Who is with me - I LIKE the DELUXE DINING PLAN!!!!

[meghanlea]

im glad i stumbled on this post. i have been tossing the idea around of getting the deluxe plan. no we may not eat all of the food, but i like the idea of having all my meals paid for. we did the regular plan last time, and i hated the idea of choosing which "extra" meal to give up for the day b/c we only got 2 meals paid for. it makes my trip seem less stressful knowing we can eat whatever whenever and not worry about paying right then.

For us sitting down at character meals are a part of disney b/c we have 2 small kids who like that. For us it doesn't take time out of our day, it is part of our planned day. It's prolly one of the only things really planned though, lol. Also DH and i have tossed around the idea of a sitter this time so we can go out on our own for a little bit, and this way we could go enjoy a nicer meal without worrying about cost.

I think I will get it this time, I just feel more relaxed on our trip, and know that extra money can be spent else where instead of worrying about buying food.

 

[Princess Disney Mom]

It might work for us for a short trip but since we stay 9 plus nights we would really be sick of eating.....

 

[janloz]

We the deluxe plan as well. We have done both the regular and deluxe and with DS (12) and DD (9) who want to eat character breakfasts at least 3 mornings of the trip and planning 5 signature dining, it makes perfect sense for us. We all dislike most of the counter service at WDW so this plan works wonderful for us. We don't usually order apps for all of us and only eat as much as makes us full and I love having everything paid for (except the tip) before we go. I will not plan to do lunches most days but use snack credits since 3 ADRS/day does cut into park time quite a bit for us. Who does love a mickey ice cream bar for lunch?

 

[MissBritt]

It was perfect for our 3 nights/4 days trip last month, but I think for longer use it may have been too much. We had just enough food, tried a lot of places we wouldn't have on the regular plan, were happy to have it all covered upfront, and saved $104.10.

 

[PaulaSB12]

I read more "bashings" about the deluxe plan, too much food, leftovers, etc., but we really, really like it! For us, there is me (41), DH (47) and DD (9). My DH is diabetic and needs to eat three meals a day. With this plan, I know we are eating well with lots of variety, I know we will be eating at set times and we are not forced to eat all our food. Plus the added benefit is that it is paid for so I don't have to feel like I have to order salad and water.

My husband will easily eat the big steak at the Yachtsman with all the fixings and so will I. Are we fat? No, but we choose to not eat all of it, but enjoy what we do have.

I know there are others out there like me who enjoy it or Disney wouldn't even offer it, so speak out and say why you like it.

Thanks - Diane

I am going to the Yacht Club in August for 14 nights and will be having the deluxe dining plan, I love delux dining!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[robinb]

I loved the regular DDP when my DD was only 9 ... now that she's 10 and a "Disney Adult" it will be a long time before I pay for even the regular DDP. The Deluxe Dining plan sounds good on the surface and I even considered upgrading to it when I got the regular DDP for free. However, once I began to think about it I knew it wasn't for me. My biggest issue with the Deluxe Dining plan is that you have to spend so much of your time eating. I have seen some people's schedules and it seems that they are running from one meal to another all day. I just don't want to take that much time out of my park time, nor do I want to put that much effort into figuring out 2-3 ADRs per day. I certainly don't want to waste all my morning park time eating a big breakfast! I can see Tigger, the Princesses & Mickey somewhere else. Lastly, while I consider myself a "big eater" even I don't think I could eat 3 TS meals a day! You would have to onto the plane for my ride home.

 

[carps09]

We were on the Deluxe Plan on our October 2009 honeymoon and we loved it! It was nice to have more flexibility with the credits and not have to worry so much about how many TS credits we had left or how many CS credits we had. I was concerned about the amount of food going into it, but it was our honeymoon so we went all out. And with all of the walking we did at Disney, we broke even anyway!

 

[MelanieC]

I think it's good there are 3 plans since people have a range of what they prefer.

For us the DP is perfect, and almost a little too much food. I think we would burst if we had the DXDDP, but I guess it's nice if you don't care about getting the full value out of it. There is no way we could eat appetizer, entree and dessert. For us it might work if we ate CS breakfast early. Sit down lunch or dinner and some days another sit down or counter service, but we couldn't eat both appetizer and dessert at each meal (especially one per person).

We are actually trying the QSDP this year and besides being a little sad to miss some of our sit down restaurants I'm excited to try the QSDP.

 

[MissBritt]

I just don't know where people get the idea that DXDDP=tons of time lost eating. I can see Signature meals taking a long time, and TS do take longer than CS by their nature, but we never felt rushed to get to or out of a restaurant. We did a CS and 2 TS basically each day, and none of our TS meals took longer than an hour, checkin to leaving. Actually, only 1 meal took that long, most were around 30-40 minutes start to finish. With the parks open 10-12 hours or more, spending 1-1.5 hours total sitting in cool rooms enjoying nicer fare doesn't seem that bad. That said, we don't tour commando, have no kids, and decide on our meals quickly.

 

[danielle.st]

We love it! I agree with the OP about how it seems to be bashed so much, almost always by people who haven't even tried it.
We tried it in December '08 and it was fantastic! We are using it again this April.
We did a few CS meals in December, but we are planning even less now. I much prefer the less chaotic feeling of the TS meals. I hated standing in 2-3 different lines to get my food and my girls food.
Also, if it matters, none of us have super humungous appetites.
I never felt like we were wasted oodles of park time. I actually am doubtful that there is a significant difference in houw long it takes, most of the time. People count all this travel time, but that doesn't effect us at all because we plan our meals for which park we will be in each day. And if we decide we are too full for a meal or too tired to make a morning ADR, we just cancel. It's not like they track you down and force you to go to each ADR, lol.

