Ok, so I did the math...

[3boymthr]

We buy it and DONT think about the price when ordering, we just order what sounds good and yes its OK if it is the most expensive item but it certainly doesnt have to be. I dont always get dessert. Its OK to say no!
For me, the convenience of having it pre-paid and not worrying about what someone wants to order make it well worth it. I never have to say no, you can't order something or no you cant have dessert.
I am going in March and using the 200 GC for tips and any extras. I shouldnt need very much if any extra money and there wont be a big bill when I check out to pay for meals.

And don't forget even if you're full at the end of your meal and with possible exception of the buffets you can get your TS dessert TO GO! Yay! What says vacation more than a relaxed late night dessert on the balcony or while watching TV!! Most of the CS desserts will travel too!

That way you can save those snacks for the most important part of your vacation like oh, you know, what's that stuff, oh yeah, fruit!

 

[MickeyMomOfThree]

momofthree, I totally agree with you. We have 4 kids and I am fortunate enough to be a sahm, but not without sacrifices. So when planning a vacation, I am all for eating good and having dessert. I save and save all year long (I say it's my job). When we are on vacation if someone wants steak, they should have steak! And desserts, bring me 2!!!

I'm a SAHM as well and truly feel that being thrifty is part of my job and why we have been able to have me be at home for 15 years.

 

[MickeyMomOfThree]

And don't forget even if you're full at the end of your meal and with possible exception of the buffets you can get your TS dessert TO GO! Yay! What says vacation more than a relaxed late night dessert on the balcony or while watching TV!! Most of the CS desserts will travel too!

That way you can save those snacks for the most important part of your vacation like oh, you know, what's that stuff, oh yeah, fruit!

We almost always take our dessert to go (or if it is a dessert/icecream, we ask for the dessert to be packaged and have just the ice cream.) We like to eat our desserts for breakfast! Now that's a vacation!!!

 

[AndreaDBfan]

That's one thing I was going to ask, if we can get "doggie bags" at the sit down restaurants. This is our first trip and we got the kids eat, stay, play free deal, so we have the DDP. After reading all these entries, my head is just spinning! I know we are getting a deal since the kids are free, but there's so much to figure out! I'm a little worried about having to "sit down" to a meal every day, but I'm sure it will all work out.

 

[tamclan]

That's one thing I was going to ask, if we can get "doggie bags" at the sit down restaurants. This is our first trip and we got the kids eat, stay, play free deal, so we have the DDP. After reading all these entries, my head is just spinning! I know we are getting a deal since the kids are free, but there's so much to figure out! I'm a little worried about having to "sit down" to a meal every day, but I'm sure it will all work out.

Last year my sister doggie bagged many of her daughters meal. Her daughter hardly ate the dinner at dinner but of course was hungry 1 - 2 hours later. This is not a to go meal but meal not eaten then bagged.


Personally I would never let my kids get away with that but to each their own.

 

[AndreaDBfan]

I wouldn't let my kids do that, either, but it's good to know in case one doesn't finish their chicken tenders or a dessert.

 

[sandym718]

I'm a SAHM as well and truly feel that being thrifty is part of my job and why we have been able to have me be at home for 15 years.

Here, here!! Me too! Well, now I'm a work-at-home Mom part-time, but I have no child care, other than regular school hours, and DD is here with me most of the time, so I still really consider myself a stay-at-home Mom. And yes, I cut coupons, search for discounts, have made many sacrifices to be here. I shop sales, etc. etc. the reason we CAN go to Disney is due to the excellent job opportunity I stumbled upon that lets me stay home too. So when we go, we GO!! Poly, meal plan, etc. I don't want to worry about prices! (Though we don't buy much in the way in souveniers at all, we prefer to spend on the Experience!!)

 

[Eli's 1st trip]

For those of you who have done the math...how did you do it? I know you have mentioned an excel spreadsheet, would anyone mind sharing?

I am trying to convince DH and my inlaws that the dining plan in something that we should do when we go on our first trip together in Nov. but they all keep thinking we wont be eating so much and b/c we have my son who will be 2 we wont want to sit down at TS much...any amunition I can have to convince them otherwise would be very helpful...I do not want to get to WDW and spend all my money on food when it could be spend on goodies to take home...

Thanks
lauren

 

[dogodisney]

Last year my sister doggie bagged many of her daughters meal. Her daughter hardly ate the dinner at dinner but of course was hungry 1 - 2 hours later. This is not a to go meal but meal not eaten then bagged.


Personally I would never let my kids get away with that but to each their own.

How old is your niece? When we out (especially at Disney) my DGD(5) hardly eats. There is so much else going on that gets her attention.

