Things I learned on the DDDP last week....

[cattrix]

Here is a list of things I learned while at Disney last week for free dining, we have done free dining before but this year we tried the Deluxe plan to see how that worked.

1. The word on free dining is out, while crowds are manageable the parks are no where near as dead as they use to be.

2. It was hard for us to have 3 meals a day on the deluxe plan, since everyone books 180 days out it's hard to get your reservations completely in place to utilize the 3 sit down meals a day to where you aren't stuffed all the time.

3. The vouchers that we got for eating a counter service instead of a table service proved to be more of a hassle than a help as no one knew what they were and wouldn't accept them. So we ended up coming home wiht 4 totle bags. The snack credits on the paper vouchers you get REALLY confused a lot of CM's.

4. We did book bounceback free dining (with deluxe dining) for next year and we are going to eat a lunch table service and a signature dinner every day..or that's the plan anyway. We may throw in 1 day where we do a character meal but for the most part we will stay with that schedule.

5. We ended up using all of our table service credits and snack credits, and there is a lot trust me. We got to the end of the trip and bought fudge with all of our remaining snack credits

6. Having a small printed piece of paper that DBF carried around in his wallet with our dining information proved to be a life saver. I put restaurant name, confirmation number and time on the card. We got to LTT and had to supply our confirmation number as they couldn't find us, when we gave them our confirmation number they pulled it up and it showed as cancelled but they got us in anyway.

7. (No flaming please) We did arrive late to a few of our reservations as we didn't rent a car so we had to rely on Disney transportation to get places. They were more than nice and accomidating when I apoligized even though I knew they could have said......to bad you missed your time.....no one even acted concerned. Well I was pretty upset cause I'm never late to anything but they were so nice about it.

All in all it was a great trip but for the most part it seemed like the dining ruled our schedule. It wasn't too much food it just seemed like after we were done eating at one place we had to look at our watch and see where/when we were eating next then plan our next move according to that. I take full blame for that as it was poor planning on my part. I will learn from my mistakes and make better decisions for next year. It was a fantastic time though and we can't wait till next year

 

[jenjersnap]

We got back on Sunday and had DxDDP as well. We did a character breakfast/lunch and signature dinner most days and we loved it. We thought it was much less crowded than the same week last year, I think Disney is feeling the economy pinch.

My other observation is that they seem to have figured out the operational aspects of the free dining crowds. Last year, we waited 20-30 minutes to be seated most of the time and, once, at 'Ohana's breakfast we never did get seated, we waited an hour before leaving. This year, longest wait was 10 minutes, usually 5. I wonder if eliminating the appetizer truly was the secret to faster table turnaround?

 

[cattrix]

My other observation is that they seem to have figured out the operational aspects of the free dining crowds. Last year, we waited 20-30 minutes to be seated most of the time and, once, at 'Ohana's breakfast we never did get seated, we waited an hour before leaving. This year, longest wait was 10 minutes, usually 5. I wonder if eliminating the appetizer truly was the secret to faster table turnaround?

I couldn't agree more on this point, in years past it seemed like we had to check in then wait a while to be seated. This year our longest wait was probably at Crystal Palace and it was only 5 minutes.......even when we were late for by a few minutes we got seated right away. Thanks for mentioning that.

 

[TDC Nala]

We got back on Sunday and had DxDDP as well. We did a character breakfast/lunch and signature dinner most days and we loved it. We thought it was much less crowded than the same week last year, I think Disney is feeling the economy pinch.

My other observation is that they seem to have figured out the operational aspects of the free dining crowds. Last year, we waited 20-30 minutes to be seated most of the time and, once, at 'Ohana's breakfast we never did get seated, we waited an hour before leaving. This year, longest wait was 10 minutes, usually 5. I wonder if eliminating the appetizer truly was the secret to faster table turnaround?

The appetizer elimination, of course, does not affect buffets.

I think I saw the proof of the effects of free dining for Disney - I was at Universal Tuesday and it was almost completely dead. Half the food kiosks and some of the restaurants at both parks seemed to be closed

the MK yesterday was, while not incredibly crowded, much busier. Only interesting observation is that you can't get a Coke at the snack place in Liberty Square next to Columbia Harbor House anymore. They are selling only water, vitamin water, and juices.

WDW is now seriously plugging vitamin water at $3.25 a bottle.

 

[minmate]

I don't think the Deluxe plan would work for our family as it is too much food and like OP said, too much planning around meals!

We were there last week and found the snack vouchers (trading a TS credit for a CS and 2 snacks) to be totally fine. We never had problems with people taking the paper vouchers for snacks. They all knew what they were where we went. however, when I asked to redeem one for a bag, I was told they were all out of the bags and wouldn't be getting any more for a week. (This was yesterday) and I left that day. She said they whole resort was out not just that store.

 

[imthatgirl]

out of curiousity...
if you were on the deluxe why was it you needed the vouchers for the counter service restaurants? i was under the impression with the deluxe you were free to eat where you wanted and mix and match credits?

if they make you get special vouchers that would be a big hassle.

 

[cattrix]

out of curiousity...
if you were on the deluxe why was it you needed the vouchers for the counter service restaurants? i was under the impression with the deluxe you were free to eat where you wanted and mix and match credits?

if they make you get special vouchers that would be a big hassle.

From what I understood they were only giving these vouchers during free dining when you were using a counter service instead of a table service. I think it was kind of an incentive to go to a counter service.....it was no incentive for us though You are correct though, on the Deluxe plan you can use your credits for counter or table service, each person in your party gets 3 credits a day.

 

[imthatgirl]

From what I understood they were only giving these vouchers during free dining when you were using a counter service instead of a table service. I think it was kind of an incentive to go to a counter service.....it was no incentive for us though You are correct though, on the Deluxe plan you can use your credits for counter or table service, each person in your party gets 3 credits a day.

thats why i dont understand why you needed to use the vouchers. i guess im just confused.

 

[Condorman]

thats why i dont understand why you needed to use the vouchers. i guess im just confused.

It was a way for Disney to appease people during Free Dining, who, on the off-chance they didn't making ADRs and just showed up at TS locations only to find them booked solid -- Disney offered vouchers for CS and snacks in place of 1 TS credit as a sort of alternative so that no one would feel as though they were losing something on the deal. I may be wrong on this, and someone is more than welcome to correct me, but that is how I understood it.

 

[imthatgirl]

It was a way for Disney to appease people during Free Dining, who, on the off-chance they didn't making ADRs and just showed up at TS locations only to find them booked solid -- Disney offered vouchers for CS and snacks in place of 1 TS credit as a sort of alternative so that no one would feel as though they were losing something on the deal. I may be wrong on this, and someone is more than welcome to correct me, but that is how I understood it.

i guess i just thought it only applied to the basic, since the deluxe was interchangeable. i guess i was wrong.
that was a really good deal for anyone that was on the deluxe then, they got a bunch of free snacks. assuming they werent using their credits on only table services anyway.