Disney Dining Plan Going Downhill? Your Thoughts???

[Bummbok]

Hope there is some happy medium to make the quality of the food better, access to the dining better, and still give the perks for people on a package.

There is, the question is whether or not Disney is willing to do it. They made a step in the right direction when they removed the tip component from DDP. Removing the appetizer component helped too.
A couple more things they could do IMO:
1. Add surcharges to the more expensive dishes. No reason anyone should be able to order filet every night for the same low price someone else pays for chicken fingers.
2. Allow more customization. Want to add nightly desserts to your meal plan, pay more. Want more/less snacks per day pay more/less. This still lets folks get “value” from the meal plan but also allows the people to buy only what they need.
3. And my least popular suggestion (and not one I really like either) would be reconsider free dining and other discounts. Whenever Disney drops the price of something they either have to eat the loss or try to make up the difference somewhere else. Unfortunately for us the only things they can easily change the quality (and thus increase their profits on without adjusting price too much) is food and merchandise. The hotels and parks are fairly fixed and hard to get more value out of without changing the price.

PS: I really liked the Pot Roast at Liberty Tree

 

[TDC Nala]

1. Add surcharges to the more expensive dishes. No reason anyone should be able to order filet every night for the same low price someone else pays for chicken fingers.

They solved this by removing filet from the menus of most non-signature restaurants.

 

[Tribe0701]

Enjoying reading all the posts. Many great points came out of this. Seems there is a mixed set of opinions. We also dined at sit down in China. We were at DHS that morning and went to Guest Relations to ask for an ADR and were told that they were full until 9PM. We do not want to eat dinner at 9PM. We went to China at 6PM and were told it would be a 35 minute wait, so we waited 8 minutes exactly and then got called in. We were told that they had 4 no-shows for their ADRs moving us up the list. Do people make more multiple ADRs and then just choose what is most convenient? Our food in China was better than 'Ohana by far, but we were in at 6:08PM, 2 adults and 2 kids ate and outta there by 6:45. We felt very rushed and when we were done eating, we just wanted 10 minutes to digest a bit and talk with the kids. We were asked if we wanted desert or coffee and we replied, "no". We were given the check and asked if we needed anything else. The staff then asked us again if there was anything else we needed. We decided to leave instead of dealing with it. Needless to say the tip reflected the service received.

 

[MinnieGirl33]

I definitely think the DP's have driven the quality of food at Disney downward. That combined with the move to more buffets and all you can eat restaurants have taken what used to be a fine dining experience and made it mediocre at best.

You can't really blame Disney for this but with everyone paying the same for meals everyone is going to pick the highest priced option to get the best value for their money. So now instead of having menues that run the gambit from lobster to chicken fingers we have menues that have a pot roast and meatloaf! Many people don't remember how good dining at Disney used to be but I can assure you it used to be considerably better than it is now.

Absolutely agree

 

[sissy_42]

I think it may help to limit the number of TS restaurants a little more, or to make a few more signature restaurants requiring the DxDP or two TS credits. That being said I am doing the DP this year and there are several restaurants I just wont go to based on their menus.

 

[DisneyBamaFan]

Simple solution - raise the price of the DDP by $10/pp while only offering the QSDP for free (as free dining promos) and charging $20/pp to upgrade.

 

[MurphyJoe]

Simple solution - raise the price of the DDP by $10/pp while only offering the QSDP for free (as free dining promos) and charging $20/pp to upgrade.

My idea, keep the prices the same (excluding the standard yearly increase) and have the customers on the DDP order off of a special menu. The DDP currently operates similar to a prix fixe menu anyway, why not take it to its logical conclusion?

 

[Chellymouse]

Couldn't agree more with everything. Although, we've never had a bad meal or bad service at Ohana. DH and I have done DDP for the past several years and will be switching to TIW for our upcoming trip. And yes, we did tend to order the more expensive items on the menu because we wanted to get our money's worth. However, more often than not, we really didn't want the most expensive thing on the menu. DDP has really lost its value and we aren't very big dessert eaters, would much rather have an appetizer and found ourselves ordering stuff that we really didn't want because we "paid for it" The DDP isn't a bad thing, but it does need to be corrected in quite a few ways. Another posted mentioned the free dining and I couldn't agree more. Make it CS and if you want the regular, then charge an upgrade fee. Also, we have noticed in a couple of places that there is a surcharge for higher priced items as well as a "second menu" if you're on the DDP. Not very many places have this though. Will be interesting to see how Disney corrects these issues.

