Strategy for Food and budgeting

[kizmac]

Go with the dining plan, it seems to be only a couple of dollars more and you won't have to scrimp and save to get through the day. You'll also get the chance to experience some nice places to eat in WDW this way, some of which are an attraction themself.

ITA! Especially since your kids are still at the children's price. The Dining plan is sooooo worth it. Take advantage of it now and do all the Character Meals and really enjoy it! We did last year and it really made the trip special. We ate at places that we never would have ate at. If you are staying on property and need tickets, go with the DP. Even if you don't need tickets, you just have to through in a 1 day base ticket for everyone to get the DP. I believe the DP is only $37.99 per adult and kids are $10.99 or $11.99...I'm not sure on the kids....but that only works out to $99.96 (DP includes Tax & tips at the TS's) at the most for the four of you and you can eat like kings for the week.

 

[sanilacjack]

I don't believe the OP said where they were staying.

If they are off property, than the DP won't be available to them.

 

[Jen D]

Well, if you're doing mostly counter service, I don't think $100 a day is bad, in fact on the days you do only counter service you will probably come in under budget and that will make up for the one or two TS meals you do plan.

But I have to agree-- if you are budgeting $100/day, why not just do the dining plan (if you are onsite?) Of course you still have to figure breakfast but I would just do inexpensive breakfast items in the room.

 

[princess aurora]

Wow so many responses thanks.
We are staying at POP C this time. We did use the dining plan on our last trip. I guess I felt we did a lot of manipulation to be able to eat at "signature" dining places that used 2 credits each and paid for kids meals out of pocket etc... that I found we did use the meal plan to its full advantage but still paid out of pocket for some things (like breakfast). My hubby is a regular 3 meal a day eater so we tend to follow him and like some have said I found we were "needing" to go somewhere specific b/c we had a ADR planned rather than move where the spirit takes us. I suppose if we stick to the basic Dining plan and do not try to do any "signature" dining meals we will stick to a $100 budget, eat more food and have a TS/character meal available every day.

Next question...Going in May (9 -16) do you think we will need to make ADRs ahead of time? Do you think it will be less crowded and we can find ourselves spontaneously in a park one morning then book a TS meal for lunch or dinner as we decide where to go the same day?

 

[sanilacjack]

O-kay.....I see from your OP that it is possible to get the dinning plan. I figured you will have about 100.00 per day if you buy the dining plan.
If you do not go to Disney every year like a lot of people on this board, than I think the DP is a good choice for you.

Would you like to take your girls to the Hoop Dee Do Review or the Sprit of ? Luau? You can do this on the DP, only they take 2 TS credits instead of 1.
The DP can afford you some of these things that other wise a person might not do. Than it would be easy to split some counter meals on the off days you don't have a dinner show. Also as far as snack credits the mickey rice krispies are to die for and pack will. We also try to book ADR in the park that we will be in, but you can call from any on site phone, (#88, i think) and move a ressie if you need. We usually have a light B-fast in the room, an early lunch and than dinner.When you check in the CM will give you a brochure on the DP and it is easy to follow.
Actually I will just give you a link to an online version.

http://adisneyworld.disney.go.com/m...gespecific/eng/nontheme/tickets/MYWDining.pdf

You will have the peace of mind that your meals are paid for and you won't feel like your over eating too.
On the dining plan, we have taken our kids to places we might not have other wise like coral reef, le cellier and HDDR.

Kim

 

[mouseplanner]

We are a family of four - two kids 4&6. I looked into the dining plan and it is a great deal (esp. if you would like to take advantage of character meals) but unfortunately we are unable to use it as we are getting our room at a discounted rate (AAA). We will have a rental car so our plan is to stop at a grocery store on the way in. Breakfast will be cereal, granola bars and fruit in the room to ensure us a quick start. We will also bring a small cooler with sandwiches, drinks and snacks for lunch which we normally do on our outings from home as well. I'm figuring we will only spend $$ on an occassional CS lunch, afternoon snack or ice cream, and TS dinner which in total should be well under $100/day. You might also want to check the Budget Board for other suggestions.

 

[WINTER]

Personally the dining plan wouldn't work for us. We aren't doing any Character meals and not much table service. Mostly counter services and of course snacks! I won't bring food and eat in the room because that is not vacation to me and I want three meals; the dining plan calls for 2. Therefore, if we went with the dining plan it would be more expensive. I guess if you only eat 2 meals a day it would work.

 

[jann1033]

so much depends on how much you and the kids eat...usually my husband and i split an appe, dessert and entree for one meal( we had vkl vouchers and that's what one voucher was for) and each then got a counter service.( obviously didn't split at buffets) and we come to about $100 a day so that is closer to $50 each. we don't drink many "adult " beverages and that didn't include some of our snacks which added about another 10-15 per day; some days it was less( the days we split,) some days more but it averaged about that. imo the dining plan is the way to go. i can not take burgers every meal every day and i really enjoy going to different places. I think for us, if we each had 1 cs and 1 ts per day we'd be chock full plus you have snacks so i really think for us it is a savings. if your kids usually split a meal though( as my kids did at that age) you probably can do it for less but imo it wouldn't be as much fun.

one budget hint would be if you do eat ts, sometimes the lunch menus are cheaper for asimilar item( some have made the prices the same all day long now though).

just read the thread and i can see where the 2 ts places would really increase the food budget since you need to pay for so many oop. if you got the dining plan free, that's one thing but to me i don't think the 2ts are That great for the added expense when i can get decent meals at the other 1 ts places...for a splurge yes, but just a "normal" meal i'm to cheap to do that.

