DP and Garden Grocer?

[shaycamp21]

Do you find when you are on the regular dining plan you need to supplement your meals (specifically breakfast) with a Garden Grocer order? We have ordered from GG for a number our of trips when on the DP but often we had snack credits left over which we used for rice crispy treats and other food "souvenirs" to take home so I am wondering for our trip in March (we booked the Play, Stay Dine Pkg at POR) if we should just use our snack credits for breakfast items instead of ordering from GG . We only have one breakfast booked (Chef Mickey's) so we will need breakfast for the other 6 days of our trip. So what do you regular DP users do: bring food items (like cereal and granola bars) from home or buy items from the sundry store, order from GG or just use the DP?

 

[abdgeek]

When I get the regular dining plan, I don't supplement it with anything. If I do, I'm not saving any money. I eat a full breakfast every morning, so when I'm on the dining plan I usually get the adult bounty platter. That keeps me full until about 2pm when I get a snack of popcorn, a pretzel, or something similar. I usually eat dinner between 5-6pm and I'm fine until morning. I've never been a snacker.

That being said, I now exclusively get the deluxe dining plan because I find I eat better with it than I did on the regular dining plan. I can go to a buffet for breakfast and have more choices of what I want to eat each morning. At dinner, I can get a salad as my appetizer if I want something green. I have also found that I like the signature restaurants better than the regular one's, although I do still eat at some of my favorites(Teppan Edo, Sci Fi Dinner).

 

[mommyboys3]

Like you on my previous 3 trips we had the dining plan & ordered from Garden Grocer (mostly water, snacks, breakfast things). We ended up throwing out so much of what we ordered so I thought we'd try something different for our Nov. 2013 trip. We stayed at POR & had the regular dining plan. There are 5 of us ...me, DH, DS (13), DS (11) & DS (6). We're pretty big eaters too. This is what we did:

Packed some water & granola bars in our checked bags. I don't even think this was necessary and probably wouldn't do it again next time

My 11 & 13 year olds are Disney adults so between the 5 of us we were 4 adults and only 1 child...that's a lot of food. Most mornings we split 2 or 3 QS meals at the POR foodcourt. Used our resort mugs for drinks & saved bottled drink for later. If we only did 2 QS we susually spent a snack credit on something from the bakery at the POR food court. Everything we got there was really good & big.

In order to have enough credits for breakfast we split lunches too & used snack credits to fill up. Our last day we had 5 extra QS credits which we used on QS breakfast at Starbucks in MK (including large fraps for the kids & lattes for DH & I). I keep meaning to go back through our receipts to see how that happened. I was pretty careful planning everything so I think we may have gotten a little extra pixie dust there.

We also shared some TS meals so we could squeeze in an extra TS. I think the only thing we paid OOP for was a pizza at Via Napoli for the kids (DH & I used credits for our meals though). It worked out great for us. It took some planning but we never felt deprived, had pleanty of food & had a great time.

 

[TDC Nala]

Breakfast, particularly counter service breakfast, is one of the worst monetary deals on the dining plan (unless you regularly choose buffet or family style breakfasts). When you use a credit for breakfast you are basically giving up the dessert allotment (and the appetizer allotment as well if you are on the deluxe plan).

So there are many who purchase basic in-room breakfast foods and then spend their credits only on the higher value lunches or dinners.

 

[mommyboys3]

Maximizing the value of what we used credits on used to be important to me until I realized how much food we were wasting at each meal. Then add to that what we spent on the Garden Grocer order which we wasted 1/2 of that as well. So were we squeezing Disney for the max $? Yes, but we didn't enjoy it as much and we spent more money OOP. Some QS meals are HUGE & easily split. A bonus is we got to enjoy a hot (but quick) breakfast almost every morning. Everyone is different, every family is different but that's what worked best for us.

 

[Hooves]

We hardly ever do breakfast on the DP. For our past 3 visits we've been on the regular DP and we've probably done 3-4 TS breakfasts per trip (all of which were 21 nights) and 1-2 QS breakfasts if any. This year we will be on the QS plan and I don't envisage us eating breakfast much, if it all.
We get cereal and fruit from Walmart and have that in our room before we go. We use our credits for lunch and dinner and snacks as we see fit. Is it too much food? Yes, yes, yes but honestly McDonald's breakfasts are far more appealing than anything Disney offers for breakfast on QS.
(We get free dining however)

 

[chocolateMinnie]

We do always. Firstly I order copious amounts of water. On a one week stay we use about 70 bottles of water at a cost of $155 in the parks or about $24 from GG. Basically the difference pays for everything else. We order snacks like Teddy Grahams, pringles and Famous Amos that are either brands or flavours not available in the UK and bring them home We also buy breakfast cereals in cups which are much cheaper than in the parks for the days when we don't have a ts breakfast as the cs breakfast are IMHO not great even taking the 'value' out of the equation. We also order things like Clorox wipes for the room and hand wipes which stops us from having to pack them. Generally DD and Ds pop some snacks in their bags/pockets so that they can graze in the morning without us having to stop and pay for snacks. We usually find the whole order costs less than the price of the water in the theme parks.

 

[wiigirl]

When I get the regular dining plan, I don't supplement it with anything. If I do, I'm not saving any money. I eat a full breakfast every morning, so when I'm on the dining plan I usually get the adult bounty platter. That keeps me full until about 2pm when I get a snack of popcorn, a pretzel, or something similar. I usually eat dinner between 5-6pm and I'm fine until morning. I've never been a snacker.

That being said, I now exclusively get the deluxe dining plan because I find I eat better with it than I did on the regular dining plan. I can go to a buffet for breakfast and have more choices of what I want to eat each morning. At dinner, I can get a salad as my appetizer if I want something green. I have also found that I like the signature restaurants better than the regular one's, although I do still eat at some of my favorites(Teppan Edo, Sci Fi Dinner).