 

[Bummbok]

They solved this by removing filet from the menus of most non-signature restaurants.

Which unfortunantly hurts the OOP people the most...

 

[FlightlessDuck]

Just because menus have been "dumbed down" (standardized) in the years since the DDP started, you can't necessarily say that one caused the other.

 

[HunnyJar]

So if I am reading certain posts right (and I'm not saying that I am 100% correct) people who purchase the dining plan should be punished. You want us to have to order from "special" menus and have less options.. And you want us to pay more? Okay, first off I am PAYING for this, it isn't free. We like the dining plan because we want to be virtually stressfree during vacation. I am paying $41.99-47.99 per night for the standard dining plan and you think I should be limited in what I order and that I should have to pay an extra fee? I'm sorry, but that's just ridiculous.

Has the quality of food gone down in the recent years, yes. But it is like that at MOST restaurants these days. Businesses are looking for ways to cut back on the costs and unfortunately quality is usually the first to go. I think it's silly to put the blame on the dining plan especially since most of the people who take advantage of the dining plan are PAYING for it. Remember FREE dining isn't all year round! You want to put the blame on someone - take it up with the people in charge ordering the food and deciding on the menus.

 

[MurphyJoe]

So if I am reading certain posts right (and I'm not saying that I am 100% correct) people who purchase the dining plan should be punished. You want us to have to order from "special" menus and have less options.. And you want us to pay more? Okay, first off I am PAYING for this, it isn't free. We like the dining plan because we want to be virtually stressfree during vacation. I am paying $41.99-47.99 per night for the standard dining plan and you think I should be limited in what I order and that I should have to pay an extra fee? I'm sorry, but that's just ridiculous.

Has the quality of food gone down in the recent years, yes. But it is like that at MOST restaurants these days. Businesses are looking for ways to cut back on the costs and unfortunately quality is usually the first to go. I think it's silly to put the blame on the dining plan especially since most of the people who take advantage of the dining plan are PAYING for it. Remember FREE dining isn't all year round! You want to put the blame on someone - take it up with the people in charge ordering the food and deciding on the menus.

Who said anything about punishment? Disney only reimburses participating restaurants a set value per dinning credit redeemed at their location. For a restaurant to keep their profit margin where they would like it (when accepting the DDP), they have don't have many options. Thus the rapid decline in quality and homogenisation of the menus since the inception of the DDP. Cheaper items bought in bulk allow them to maintain their profit margin while customers on the DDP are ordering the higher end menu items, which are only reimbursed at the same rate as the cheapest item on the menu.

The dinning menus will to continue to cheapen unless Disney changes the way it handles the DDP internally. Either price on the plan will increase drasticly (so that the reimbursement amount increases), a prix fixe menu for DDP participants will be instituted at all participating restaurants (so that the restaurant's margin is maintained), or the restaurants that accept the plan will diminish. Maybe all three.

 

[connorlevismom]

So if I am reading certain posts right (and I'm not saying that I am 100% correct) people who purchase the dining plan should be punished. You want us to have to order from "special" menus and have less options.. And you want us to pay more? Okay, first off I am PAYING for this, it isn't free. We like the dining plan because we want to be virtually stressfree during vacation. I am paying $41.99-47.99 per night for the standard dining plan and you think I should be limited in what I order and that I should have to pay an extra fee? I'm sorry, but that's just ridiculous.

Has the quality of food gone down in the recent years, yes. But it is like that at MOST restaurants these days. Businesses are looking for ways to cut back on the costs and unfortunately quality is usually the first to go. I think it's silly to put the blame on the dining plan especially since most of the people who take advantage of the dining plan are PAYING for it. Remember FREE dining isn't all year round! You want to put the blame on someone - take it up with the people in charge ordering the food and deciding on the menus.

You say that your paying $41.99-$47.99 per night for the dining plan and believe that you should be able to go and order whatever your want. Some of the places that your eating have items on the menu that cost that much just for ONE item.

So if I am paying OOP, and I go to Le Cellier and order the fillet that ONE item costs me as much are you are paying for an ENTIRE day of meals and snacks.

How is that fair? We don't do DDP because frankly we cannot eat that much food and we would be wasting a lot. But I do not think that people on the DDP should be able to order whatever they want. You should be able to order an appropriate meal for the amount of money that your spending.

Kristine

 

[keishashadow]

imo both the dining plan and the menu offerings went downhill after the intial year the DP was offered in '05.