 

[ExPirateShopGirl]

We are a family of four - two kids 4&6. I looked into the dining plan and it is a great deal (esp. if you would like to take advantage of character meals) but unfortunately we are unable to use it as we are getting our room at a discounted rate (AAA). We will have a rental car so our plan is to stop at a grocery store on the way in. Breakfast will be cereal, granola bars and fruit in the room to ensure us a quick start. We will also bring a small cooler with sandwiches, drinks and snacks for lunch which we normally do on our outings from home as well. I'm figuring we will only spend $$ on an occassional CS lunch, afternoon snack or ice cream, and TS dinner which in total should be well under $100/day. You might also want to check the Budget Board for other suggestions.

You can get the discounted AAA room rate and the dining plan if you book through AAA. No other deals apply, but it's a good deal when there aren't other specials.

 

[FigNewton]

For my wife and I we generally will split lunches at CS places - it's usually enough to fill us and we save considerably. We can both easily eat for $10 at a CS place. On dinners we don't usually eat TS because of the time involved, usually only twice for a weeklong stay, so usually another $10 for dinner. Our biggest food expense comes from breakfast. Almost every morning we do Boma, which for two is about $40. After accounting for a couple mid day snacks, food is usually abuot $75 a day for us.

 

[dyna]

We have went and NEVER spent any money on drinks or food in parks or food court at the resort the whole week. Most times we get dinner or supper CS whichever meal we don't eat in park is eaten in hotel room.

We always take a cooler and food from home cereal for breakfast, juice for DD and DH if he wants it. Peanut butter travels real well and we like it so eat lots of peanut butter sandwiches.

Last visit just DH and I we did the free dining while we enjoyed eatin in all the resturants we don't normally eat in we found we lost way to much time in the parks by doing TS meals. Which was why I had wanted to do dinner instead of supper TS because at dinner time we'd be wanting a break and goin back to the room to rest and escape crowd and sun so it wouldn't have mattered that we lost park time. DH wanted to do supper because they cost more makes sense in a way but my plan made sense too.

When DD 15 is with us the dining plan would not work at all for us. She's a very very picky eater even if the food is something she likes at home if it looks different out she won't touch it. NO interest in tryin new foods. Plus she never eats much kids meal from mickey d's usually lasts her 2 or 3 meals.

 

[susan1]

hi
it really all depends on how much importance you put on food and the surrounding ambience! dh and i allow $70 a day for everything including food. we managed to have enough money to pay for a night at vero beach. breakfast in room, share a chicken wrap for lunch, they are huge. also share a coffee certainly too much for me to drink in one go. take our own water with us. in the evening go off site to downtown/crossroads area to golden corral/ ponderosa or cicis. as said by previous poster would rather spend time and money in/on the parks

 

[DebbieinWA]

We have a family of 6 (all technically adults now), and I am budgeting $100 per day for our trip. But - we will be staying in a condo off site, and Disney is only part of our trip. I know we will spend more than $100 per day while we do the parks, but we'll be able to cut expenses other days by cooking at the condo, and I also included our "travel" days in the budget - our actual meal expenses those days will be under $50 each day. The last time we went, I found the portions were more than enough for dh and I to share meals. I plan to do this again where possible. If we do a character breakfast, we will probably do it as late as possible & it will be more of a brunch for us. That being said, I am stashing away some extra $ to do some of the fun dining-related things we haven't done yet - like the House of Blues Sunday Brunch, a Candlelight Processional dinner package, etc. If we were staying on site, however, I think I would be greatly tempted to go with the dining plan. It sounds like a great deal.

 

[pookybean]

We were also debating on the dining plan. There will be me, DH, DS 11, and DD 5. It seems like such a great deal, but my son is still a chicken finger and fry kid. And there is A LOT of food that comes with the TS.
Soooo...what i did was sit down and make a list of what and where i thought that we would eat if we did use the plan, and what i thought we would do if we didnt have it. The dining plan would cost us about $984, and what we decided to do was budget $1000 for food. Rather than use the plan, I went and got a visa gift card for the $1000 and made the ressies for what TS we KNEW we would want to go to (2 character meals, hoop de do, sci fi and 50's). I will use the gift card just for all of our food purchases. I figure it will keep us on budget and if we dont use it all, it wont go to waste. we can always use it for more souviners!
There were other reasons we didnt go with the dining plan as well, like we didnt want to be tied to a ressie every single day, and we all tend to be hungry at different times, and my DD eats like a bird somedays. so i thought it would be better to pick and choose what we wanted at the time.

Have a GREAT time!

megan

1 month, 3 weeks, 2 days till FIRST FAMILY TRIP TO DISNEY!!!!!