My comparison of DDP and OOP

[Claudine877]

We're a family of 6 and I used a spreadsheet to figure out the DDP both QS and the regular and found that it was cheaper to go OOP. Especially with the 1 sit down per day! That would mean an automatic 18% gratituity each day. We have 2 3 year olds and 2 teens and while my factoring was 1 meal for each person, I'm quite sure that reality will be that the 3 year olds share so that will be less too. I factored in 1 character breakfast and 1 Le Celliler lunch too! We'll be OOP this time, but now I need to consider whether the world card would save us some $ too. Hmmmmm..

 

[mommyrosa2]

For what it's worth, last trip I did a day by day cost analysis on what/where we should eat and decided to go OOP. Turns out that we wound up spending much more OOP then if we would have done the DDP. We got extra snacks, and wound up selecting more expensive meals. A local grocery story run, wound up costing double, since fresh fruit was way more expensive than I had budgeted. Just saying the you can do all the calculations ahead of time, and find that you don't eat according to your plan. This time we are doing the DDP - it just happens to be free.

This was us exactly. First time we went, we paid OOP, but saved all our receipts. We found that we ended up spending way more $$ OOP than we would have had with the DP. What we also found was that we didn't eat like we really wanted to either for example: we always ended up choosing a cheaper entree which wasn't always what really wanted b/c of the cost. Lunchtime, I often found myself splitting something with one of the kids to save a buck. Even doing this, we ended up spending more OOP. The DP doesn't work for everyone that's for sure...for my family of 4 (all Disney adults).. We still come out ahead but we do like to dine at a lot of the more expensive restaurants and my teens do prefer a nicer sit-down dinner over QS meals...different strokes for different folks, I guess

 

[ChristineNic]

DDP vs. OOP is such an individual decision. I know the DDP, even if it is free, would never make sense for us. We are FL residents and have APs. Thus, we never pay full rate for a room. Our family is just DH and I; we don't do character meals. We also don't do buffets because I simply can't enough food to justify the cost of the meal versus the quality of most buffets. (I had WLS so the amount of food that I can eat is limited.)

I would love to have the DDP once, because having prepaid meals would be nice.

Perhaps for a future trip, I will buy gift cards so that our food is prepaid.

 

[goofyintoronto]

This was us exactly. First time we went, we paid OOP, but saved all our receipts. We found that we ended up spending way more $$ OOP than we would have had with the DP. What we also found was that we didn't eat like we really wanted to either for example: we always ended up choosing a cheaper entree which wasn't always what really wanted b/c of the cost. Lunchtime, I often found myself splitting something with one of the kids to save a buck. Even doing this, we ended up spending more OOP. The DP doesn't work for everyone that's for sure...for my family of 4 (all Disney adults).. We still come out ahead but we do like to dine at a lot of the more expensive restaurants and my teens do prefer a nicer sit-down dinner over QS meals...different strokes for different folks, I guess

This is us exactly! I totally agree here. We went thru the same thing. Paid a fortune for food when we paid OOP for a couple of days. My son loves to snack as well, so that doesnt help. Lol. Plus as you said, when paying OOP i tend to order a cheaper entree to save money. But on the DP I have the freedom to pick whatever the heck I want without worry!

To each his own right.

 

[ourpartyofsix]

We're considering a Nov/Dec trip this year. Did the dining plan in 2010 and I tried to figure out if it would be cheaper to do so this year again or not. We want to do as many character meals as we can, and know we'll do at least 1 TS a day, so for us, it is cheaper to do the dining plan based on where we'd like to eat (family of six, including one child who is two so will be free).

 

[tallen429]

IMHO, the most recent changes to the DP make it no longer a savings. I mean really with QS being $35 per, even eating the absolute most expensive CS and snack options would still have you barely braking even. Taking away the second snack was akin to taking away the savings...

With the DDP price increase but no additional food options (no, I don't think the mug counts)it seems silly to spend over $50 unless the only places you plan to eat are the most expensive...and at the end of it all with either plan you are still likely paying some OOP for extra snacks or meals anyway.

