Fantasmic welcome dinner

[massimo998]

Hey i lurk often write not so much. Anyways i will give a brief background of my story. Me and my fiancé have come down to disney from ct once a year for the past 5 years together and i have come down once a year for the past 28 years. We decided to have a disney wedding on nov 1st 2014 and became dvc members this year Aswell. We both are disney people and this planning process has started to take its toll on us. The magic simply isnt there. To start you get no info until you sign the contract and once you sign they tell you, you cant have things that originally were told you could.

The biggest issue is we were planning a welcome party the day before at the italy isola for 75 guests. Originally we were told it was a busy time and they would reserve it. Now a month later they are saying the date is blacked out and we wont know until a month in advance. This infuriates me as we feel trapped due to a contract that seems to have every possible loop hole work against us.

The gave us two options have the welcome dinner on oct 30th 2 days before the wedding which will make a lot of guests spend an extra day. Or have it at fantasmic.

I guess im just ranting because disney didn't want to listen. My main question is if anyone have pics from a dinner party at fantasmic. I would prefer this route bc if italy opens up last min i can switch. What are your thoughts?

 

[Chilly]

The problem with Fantasmic is it can be cancelled due to the weather so you need to think about that as well.

 

[massimo998]

Thanks for the response i will bring that into the discussion. Just sucks they said we could now they say we wont know till a month or so out. Our wedding is at the wedding pavillion and grand floridian

 

[Chilly]

Unfortunately often DFTW has no say in these things they have to do what the parks team say.

 

[WDWLover75]

Hi there! I think Fantasmic is very fun though the private areas are all the way in the back so the view actually seems worse than the average attendee. I think there are pictures on DisneyTravelBabble.

We had a much smaller wedding and went to the Spirit of Aloha show for our Welcome Dinner which everyone loved. No fireworks though (a couple people could see a sliver of Wishes as it went off). If you have a Tables in Wonderland card, you get a 20% discount. And since the dinner includes alcohol, there were no surprises on the bill. Just another suggestion

 

[WDWLover75]

Hi there! I think Fantasmic is very fun though the private areas are all the way in the back so the view actually seems worse than the average attendee. I think there are pictures on DisneyTravelBabble.

We had a much smaller wedding and went to the Spirit of Aloha show for our Welcome Dinner which everyone loved. No fireworks though (a couple people could see a sliver of Wishes as it went off). If you have a Tables in Wonderland card, you get a 20% discount. And since the dinner includes alcohol, there were no surprises on the bill. Just another suggestion

Oops. 20% off for 20 people if both you and your significant other have Tables in Wonderland.....so, wouldn't cover everyone..

 

[rrali33tt]

I feel SOOO bad for you.I would FLIP out if Disney told me I couldn't have my dessert party at Italy Isola. I think I would even consider cancelling my entire wedding.

A few things to note, Italy Isola is only available if you have 100+ guests for a dessert party, otherwise they will move you to Italy Isola West.There are no dessert parties allowed during F&W on Saturday nights. Is your event on a Saturday? If so, they might have misinformed you in the beginning (meaning it was never allowed in the first place). If it is on a Friday, maybe they just changed the policy (who knows). F&W usually runs until Veterans day.

I love Fantasmic and I considered that for my dessert party but was worried about the show being cancelled. (My wedding is in August when it rains a ton...it might not be the case in November) Another cool thing is having a dinner in AK with a ride mix in? I always thought that would be cool. Consider the expense for the viewing fees at Epcot transferred to the cost of a ride. I would probably do that because it is my favorite park. You could also do a wishes dessert party (that would be last choice for me but considerably cheaper).

 

[massimo998]

Yea it was a total bummer as were having 100 plus guests fly down from ct to attend our wedding. Originally we spoke to them about doing a dessert party on the friday before the wedding and they said no problem. I called to speak with my wedding planner about changing the dessert party to an actual welcome party including food and they told me they could not guarentee the location due to f & w. I love fantasmic i just dont want our wedding to be to over the top disney so instead we are moving our welcome dinner to thursday the 30th in italy. I love the illuminations and feel it will make the wedding i just wish they told me front the jump about the policy because i would have choosen a date two weeks later. I didnt want to require my guests to take an extra day of work off. I just will have to avoid epcot the night before the wedding because if i see another group with the area reserved i will not be happy

 

[Lindsay22]

You may want to think about doing a welcome dinner during wishes at the grand. You'll still have fireworks and it will be the day you want and it will be close to where everything else is.