 

[septbaby]

For those of you who have done the math...how did you do it? I know you have mentioned an excel spreadsheet, would anyone mind sharing?

Thanks
lauren

A way to do the math:
Select the places where you are likely to eat.
Select the items (no need for buffet/AYCE meals).
Add up the total of those item.
Add on 6.5% for taxes

For example:
Snacks for 4 Adults: $12.00
Chef Mickey's bfast: 4 Adults x $22.99 x 1.065 = $97.94
CS Dinner in MK:
Combo platter for the big eater $13.99
Burger meal $6.09
Chicken sandwich $7.19
Veggie Wrap $6.79
4 Desserts (2 Brownies, 2 Cakes) $11.96
4 Beverages $2.39 x 4 = $9.56
CS Total with Taxes $59.19

Daily Total: $12+ 59 + 98 = $169 vs $160 for the DP

That was choosing a low to average priced meal. I chose one big plate at Cosmic Ray's, but everything else was the lower priced option (Wrap cheaper than a salad, burger cheaper than the doubl burger, Chicken sandwich vs chicken dinner). Also Chef Mickey Dinner is $7 more so it is pretty easy for your family to save a lot more on this day by choosing different items or the Dinner option.

Hope that helps:
For a plated meal say Prime Time as so many say its "cheap":
Steak: $20.99
Meatloaf: $14.99
Fried Chicken: $14.99
Pot Roast: $16.99
Desserts: $5.49+4.99+4.79+5.99 = $21.26
Beverages: $8.00
Meal Total: $103.54 Even more than Breakfast at Chef Mickey's so again you'd save money on the DP.

One other thing to check if you are going around Thanksgiving you'll be subject to Holiday Pricing at the character meals and All You Care to eat places. That adds about $4 to most of those meals. The Dining plan price is fixed, it is not raised during this time, so that would save your family $16 plus the tax on that $16 every time you sit down at one of those meals. The Dining Plan fee includes taxes.

 

[Trixie15]

We are staying off-site this time, so my budget is feeling the sting of paying OOP for our meals.

I'm at $860 so far for the 6 of us, and that still leaves 5 meals that I'm going to have to pack/make at the house (and pay for the groceries to do so.)

If we were staying onsite and using the DDP, our pre-paid meals would have only cost $564.75 for our 5 days at the parks.

However, we are saving a substantial amount (way more than the $295.25 difference in dining + the cost to park 5 days at the parks + cost of groceries combined) in our lodging by staying off site, so I felt comfortable in planning our meals as if we were using the plan, and I budgeted based off the more expensive items on the menus just in case some of us want to order them. If we end up saving money when we're actually eating, then that is a bonus.

Despite the savings of staying off-site, I would rather we were staying at the resort and using the DDP. It just seems to tie it all together better, IMO.

 

[sandym718]

For those of you who have done the math...how did you do it? I know you have mentioned an excel spreadsheet, would anyone mind sharing?

I don't use a spreadsheet - I just did what the above poster did. Selected our restaurants (CS may change, but there's not that big a difference there), selected items I think we might choose - if I wasn't sure, I went with the cheaper item - added it all together + tax. For snacks, I just used an average of $3 per. I used All Ears menus by the way.

 

[BabyFu18]

I did the math for my family on the DDP (we've never done it before), and I just can't decide if it's worth it or not.

The dining plan will cost us $1200, but we usually don't eat more than one meal a day. I know if we take the dining plan, we will use the CS and TS, but if it is going to be a struggle for us to make sure we don't waste any of the credits. Normally if I plan the way we normally eat (one sit down meal, and just snack in the room for breakfast, no lunch while in the parks maybe just a snack here or there), my calculations come out to $800 at the very most.

I added a snack a day per person into my OOP calculations which I know will probably not happen. As well as added desserts on to our TS which we normally wouldn't order.

Part of me thinks having everything paid for and not having to worry about it will be nice, I just don't know if it's worth the extra money to us. I just wonder if we'll be overstuffed with a CS and a TS meal everyday (since we aren't used to eating that everyday), anyone ever feel like it's to much food?

If the dining plan was one TS and one snack per day, it'd be perfect for our family. Right now we are booking with the DP but I am not sure if we will keep it or not.

 

[septbaby]

but we usually don't eat more than one meal a day. ...Part of me thinks having everything paid for and not having to worry about it will be nice.

If the dining plan was one TS and one snack per day, it'd be perfect for our family. Right now we are booking with the DP but I am not sure if we will keep it or not.

