Calling on those who have over analyzed the dining plan!!

[kniquy]

I have plenty of time before our next trip and i am trying to decide if the dining plan (just the 1TS, 1QS, 1 snack) makes more sense than purchasing the tables in wonderland discount (@$150) in order to get the 20% discount. We will only have one trip for 7 nights with the TIW where as I know if you are a frequent visitor the TIW tends to make sense. We really are not drinkers and I know the TIW does offer a discount on alcohol.

So what i am wondering is if anyone has already created a spreadsheet that does all the adding/calculating for you. What I want to do it select the restaurants we want to visit, select hypothetical meals we might order and figure out which way makes the most sense. I have been on the website where you select the restaurants TS/QS that you want to go to and then calculates the difference, but I want to take it a step further.

I know this sounds crazy but sometimes I am bored at work and just need a little project to keep me busy.

 

[kniquy]

Oh and if you are one of those who might have a spreadsheet then please PM me and i will give you my email. Thank you!!

Ps- secretly hoping that I am not the only crazy one out there that likes to crunch numbers

 

[JWigs]

Hi, I have done the same. We are going on our trip on 30 days. I just made up a Excel spreadsheet so it's nothing pretty but we opted in based on what I found.

We are only going to WDW once this year so TIW doesn't make sense for us at all. Good luck

P.S. numbers ppl like spreadsheets lol

 

[eliza61]

This is a great on line one.

http://www.distripplanner.com/

Not sure exactly what a "step further" means? once you selected the restaurant and the hypothetical meal, what's left?

My spread sheet I simply calculated out what we would spend each meal using allears.nets menu's
I picked meals the way we really eat, not the way the ddp forces you to. for example no way would all 4 of us eat dessert 7 days a week and we generally eat 1 appetizer at each ts. then I totaled up the day.

 

[MaryLovesPoohBear]

This is a great on line one.

http://www.distripplanner.com/

Not sure exactly what a "step further" means? once you selected the restaurant and the hypothetical meal, what's left?

This site doesn't allow you to select your meal. You simply put in the restaurant. (Which is why I don't use it.)

The poster wants to be able to put in the meal that they would select.

 

[eliza61]

This site doesn't allow you to select your meal. You simply put in the restaurant.

The poster wants to be able to put in the meal that they would select.

Gotcha I guess I was a bit confused because it's not complicated, actually not even worth calling a "spread sheet" IMO

Ok, I'll try to paste a screen shot of my spread sheet.

 

[sharonabe]

I can't help with a spreadsheet as I am a tech dummy; I just use pencil and paper.

One thing I would suggest as you go to the menus and select sample meals, is to not look at the prices. Simply read the descriptions and choose based on that. Decide how many desserts you really want to eat. Normally, we would share just one dessert, but if there are two desserts that sound yummy at the restaurant where we're eating, I might include both in my calculations just because I know if we use the DDP, we would get FOUR (which we would never order). We are water drinkers, but again, if there is a specialty drink or milkshake, I will include that in my calculations too. You need to be as real as you can in what you MIGHT want to eat.

 

[Lisa F]

I made a spreadsheet that is basically all of my days/plans and I just manually put in the totals for what I'd likely order for TS and QS and then I just figured on $5/snack on average. each column is a day and i have a row for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I made the background of TS green and QS blue for ease of reading. I have a totals column that subtracts out the cost of the plan from what I am spending. I also have notes for what I am doing on what day.

 

[Marlyn]

I find it depends on what kind of diners you are. We do not eat deserts, but we do like appetizers. We eat at a few signature dining restaurants and find there's no way we would use up 2 TS credits at a signature dining place. Especially with no deserts.
It's just not worth it for us. We pay less out of pocket based on what we would order. TIW would be a better option for us.

 

[Adam6952]

One year we used the dining plan and then looked at how much extra we spent on drinks and food in addition to the plan. The following yea we compared paying out of pocket. Basically if is just the two of us it's cheaper out of pocket. If we bring the kids, it's cheaper to get a plan.

 

[SnipsNSnails]

Having kids under 10 is where a lot of people save money. We have two and intentionally scheduled this trip before our oldest turns 10 in August. I am well aware of the many ways we could pinch pennies. I have no doubt that we could each cheaper if we really wanted to. But it's vacation, and I find the plan in our case to be a reasonable budget for us. It allows for the fun extras that we would like to have on vacation: soda at meals and at our resort, desserts, snacks. When my kid wants the overpriced bag of Doritos, I can say yes without wanting to say no! Last time we didn't spend any money on food beyond the DDP. We shared QS credits to cover both lunch and breakfast and no one was ever hungry. I figure we save a minimum of $50 each on the boys so at worst the whole thing is a wash but we probably save some. The convenience for us is there too.

 

[Wood Nymph]

I have plenty of time before our next trip and i am trying to decide if the dining plan (just the 1TS, 1QS, 1 snack) makes more sense than purchasing the tables in wonderland discount (@$150) in order to get the 20% discount. We will only have one trip for 7 nights with the TIW where as I know if you are a frequent visitor the TIW tends to make sense.

You need to do a lot of number crunching to see if you will break even or maybe come out a little ahead with the dining plan, so that isn't really the issue here. The real question is whether you will break even or come out ahead with the TiW card. And that all depends on how many people are in your party and how many table service meals you will be eating. You can only use the TiW discount at sit down restaurants, resort lounges, and a few other places. You can't use it at counter service restaurants. And there are some restaurants that won't take the TiW card.

So now for the calculations. If you eat at one table service restaurant every day, then you would need to get at least a $21.43 discount on your meal every day for seven days to break even on the price of the TiW card. $150/7 = $21.43. That means that your meal needs to cost at least $107.15 to earn a $21.43 discount. We went to WDW with our daughter, son-in-law and two grandchildren and got our money back in four days. But there were a few trips to the Territory Lounge involved which helped earn that discount. And the card only cost $100 last January. So a lot depends on how big your travel party is and how many table service meals you plan to eat.

I like to crunch numbers, too.

 

[valerie160]

I'm a number cruncher as well (it's the accountant in me!). I have a spreadsheet I made that I use where I do basically what Lisa F. does. It has the restaurants we have ADR's for and QS places we will be eating at. I've gone through the menus and figured out what we will probably order (including any drinks, desserts, etc) and keep a running tally that way. I also add in money for snacks each day. I am a bit generous because of "just in case" but I know from experience that we will most likely share meals because Disney always gives too much food (and maybe we aren't huge eaters?). So for us the DDP always costs soooooo much more than paying oop.

I've also run the numbers with a side by side comparison of the exact same restaurants on the DDP vs. OOP and OOP is always just a smidge cheaper. So,if you plan on eating exactly like on the DDP, then you can take it or leave it either way. But, if you want to deviate and eat less TS and more QS because of time constraints or preference, then paying OOP seems to be the better choice.

I'll be buying a TIW card this time because we will be able to use it on our May trip, our August trip and our March 2017 trip too. With a family of 6, it adds up!