My thoughts on the "evil" Disney Dining Plan

[kimsuenew]

It boils down to personal preference... what is right for my family might be wrong for yours!

We LOVE the DDP, even with the changes and will never go to WDW without having it!

We have friends that come twice yearly and have never bought it nor would they ever! They always do CS restaurants and do not do character meals.

Even though we are adults with a teen... we lOVE character (well I do at least LOL, they go along for the ride) meals... so we schedule several!

 

[KKB]

I would argue that this suggests you should *not* get the dining plan. Why? Because the plan is less flexible than paying cash. If you decide at the last minute to change your plans, and it results in having one less table service meal, that's no problem with cash. But, with the Plan, you pre-paid that meal.

For me, the loss of flexibility would have to be repaid with cost savings for what I want. If the bottom-line cost is the same, I'd be just as happy to pay as I go.

Inflexibility: we needed ADRs (and we did change one...THAT was a mess!)

Flexiblity: We could order ANYTHING from the menu (almost everywhere) with NO regard to price---SOOOOO worth it.

We LOOOOOOOOVED DDP on our last trip. 2/6 were kids w/ good appetites, and 12 YO has good one, too, so those appetizers & desserts rarely went to waste! We ate SO well...I researched thoroughly before the trip, so meals were fantastic!

Must admit, we found desserts to be lackluster overall in WDW. Too bad they don't give the choice of appetizer OR dessert w/ DDP 2008

 

[Allegro]

It boils down to personal preference... what is right for my family might be wrong for yours!

We LOVE the DDP, even with the changes and will never go to WDW without having it!

We have friends that come twice yearly and have never bought it nor would they ever! They always do CS restaurants and do not do character meals.

Even though we are adults with a teen... we lOVE character (well I do at least LOL, they go along for the ride) meals... so we schedule several!

You're right about the character meals. It probably wouldn't be a cost savings with my two little ones, given how much they really eat except for the cost of all the character meals. Throw in a few character meals and the DDP is well worth the cost.

 

[angelmav]

missypie, I have noticed that you and several others keep missing the changes for the 08 dining plan when making your recommendations. No Tip and no Appetiser make the 08 plan much more of a head scratcher for most families.

 

[missypie]

And after this year, there won't be so much food.

The last sentence of my original post...

 

[Tricia1972]

We are opting to not do the DDP next year and will use our DDE card, and eat some lunches at our resort (we are staying in a 2BR at SSR). For us we'll spend about $100 less over the course of the week doing it this way.

For us, we felt the DDP was too much food and too much time dedicated to our ADR's. When we go back we'll do more signature restaurants OOP and do CS on other days. Also, we tend to graze/snack more and eat three smaller meals, rather than eat three big meals.

I think it just comes down to personal preference if the DDP works for you or not. I certainly do not fault anyone who likes the plan and feels it's a good deal for them.

 

[dgagnon519]

I am going with my 2 children 7 and 4 and we are doing the dining delux which includes dessert and app but does not include tip
I agree with some others on here I was not really in it to save money but more so the reason of not having to budget plus i like structure i like knowing when are meals are planned.
We are doing every character meal and all 3 shows which makes it worth it for us. I love the photo ops and their faces. I also like not having to wait in line in the sun to see certain characters.

 

[scubamouse]

We've done DDP for 3 trips and loved it. I've thought of it as we get CS for free.

With the changes, we're setting up a challenge for ourselves for next trip (probably August) to still each well but eat wisely. We'll do a villa, hit a grocery store on the way in to pick up drinks and sandwich supplies and BYO for lunch and drinks. We already do protien bars and go-gurts for breakfast so we're used to bringing some food.

Then we'll do TS for most dinners. DDP won't offer appetizers and I'd rather have an app than dessert. We'll just share instead of each getting one at every meal.

 

[Princess April]

I have to say that we love the dining plan for 1 main reason... 2006, 2007 and 2008.... FREE!!!!
~ Nuff said.

 

[Krmrr]

If you look at the tables at http://personalpages.tds.net/~rb/DIS/MYW Dining/DisneyDiningRanking2008.htm , you will find that:

The AVERAGE dining plan meal is just over $30 at the top 25 TS.
The AVERAGE CS dining plan meal is about $14 at the top 25 CS.
If you consider the snack at $3.50.

Total is $47.50 per day add in tax/tips ($7.50 for TS and $1.00 for CS) and we get to a total of $56.00 per adult per day.

If I splurge because of the DDP and get the most expensive items (even if I don't like them), the AVERAGE tip would be $8.50 based on a 20% tip (I can't do 18% in my head) and $42.50 for the average of the highest top 10 meals.

So cost of DDP $39.00 + $8.50 = $47.50. Surprized me. Same as the OOP before tax and tips. In effect, the DDP saves me the cost of tax and tips, plus it's prepaid so I don't have to worry about it. And that is PRICELESS.

If you ONLY did CS, it would be possible to get your money's worth out of the DDP, the top 10 CS meals average over $18.50. So 2 X $18.50 = $37.00 + $3.50 snack = $40.50 + tax.

But, I agree the Dining plan is not for everyone.

Happy Holidays and may all your wishes come true.

 

[rcraw45425]

We just decided to go with it due to the holiday surcharges.

 

[christa112]

I like the dining plan because your food for the most part is paid for with the vacation. It is one less this I need to stress about while, we are having a great time. I am sure it pretty much is wash if I was to take the time and do the math, but why stress out of something so trivial.