Doesn't sound like the Basic DP is right for your family. If you plan to eat TS, pay OOP. However, if CS is enough for you do the QS dining plan and have it prepaid.

 

[BabyFu18]

Yeah I thought about the QS plan, but after much consideration my group would rather do 1 TS than several CS meals. It seems like if we do on TS meal as our big meal, and have a snack (either something we buy at Disney or things we bring along to have in the room) we'd be okay and that's pretty much what we are used to anyway.

I think the biggest problem for me is that some of our party (we have 6 people) want the DP and some don't. I am still trying to crunch the numbers and see what I can come up with.

If anyone has a family of people who are not big eaters throughout the day can you tell me if you found the DP to be way to much food or did you adapt to it fairly well?

 

[lorac4disney]

We are doing a GG with 11 people. I was going to provide one sit down meal a day OOP with most of them being CM's/buffets. After doing the math, I believe I can save a small fortune if we go with the DDP. Everyone was going to be responsible for the rest of their meals so the snacks and CS meals will help towards that. We are staying in the cabins so we will have kitchens available to fix ourselves the rest without being burdened with having to cook nearly all of our meals. Knowing my bunch, they would want to order the most expensive things on the menu regardless.

 

[delmar411]

Yeah I thought about the QS plan, but after much consideration my group would rather do 1 TS than several CS meals. It seems like if we do on TS meal as our big meal, and have a snack (either something we buy at Disney or things we bring along to have in the room) we'd be okay and that's pretty much what we are used to anyway.

I think the biggest problem for me is that some of our party (we have 6 people) want the DP and some don't. I am still trying to crunch the numbers and see what I can come up with.

If anyone has a family of people who are not big eaters throughout the day can you tell me if you found the DP to be way to much food or did you adapt to it fairly well?

I'll be honest. We had lots of TS credits leftover from our last trip. I realized we cannot do the regular dining plan w/o wasting credits, and therefore money. This was the 2nd time we've been in that position of burning credits hours before we needed to leave.

We have 6 ppl in our family and we are just not big eaters esp on vacation. The kids rather go go go from rope drop to close.

I did try the QSP on my solo trip and found it to work a lot better. It was 2 CS and 2 S each day plus a mug for the stay. I was able to grab a drink and a pretzel (for example) as a quick lunch on the go and then use the CS meals for breakfast and dinner.

We're trying the QSP for all of us on our spring trip and even if we 'waste' credits it will save us money. I ran the numbers using the prices of the foods we would buy and it comes out on the positive side for QSP.

 

[septbaby]

I think the biggest problem for me is that some of our party (we have 6 people) want the DP and some don't. I am still trying to crunch the numbers and see what I can come up with.?

Are they in a separate room? If they are they can get the DP and you don't. You don't have to eat every meal together. Personally, I love the DP, but it isn't for everyone. We planned out TS meals. We overbooked by one that would have been OOP but cancelled onsite because we knew we couldn't eat that much then. We had some CS credits left to burn at the end, but an observant CM at our resort showed us how to get CS meals for the grab and go section to use those credits.

 

[BabyFu18]

Yeah we have two rooms, but under one code (military 40%) since we are all under one code, I wonder if one of our rooms can use the dining at the other can go without it? I will have to call and ask about that and see, if not we will all have to sit down and see if we can work something out. Thanks for the info though, I didn't even think having one of our rooms on the DP and one off was an option.

 

[sandym718]

I did the math for my family on the DDP (we've never done it before), and I just can't decide if it's worth it or not.

The dining plan will cost us $1200, but we usually don't eat more than one meal a day. I know if we take the dining plan, we will use the CS and TS, but if it is going to be a struggle for us to make sure we don't waste any of the credits. Normally if I plan the way we normally eat (one sit down meal, and just snack in the room for breakfast, no lunch while in the parks maybe just a snack here or there), my calculations come out to $800 at the very most.

I added a snack a day per person into my OOP calculations which I know will probably not happen. As well as added desserts on to our TS which we normally wouldn't order.

Part of me thinks having everything paid for and not having to worry about it will be nice, I just don't know if it's worth the extra money to us. I just wonder if we'll be overstuffed with a CS and a TS meal everyday (since we aren't used to eating that everyday), anyone ever feel like it's to much food?

If the dining plan was one TS and one snack per day, it'd be perfect for our family. Right now we are booking with the DP but I am not sure if we will keep it or not.

Doesn't sound like it would be right for your family. Maybe a way to have it all "paid for" in advance to get that convenience would be to buy/load a Disney gift card with the amount you'll think you need for the TS meal per day, including tips, and enough for snacks, too. That would help with the convenience factor while not costing you money for things you don't really want!