Out of pocket costs w/ Disney Dining?

[Fionasmommy]

If we get the Dining program, how much more do you think we'll end up spending on food out of pocket? From the sounds of it, we'll have to get one meal on our own each day, so I'm wondering if the dining plan would really save us money, or if we'd end up spending even more than we would if we paid all out of pocket.

We would like to do character meals - maybe even 1 per day - so does that make the plan pay for itself?

 

[torinsmom]

I'm going with my son for 5 nights in March and getting the dining plan. He's 11, so its around $76 per day for the two of us. We will be doing a character meal most days, and those are pricey(remember the price given in w/o tax and tip) Without the plan, I figured $40-$50 a day for character meal, and $15-$20 for CS for the other two meals. THat is a minimum of $70 before tax and tip, and of course, does not account for other snacks.

I figure we can share counter service for the other two meals of the day. That way we would have enough credits. If I need to buy a meal, I will buy at a CS off the child's menu. I'm bringing in some snack foods, like chips, peanut butter tubes, fruit snacks, and juice boxes for my son, probably water for me. I'll be carrying a sling pack. For the resort, we will pay the $11.99 for the resort mug, b/c I think it will pay for itself and be a good souvenir. So.......I am planning on maybe $50-$75 for food outside the dining plan.

Marsha

 

[The Sweetness]

For sure, Ill still get 2 mugs for the 4 of us to share (24.00) Ill pay oop for 9 breakfasts, (4ppl inc 2yold) approx $250 just under 30pday. We arent big breakfast eaters, only DH will need his own plate, and who's to know if me and dd15 have kids waffle or pancake at cs?. Spend little on extra snacks ($20day for fam) $180. In some rest I may have to order dd2 a milk ($2 each?)
18 of those (9l and 9d)$36. I dont know if Id need to order the baby any extra food, Im doubting it. And last but not least~ 8TS meals, x$5 extra tip each$40 ( feel like its deserved... Unless I really get screwed with a bad server)... Realistically, looks like for me, about $530- 550, if we dont share meals. Thats if we dont deny ourselves anything, which we shouldnt (IMO) on vacation

 

[msmayor]

We had the dining plan in August; it was myself, DH and our two kids (14 and 11) who were both considered adults.

Honestly, we spent very little OOP.

Four mugs at WL, maybe a couple of nachos poolside (no more than $20) and a few alcoholic drinks (maybe $50).

There is SO much food that we really needed no more than two meals a day. We primarily used the CS on breakfast, but did a couple of Character Buffets. By planning our breakfast around 8 or so, grabbing a snack off the plan around noon-1 o'clock and then dinner around 5 we really had more than enough food.

 

[Disneynutbsv]

We went last September and had the dining plan. We also paid very little out of pocket. I think we got pastries in France (which are normally very yummy...but were so dry we threw them away ) I'd say we paid less than $20 out of pocket, but what we did was, we shared a breakfast, we shared lunch and then had our own ts. If we were to get a full breakfast and a full lunch it would be WAY too much food. on the first day we did that and we felt so ill that first night, so after that we shared and they serve plenty for a breakfast (like 5 pancakes with bacon)and fruit, at Tusker House 1/2 rotisserie chicken with veggies, mashed potatoes and dessert. It realy is a lot of food.

 

[DISNEYFAMILYOFFOUR]

We were at WDW for 11 days and spent about $300 OOP. However, we did a couple of character meals for breakfast where we paid cash. We also had 3 CS credits and 17 snack credits left.

 

[Thinktinknpixiedust]

The five of us stayed for 10 days last summer. We had 2 character breakfasts in addition to our dining plan, 110.00 each. Honestly on the days that we did those we felt like we would blow up!! most days we all were amazingly fine with just having a granola bar for breakfast on the bus going to the parks!! With the 2 breakfasts and 2 mugs we spent 250.00, but really could of saved 220.00 not doing breakfast and being just fine! the dining plan is a great saver, for us.

