What is a reasonable amount of $ to budget for ....

[Piglet]

souveiners and food???

There is 3 of us - 2 adults - 1- 6 yo DD. We are there from Oct 24 - Oct 31. We will probably do a couple character meals. Maybe 3. We will eat mostly counter service in the parks and probably food court at ASMu some. May eat off site a couple evenings.

Any advice on what to budget???


TIA

Melinda

 

[C.Ann]

That's the same number traveling in our party - myself, grown DD, and 5-year old granddaughter..

I've checked menus and prices for all of the eating establishments and I'm allowing $25 per day for counter service (none of us are big eaters) and $50 per character meal (which could be a bit more or a bit less depending on the ones you choose)..

We will eat breakfast and our evening meals off-site (unless we're doing a character meal) and that cuts down on the food budget CONSIDERABLY!!

Isn't the planning fun?? I love looking over all of this stuff every day to see if I can cut another corner here or there so we'll have more money to "play" with..

 

[Rpsemont]

I hope this doesn't discourage you but we plan on $150/day for three of us - me, DH and DD(8) That's for food and souvenirs and cocktails. (the cocktails part is probably about $50/day - not that we drink alot, but one or two beers when it's hot, or one of those special frozen drinks ($8 +/-) or a glass or two of wine ($5-7 glass) and whadaya know! And that's including our meals off site and buying many of our souvenirs at the Disney outlet store. We also allow ourselves a few treats while we're there. We usually buy at least one, and sometimes 2-3 of the pictures that are taken for you - either at the entrance to the park or on a ride. Over a five day trip, that may only include only one or two character/special dinners, we usually don't eat breakfast, we make coffee in the room, have one meal or snack off site or from food in the room and eat light or counter service the rest of the time. It always amazes me how much I spend. But, after all, it is vacation!

 

[hipporina]

We just got back last week and we did not spend near as much as I thought we would. There are 4 of us: me, DH, Ds-7, Ds-almost 3. I budgeted $75/day and took each days in its own envelope. We ate breakfast in our room, took water bottles to the parks with us instead of buying drinks (we got plenty of soda at the resort using our refillable mugs, which we bought 2 of), and ate all counter service or ASMo food court except one night when we went into Kissimee to Red Lobster. We didn't snack a lot in the parks and we shared most of our meals, and we still all got plenty to eat even though we are big eaters. We ended up with somewhere between $150-$200 leftover that we got to splurge on more souvenirs with! With as much as we were doing and the heat, we just didn't want to eat a lot anyway. We never felt deprived, hungry, or cheap. Its just not our style to do sit-down meals at Disney anyway. However, we would like to do a character meal on a future trip. I hope that helps.

Kristy

 

[hipporina]

Oops, I forgot about the souvenir part of your question. We had budgeted $250 for souvenirs but ended up spending closer to $500. The boys' grandparents gave us extra money that we put towards souvenirs and we used our food money left over, so we splurged on things we normally wouldn't have. We easily could have done it on the $250, but just chose not too since we had the extra money already put aside for the trip.

Just to get an idea of what that got us, we came home with 4 t-shirts, a light up sorcerer mickey hat I fell in love with, lots of pins, some limited edition Star Wars stuff, a few toys for the kids, a tote bag, 2 pictures from in the parks (the only ones that came out good), 2 mugs, 3 lanyards, 2 autograph books, a birthday present for my sister, a picture frame, a scrapbook, 2 scrapbook kits, mickey ears for kids, 2 light chasers for kids, and some other assorted items.

Okay, I hope all that rambling helped you!

Kristy

 

[Rpsemont]

Kristy, I'm impressed!. But tell me, when you put it all together, the cost of the food, what you actually spent on souvenirs (including additional money from grand parents) how much did it end up per day - and are you counting the travel days?

I guess the other amounts that get lumped into this category in my budget is all our tipping - airport porters, housekeeping, bellhops, valet....

 

[MELSMICE]

I believe you should budget more than you ever imagine you will spend. If you think you may spend $100, then budget $150 "just in case". Some days you may spend $100, some $50 but then some $150 or some $200 depending on where you go & what you buy.

It's always better to have money left over than not enough. If you come home with money it's a bonus that can be used for the next trip.

 

[geffric]

We watch the amount we spend so that we can afford to have a character lunch. We eat breakfast in, and take nutrigrain bars, apples, carrots, crackers, etc with us, we bring our own water. Water is much too expensive there, and bring PB&J sandwiches for some days.
Character breakfast is very expensive and cost the same as lunch. So if you take your snakcks, and schedule lunch for 2 or 3 i the afternoon, before the prices go up , you can have a wonderful Lunch/dinner. This means that dnner is light and inexpensive back at the resort.

Just a thought

 

[DDreneeT]

I have been researching and developing a budget for when we go in July. My DH thinks I'm crazy for doing this. I have allowed DD $250 on souvenirs. DS is not going (only 1 yo-he's staying with Grandparents) and allowed $150 souvenirs to bring back to him. And $200 for DH and myself.

I also did a budget on food. We are going to rent a refridge for the room ($10 per day) so we can eat breakfast in the room (not big breakfast eaters). I have budgeted 1 morning to eat breakfast out. And also plan on eating lunch in the room also. Then, I went to www.wdwig.com to see restaurant menus with the prices and figured which nice restaurants we would eat at and which nights and i booked the reservations. The other nights we are going to eat at the food court. I was also able to get menu and prices on the website for the food court. This website helps you be able to budget for meals because I know what my family will probably order.

 

[jaw62901]

Here is what my budget looks like for my solo trip Dec 26 to Jan 3.

This budget does not include airfare since that was taken care off already or breakfasts since those are included in my reservation at the Swan (Club level):

Food: $600 (25 lunch, 25 dinner 15 a day for snacks, brkfst
included with room) (for 9 days)
Souveniors: $300 (I doubt I will spend this much, but just in case)
Passes $393 (getting an annual pass/will be going 2x in 04)
Transpertation to and from airport $80 (towncar)
Swan reservation: $1464 (209.06 deposit already taken care of)
Total: $2837

This also leaves me with around $263 dollars extra left out of the $3100 I had planned to use, incase of emergenies at WDW.

 

[FreshTressa]

We pay about $30 a day at home for food and about $50 at DW. But we really just don't eat that much. We eat instant oatmeal for breakfast, PB+J for lunch, bring our own water bottles and fruit for snacks then we go to a either a sit down dinner off site or counter service on site. We will usually splurge one good sit down meal during our trip that comes to about 60. But, we don't drink soft drinks, just water and that saves too. And frequently my hubbie will order a meal and I will order a salad and have a few bites of his. Most of the time, two restaurant servings are too large for us.

And we don't buys souvies. I just feel they wind up as junk at home. We take lots of pictures instead.

I also figure since I am not spending money that I usually spend at home, it usually doesn't come to that much more than usual.

 

[MK Familystone]

Part one fixed:
Airfare, car rental , resort room and park passes.
Part Two variable:
Meals, Snacks, Drinks( love those "Disney Resort Mugs"),
soveiners.
We average for Family of 4 (2 adults+ 2 child.) , 5 nights WDW Resort , flying out of Manchester, NH. into MCO, renting a midsize car or Meirs Trans, 4 Day Hopper Passes. $2000
Food ( park drinks, resort meals , past food, Character breakfast,)
and trinkets about $150 per day.
Only cost I don't have a handle on is theTipping at the hotel and trans, and meals.

ENJOY!

THE MAGIC HAPPEN!!!