a 6 night stay by price watching. Lastly on tickets you can find occasional deals through Orbitz for buy 3 or 4 days and get a day free. I waited until a few days before our trip to buy our tickets in hopes of this deal becoming available and it did which saved up $60 plus I used Ebates which was another $50ish back.

 

[pindecisive]

If memory serves, I booked a package because when I worked out the numbers The Ramada Maingate + Tickets was only slightly less than the Package (PPH Hotel + Tickets). For us it came out to less than $200 difference per person for the 3 1/2 day trip. Entirely worth it for the lanyard, pins, discounts, EE/EMH, and proximity.

We always fly Southwest so there was no question of using Hotwire or similar for the flight. (Though I've used Hotwire and love some of their deals)

 

[cutedisneygirly]

I always book separately. I can always manage to find good prices on hotels ($107/night) at BWPPI for my upcoming trip, and I'm able to get discounted tickets through my union (adult passes for less than the price of kid's passes).

 

[tarheelalum]

If you book separately you'll save money.

 

[hootey]

We have booked trips through WDTC(Walt Disney Travel Company) in the past and not stayed on property. The last one was in 2011, anyway we stayed in one of the inexpensive motels on Harbor Blvd. We still received all the little perks like the luggage tags, early admission, etc. The trip was the least expensive trip we have had to DL. Call them and ask if they still do off property reservations and if they say yes, find out what are the perks using WDTC. We saved several hundred dollars over buying/booking everything ourselves. Hope you have a GREAT trip

 

[madmaxx]

We priced out our trip out a number of times this year, and we finally went with the Walt Disney Travel Company (WDTC). I was impressed at both how helpful they were, and how they were able to find us great prices on various things. A few other perks of using the WDTC:

• We could mix our WDTC plans with some pre-purchased parts of the trip (5/6 our park ticket days are from Airmiles.ca, and we bought our flights elsewhere sometime in April),
• They were very helpful with planning various aspects of the trip (and had many great suggestions),
• They have made changing aspects of the reservations easy (we dropped our Knotts tickets in favour of the Walk in Walt's Footsteps tour),
• There was some free stuff (as others have mentioned), like the lanyards, etc.
• They allow applying discounts after paying (up to 30 days before),
• Great cancellation policies and insurance, and
• The hold music is awesome

I've used several agents in the past, and the WDTC far exceeded anything I've experienced before. Given that you can buy partial packages, I will be using them for future DLR trips and mix and match to get the best deals I can.

 

[aroseinwintr]

if you have a Costco account you can book with them and get the same price and perks (luggage tags, souvenir ticket, Pin and lanyard...ect) as DL. But with Costco you also get a premium character dining voucher for each person in your party. You can use them for any sit down dining in DL and DCA. I think it is
Each voucher is worth $41 for adults and $37 for children. I think....