Our Dining Plan Experience - May 2012

[Pmctn]

We returned from Disney this past week. The trip was given to us by my in-laws so we basically had no OOP expenses. That being said I want to relate our dp experience.

1st - We had 2 adults 2 children on our plan. The in-laws were on their own plan.

2nd - We had several adr's. Lunch at CRT, Dinner's at the Plaza, O'hana and Chef Mickey's and breakfast at Crystal Palace.

3rd - QS meals included Sassagoula FC, Riverside Mill FC, Pizza Planet, Yak & Yeti QS & Cosmic Ray's.

Our general impression was we never lacked for food. It was convenient to just use the plan rather than worrying about cost or fumbling with cash. However this also caused us to "over buy". For instance with lunch at Cosmic Ray's and Yak & Yeti my wife and I could have easily split a lunch portion. Part of this came from not knowing what to expect as far as quantity.

We had gotten some "snacky" type foods from the grocery to have in our room. We overestimated our needs in this area. Consequently we ended up 7 snack credits to use our last day, but hey we got to brng home mickey head rice krispy treats

The resort mug was great and convenient, but I don't think it was $60 worth. Where it did come in handy was the times we ate at the FC picking up a drink (OJ, Chocolate Milk, Monster) for later use.

Not having to think about how expensive the TS meals were. Most of those were character meets so the cost was offset by the time benefit.

Knowing what I know now - I would definitely plan to use more snack credits on breakfast type items and split more qs items simply because of the portions not the cost. The ease factor does have some value to me though.

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

We did the DP for the first time in December. We used up all our snacks (popcorn in the parks, mickey bars, milk for breakfast cereal) , CS and TS credits but we ended up with a stack of desserts in our room at the end of the trip. Two desserts a day was waaaaay too much for us, especially since we were so full from our meals. The 50's Prime Time Cafe fried chicken meal is half a chicken! I couldn't finish half a chicken, let alone dessert.

 

[rascooby]

Good to hear. I think if they don't do free dining during our November trip, we'll pay out of pocket. I think even with a few character meals we'll still come out ahead because my 3 kids can easily share 2 meals or snacks and my DH and I can sometimes share too. Last time we did the dining plan and even with 2 kids eating free (under 3) we still had tons of food left. I hate wasting it.

 

[ADisneyQueen]

I'm a little confused by your sentence about the resort mugs. Are you saying you were able to use them for OJ and choc. milk? I thought you could only get soda, lemonade, and tea/coffee in them?

I am trying to plan some snacks for our room and I'm worried I am overestimating, so it was good to read your post. Maybe I need to not bring/order as much.

 

[elaine amj]

I'm a little confused by your sentence about the resort mugs. Are you saying you were able to use them for OJ and choc. milk? I thought you could only get soda, lemonade, and tea/coffee in them?

I am trying to plan some snacks for our room and I'm worried I am overestimating, so it was good to read your post. Maybe I need to not bring/order as much.

I was worried about us having enough food with DDP too. We were there last for 10 days on free DDP (in 2011 when we had no free refillable mug). Our goal was not to have any OOP. To that end, I brought a big stack of granola bars, instant oatmeal, and cheerios for breakfasts/snacks. We were cautious with our credits and shared as much as possible.

Halfway through our trip, we realised we needed to burn through our snacks faster. We were so used to sharing 1 snack a day between the 4 of us, it was hard to say "yes" to more snacks. One day we went back to the popcorn cart at DHS 3 times over because we were in a popcorn mood. (Def not a normal thing our our frugal family!).

Anyway, moral of the story - we didn't touch the stash of food I brought at all.

I did feel we were a bit too conservative with our credits on occassion. For our next DDP trip, I plan for us to use 2 CS and 1 S credit for bfast in the mornings and share 3 CS for lunch/dinners. That should stretch our credits to cover all our meals over 12 days for the 4 of us. I really do wish DDP covered all 3 meals of the day - would be even more relaxing although it would be much more food than we would need. That said, it would eliminate the juggling of credits that we do.

 

[bdoyledimou]

I'm a little confused by your sentence about the resort mugs. Are you saying you were able to use them for OJ and choc. milk? I thought you could only get soda, lemonade, and tea/coffee in them?

I am trying to plan some snacks for our room and I'm worried I am overestimating, so it was good to read your post. Maybe I need to not bring/order as much.

I have not seen OJ or AJ but hot chocolate is a definite yes with the resort mug. I end each night with a nice warm cup of hot chocolate.

 

[Pmctn]

I'm a little confused by your sentence about the resort mugs. Are you saying you were able to use them for OJ and choc. milk? I thought you could only get soda, lemonade, and tea/coffee in them?

I am trying to plan some snacks for our room and I'm worried I am overestimating, so it was good to read your post. Maybe I need to not bring/order as much.

No. I am sorry to have confused you. A drink comes with a CS meal. So we would get bottled OJ or Chocolate milk (or Monster) to drink later and fill our resort mug with either coffee, tea, hot chocolate or a drink from the soda fountain to drink with our meal. Hope that is more clear. Have a great trip.