 

[pooch]

splitting 2 breakfast platters and 2 lunch somethings between the 4 of us and then each getting our own ts for dinner with all the trimmings? (DH, Me, DD(21) & DS (15). This was kind of my plan, then filling in w/a few snacks for DS as needed!

 

[Dorisk3]

You can get away with really spending nothing on out of pocket expenses if you really are looking to save money or just be smart with money. Unless you love big breakfasts, I think its easier to pack some kind of breakfast bars and have a few waters with you. Most hotels have coffeemakers in the rooms or you could spring for the refillable kind if you are staying onsite. That way you can use your credits for lunches and dinners and snacks, and believe me- you won't be hungry or even want a big breakfast after a few days of that!

 

[EmmaAndQuinnsMommy]

Our plan is along those lines too, but we are planning late TS breakfasts (around 10am) so that we aren't hungry for lunch and can have something we bring along on those days and then a nice dinner. I am still planning to order pizza delivery one night though because we didn't have enough credits after using 2 each at CRT. No biggie, that will only be $20 and we can reheat some the next day for lunch!

 

[susieq76]

We'll be there 7 nights. I've budgeted $500.00 extra for food & alcohol- there are three adults and three babies (under three). I also paid OOP for the Hoop Dee Doo- so we have an extra TS credit from that. Wish me luck

 

[ssdeverell]

We also did not spend much OOP in September, as it is a lot of food. However, other than the PSB breakfast, we always take a few things to eat in the room for breakfast. I insist on being there at park opening, and I just do not like to waste time on getting breakfast from the CS. Would that be an option for you? I think the only thing I bought OOP was a ice cream for DH and onion rings at Flame Tree. The dining plan is a good deal, and yes, you will get your money's worth doing a character meal every day. Well, maybe not CRT.

 

[MomofKatie]

We used the Dining plan last fall for 7 nights/8 days. We shared some TS meals, and some CS meals. Some we didn't. We were very well fed for all 8 days, even though we had 7 nights of DP meals. We even left several CS meals and lots of snacks unused. There were 3 of us- me. DH, and DD7.

OOP-I think we ended up spending around $50. We got a mixed drink or a beer at a couple of TS restaurants, and DH got one or 2 items at the Food & Wine Festival (we didn't realize we could use snack credits for some of the F&W offerings until AFTER we spent the $). So, really, except for alcoholic drinks, we didn't need to spend a dime extra!

 

[budbeerlady]

In Dec 2005 we were on the plan and only paid for the resort mug for myself. We had more than enough food. Dh had a big cs breakfast at pofq and then we at 6pm dinners. So we were hungry at dinner time and then waddled to our rooms later and got a snack if it was late and we were hungry. I did have to burn 9 snack credits the last day, so we took mickey rice crispy bars home.

 

[disneyjunkie]

My son and I used the plan last April. (He was 13 during that trip)

I ended up spending quite a bit out of pocket; mostly for snack items. The snacks included with the plan are very limited.

I ended up paying for ice cream, cookies, funnel cakes, candy apples, caramel apples, fudge, school bread....

We also added crab legs to our dinner at Cape May Cafe.

We're using the plan again this April.

I'm planning to use cash to cover a few character breakfasts, food court breakfasts, and of course all of the yummy snacks that aren't covered by the plan.

 

[DCDisney]

I bought the kids milk each morning to go with the granola bars we packed and the milks were 1.25. Mostly the adults snacked on some leftover cookies and brownies for our breakfast though I used my snack credits for begniets each morning (only available at Port Orleans). We had the mugs for our coffee, etc. WHen we did eat a meal at our resort we got bottled water to use later. We did end up buying 1 drink per person extra over the whole trip. We also bought a bucket of popcorn at Illuminations since we had eaten dinner at 4:30 before Fantasmic (and dinner was yucky at Mama Melrose). Other than that the dining plan was plenty.