Many items we had enjoyed in the past disappeared entirely off the menusso many of the menus are quite limited now; im sure as to make the plan cost-effective

Eliminating the appetizer & the gratuity represented a substantial increase in the plan's cost. Still, we more than not purchase it just for convenience sake.

 

[Cheshire Figment]

A quick look at the menu at LeCellier shows that it is possible to order one entree and one dessert, and with the unstated price of about $2.00 for a soft drink (which is included) come up with more than $50 including tax. This is much more than the standard meal plan daily amount, and even higher than the peak season daily amount.

And there is still the QS meal and the snack to be considered.

 

[68wdwmom]

My family have never liked Ohana and We tried it before the dining plan came out We have had free dining for five years and it is not the best meal in the world but it is good. after all it is a theme park and it is very busy and they do produce alot of food.

 

[gokenin]

A quick look at the menu at LeCellier shows that it is possible to order one entree and one dessert, and with the unstated price of about $2.00 for a soft drink (which is included) come up with more than $50 including tax. This is much more than the standard meal plan daily amount, and even higher than the peak season daily amount.

And there is still the QS meal and the snack to be considered.

so using your logic here why would you pay out of pocket for this? I would say its makes more sense to get the standard DDP since it would save you money using your scenerio you have here. every time these threads come up I make the same request and that is show me the proof. show me the menus from before the dinning plan where disney has outstanding food choices at every resturant on site but noone has ever done it.

 

[asmit4]

You say that your paying $41.99-$47.99 per night for the dining plan and believe that you should be able to go and order whatever your want. Some of the places that your eating have items on the menu that cost that much just for ONE item.

So if I am paying OOP, and I go to Le Cellier and order the fillet that ONE item costs me as much are you are paying for an ENTIRE day of meals and snacks.

How is that fair? We don't do DDP because frankly we cannot eat that much food and we would be wasting a lot. But I do not think that people on the DDP should be able to order whatever they want. You should be able to order an appropriate meal for the amount of money that your spending.

Kristine

WOW! Such harsh words here! It's not up to you to decide what DW does with the DDP or just how much food those on the DDP 'deserve' to get. Or what's 'fair'. The DDP IS available to you and your family. If you don't like paying $30 for a steak at LeCellier- then get the DDP for your family.

These are business decisions that are left to DW to decide- not for you or me or anyone else. We make our DW financial decisions based on what DW offers... your post above almost makes it sound like those on the DDP are stealing food. DW makes the rules here, not those on the DDP. We are just playing by those rules.

 

[BriarRosie]

Which unfortunantly hurts the OOP people the most...

This was a quote regarding the removal of filets from most non-signature restaurants. I wanted to say that's why Le Cellier's popularity rose exponentially. They used to be a 2 TS restaurant during the original year of the dining plan. People went nuts trying for ADRs when it went to 1 TS credit.

But to reply to the general post, I pay OOP and know where I want to go for filet. Most likely a signature restaurant. Unless I want to be one of the mass hordes who want to try for Le Cellier. I haven't been to Le Cellier since the DDP started because I don't want to be part of a horde.

A quick look at the menu at LeCellier shows that it is possible to order one entree and one dessert, and with the unstated price of about $2.00 for a soft drink (which is included) come up with more than $50 including tax. This is much more than the standard meal plan daily amount, and even higher than the peak season daily amount.

And there is still the QS meal and the snack to be considered.

so using your logic here why would you pay out of pocket for this? I would say its makes more sense to get the standard DDP since it would save you money using your scenerio you have here. every time these threads come up I make the same request and that is show me the proof. show me the menus from before the dinning plan where disney has outstanding food choices at every resturant on site but noone has ever done it.

This ties into my comment about Le Cellier. Normally you'd be paying $40 for that filet entree at a signature restaurant like Yachtsman Steakhouse, which would equal the full cost of one day for two days' worth of credits. In my scenario, you wouldn't come out ahead. And that's how Disney is typically keeping their margins. Le Cellier's 1 TS credit leveled the playing field.

I pay OOP at the restaurants because I can order a couple appetizers and perhaps dessert instead of having to conform to the entree+drink+dessert. Oh, I'd also have a choice to order a glass of wine. It makes the Tables in Wonderland card a more attractive option for me.

 

[tinkerbell1967]

We had a great dining experience at Ohana several weeks ago. We all commented on how good the food was.

I agree, I loved the food and really enjoyed our server at Ohana, we will be going back again.