TIW and OOP will be fine for us this time.

 

[Sparkly]

Even if we stayed onsite, I don't think it would be worth it for us. Even though I'm a big eater, the DDP would still be too much food and I would struggle to eat it all!

The "free" DDP isn't really free anyway- you still need to add expensive tickets/pay more for a room. I priced up 5 days in the cheapest moderate that gave you the QSDP and it was £600, plus £250 for a ticket because you're forced into paying for the 7 day, 14 day or 21 day Ultimate tickets in England :/

So that's £850 for 5 days with free dining- not really worth it.

 

[summermac]

We just returned from a week at WDW and I posted this exact thing just above but I'll put it here too in case you only come back and read your replies.

DDP would have cost our family of four $931.84 for our 7 night trip last week.

During our trip, we spent $1124.97 on EVERYTHING, as in all souvenirs, 3 refillable mugs, stroller rental when necessary, BEER, baggage fees, you name it. That also included our breakfasts the morning of our trip (near the airport) and the morning home so that wouldn't have been covered by DDP anyway.

We had four sit down meals:
Rainforest Cafe (which I had a $100 gift card and that still didn't touch our bill for our group of 7, OVERPRICED!)
Akershus lunch (awesome!)
SciFi late lunch so almost dinner really (got an appetizer that wouldn't have been "allowed")
Crystal Palace late breakfast (just as great as I remember in 2009!)

Every day we had at least one counter service meal a piece (sometimes we'd share and get a side and a lot of times my kids shared a meal and I'd buy an extra drink) and then either our sit down meal that was planned or quite a few snacks. Not once did we not get a snack because I was cheap so it wasn't like I tried to minimize costs.

And lastly having only 4 ADRs was fantastic as compared to "needing" 7 (like in 2009) to get our money's worth for DDP.

So there you go, that's my official comparison of DDP vs. OOP. I can't go into the exact dining only costs because honestly I didn't save all the receipts and I also used Disney Rewards points to cover our sit down meals (and had $9 to spare, WOOT!) so those weren't even on our bill at checkout. I did know my balance available to spend before we left though so I used that to determine the money spent overall.

 

[Tink-n-MrIncredible]

This was us exactly. First time we went, we paid OOP, but saved all our receipts. We found that we ended up spending way more $$ OOP than we would have had with the DP. What we also found was that we didn't eat like we really wanted to either for example: we always ended up choosing a cheaper entree which wasn't always what really wanted b/c of the cost. Lunchtime, I often found myself splitting something with one of the kids to save a buck. Even doing this, we ended up spending more OOP. The DP doesn't work for everyone that's for sure...for my family of 4 (all Disney adults).. We still come out ahead but we do like to dine at a lot of the more expensive restaurants and my teens do prefer a nicer sit-down dinner over QS meals...different strokes for different folks, I guess

I have teens who like to eat at nicer sit-down places also. What are some of the nicer places they have enjoyed? We are on the DDP (not free), and am not sure of some of my choices.

 

[mmouse50]

This is an interesting thread - I am true believer in the Dining Plan - usually get the Deluxe because I like to eat at the Signature Restaurants, do OOP for breakfast. But with all quotes on how much money that everyone is saving are you looking at the dates of the menus? Some of them of over 1 year old - prices have gone up.

Yes, you might be saving some but don't forget to factor in the age of the menu when comparing your prices.

 

[momof1+1+2]

This is a great thread. Very interesting. We are in the middle of planning for November and we are staying offsite to try and save money. There are six of us and all of us eat pretty well but I was worried about how much it was going to cost us to eat without the dining plan. Great reminders to think outside the box - appetizer for a meal, sharing meals, etc. If you are staying on site and had the option, I would say if you still had little ones where a character meal was so important to them, then the DDP really makes sense (I say that after pricing it out for this trip). We will not be having any since they are so expensive but that's okay - we are going to Disney!!