Yvonne

 

[Mickey'snewestfan]

We did it last summer, and needed verylittle out of pocket. Pretty much the only things we paid for out of pocket were either because we wanted a snack that wasn't covered, or because we did some signature meals, plus some days we did more than 1 TS. We also bought some extra water just because it was August and HOT!

There are so many places at WDW where the portions are huge that we often split. For example, in MK we got a platter with ribs and 1/2 a chicken -- definitely enough for 2! or at the Main Street bakery you could pick any 2 items for breakfast so we got 2 bagels and cream cheese and used a snack credit for a 2nd bottle of water -- breakfast for two and it cost 1 CS and 1 snack.

We split a lot at TS too. You can't split at a character meal, but you can wherever you order from a menu. For example, at Beaches and Cream DS6 and I got a caesar salad (appetizer) a double cheeseburger with fries (entree), an ice tea for me (beverage) and a rootbeer float for DS (dessert). Plenty for two, and they even divided the cheeseburger and brought it on two plates. By splitting TS we were able to save enough for a couple of extra sit down meals.

 

[ksumn1]

We're going in June and we're not big breakfast eaters. We'll have cereal, pop tarts, granola bars etc along with juice and mile that we'll keep in the cooler. We're doing PSB one morning, but other than that all out meals on the dining plan will be lunch or dinner. But I know we'll have to buy extra snacks like Dole Whips, funnel cakes, crespes in EPCOT, etc. And we're also buying lunch at Earl of Sandwich in DD one day so total OOP I'm expecting about $100 or less. So far I'm not planning on sharing any of our meals but CS especially we may be able to split so DD 2 and myself could easily share. Which means not as much OOP but I know we will have to buy at least a few things OOP.

 

[dsnymomadopt2china]

my kids are 9,8,4 and 2. I paid only for the 1 dole whip 3.89, a couple of waters $4, 4 adult drinks $25 and for the mcflurrys in Epcot $5. At Kona on the first night we all 6 shared the Kiddie cone and took 4 deserts back to the room which we ate for breakfast on a couple of days. We split a large counter service breakfst 4 ways supplementing the deserts from the TS, so really never paid for another meal. My kids really did not eat much the entire time due to the excitement. My 2 year old ate more than all them combined! for a 4 night package and an extra AAA rate night we spent $428 for the package and our dining receipts were $840.

 

[MOMOFMNM]

we had bkfst in our room and lunch was a CS usually and we shared a lot of meals!!

there is SOOOOOOOOOOO much food it is crazy!!! I can not eat a WHOLE burger or chicken, fries, and coke and desert by myself and my girls can not either so we usually got one meal for me and DH and 2 meals for the girls to share at the CS

now we did not share any dinners because they were mostly char buffets and teppanyaki...and Ohana!!and we used all TS credits...

snacks...wow!! We got ice creams and sodas and popcorn and then had a hard time eating lunch or dinner!! GET THOSE MICKEY RICE CRISPY TREATS!!
My dh fought over the one that made it back home to Iowa...we thought we would give some away to family back home...that was before we ate them all!!!

one day we shared churros and a huge pretzel between the 5 of us and has some LEFT OVER!!!

I took Crystal light to go to add to the bottled/tap water at WDW so that we would not use our snack credits on drinks...that worked out great!!


I bought one resort mug (IT IS MINE!!!) and I would fill it with hot chocolate at night for the girls and make them split it in three room coffee cups there at the Poly...
mmm hot choc with mickey heads....

oh yeah, back to the advice....

we bought alcohol drinks only once at Ohanas...we added a day on our passses, we bought VERY expensive millenium batteries at MK...

that was it...I think we spent 160 OOP bucks including tips and ALL!!

it was great but we will not do the plan anymore, too costly for my 10 yo and really we left WDW with 16 CS credits EVEN AFTER we bought take home food at Captain Cooks for MCO!!! We had a lot of credits left over...12 snacks...all to buy...

yeah....


Mickey rice crispy treat Heads!!!