 

[jenjersnap]

We are huge fans of the deluxe dining plan! First of all, we hate 90% of Disney's CS restaurants and, especially with the kid's meals, I think we are eating healthier avoiding them. With deluxe we get character breakfast or lunch for the kiddoes, signature dinner for the adults and everyone is happy. What's not to love?

 

[Princess654]

I have been toying with the idea of down grading my delux to just the regular dining plan, but I feel that we will run out of credits and wind up paying OOP. I am an easily stressed person and if I have to count my meals/credits all the time wondering how I am going to make it work it is going to ruin my vacation. If we are too full from breakfast we will skip lunch or get something quick.. I am not worried about the extra money (yes money matters, but my sanity is worth paying for - this is what vacation is for). If we could at home we would eat out 3 meals a day. DD is 4 and LOVES eating out and asks "can we go to a restaurant". Most of the time we are out of a restaurant in under an hour - I hate to eat on the run. DD will be 5 when we are in disney and I don't want to stress her out with "omg we have to get to this ride" if we see it we see it I am not going to fight with her about having to see all the parks completely KWIM..

I can not wait now to try my deluxe dining plan

Thanks for this post - you made me feel more confident about my decision.

 

[Nicole&Becker]

I read more "bashings" about the deluxe plan, too much food, leftovers, etc., but we really, really like it! For us, there is me (41), DH (47) and DD (9). My DH is diabetic and needs to eat three meals a day. With this plan, I know we are eating well with lots of variety, I know we will be eating at set times and we are not forced to eat all our food. Plus the added benefit is that it is paid for so I don't have to feel like I have to order salad and water.

My husband will easily eat the big steak at the Yachtsman with all the fixings and so will I. Are we fat? No, but we choose to not eat all of it, but enjoy what we do have.

I know there are others out there like me who enjoy it or Disney wouldn't even offer it, so speak out and say why you like it.

Thanks - Diane

Our last trip we had the Deluxe Dining Plan, and just loved it. We felt that we had a lot of flexibility with it. We didn't make it to all our ADR's because I was injured half way through the trip and had to miss a bunch of things, but we never worried about not having enough to eat.

We plan to do it again our next trip this November. I just had weight loss surgery and need to make sure I have good, lean protein options three times a day or more. So avoiding counter service meals is the best for me. Our kids always like to have veggies, and pasta and things like that. Hubby has a really fast metabolism so he also needs to make sure he eats regularly as well. So it really works well for us. We also like having an excuse to take a break from all the walking while still making sure we are getting healthy options.

Personally I think that the restaurants are part of the fun and magic of the whole thing. I love trying all the different foods, and seeing all different scenes inside the places. Each one has something different going on. It is almost like a different attraction or ride.

So we will likely be stuck on the Deluxe Dining plan forever now. Planning out our meals is also part of the fun of it all!!

 

[dansyr2514]

we love it! we do either late breakfast or early lunch, and a signature dinner every night! love being able to do that! And no we are not fat and yes we eat all the food!

I agree...plus we love having everything pre paid. I probably would not eat at alot of the restaurants if I was paying cash.

 

[cdotla]

Funny....we get DXDP and I always have to plan and plot to ensure that we don't run out of credits. We definitely don't have a problem using them!

We eat 3 meals a day and can't stand counter service.

Most of our dinners are at signature dining restaurants, and we typically always eat at both CRT and Brown Derby once a trip for breakfast or lunch when we are in those parks, which take up 2 credits.

In addition, I always stretch the plan into an extra day, ensuring that we are covered both the day of check-in, the duration of our stay, and the day of check-out. (So even though we pay for 7 days on the DXDP, I always ensure I get 8 days out of it.)

So my problem is always ensuring that we have enough credits!

 

[pezaddict231]

We love it too! Have done it twice so far and saved a ton of money both times. On our most recent trip we saved over $500 and there are just two of us!

We love being able to try so many Disney restaurants and we're always able to do a few new ones and some of our favorites. We usually do 1 ts (character meal or lunch) and signature dinner and I definitely do not feel like that is too much food. I like that it's prepaid because I think I would be really shocked to have to pay cash for some of those meals.

I say if you're considering it, give it a chance!

 

[disfanRN]

I love the deluxe dining plan. We usually would eat a lunch and do a dinner that used 2 credits. We ate som fabulous meals but didn;t take the time to do it three times a day. I am finding with a Tables in Wonderland card we spend probably a little less because we don't always want a dessert anyway. I say go deluxe or go home! I don't like the regular dining plan because we love the appetizers. That is again why the tables in wonderland card works better for us I think.

 

[mossyflossy]

We loved the DLX plan, albeit wouldn't want to do it for more than about 6 days. And it helps that we only pay the upgrade cost from free dining.

Gives you the chance to recharge in a nice aircon restaurant, stress free, as all paid in advance.

Liked the flexibility of being able to have an appetiser.

Could care less whether we're maximising its value...just out to enjoy places we would not otherwise go to and have a good time. And noone forces you to overeat: we eat what we want and as much as we want: not bothered if we don't eat it all or order it all. And there's more chance to pick healthy options too.

The ordinary DDP doesn't work for us as we are restricted in what we will eat and most of the CS options, esp for kids, do not cater to us, or are dire and repetitive.

Moreover, I wouldn't eat CS at home, so why would I want to eat it on holiday once every day?

So for us it'll always be DLX or OOP.

 

[Cookie Princess]

We have done the basic DDP a handful of times, but last year upgraded to the Deluxe plan. I gotta agree....we loved it. Many of the people who provide "non-positive" feedback about it have not tried it.

We missed the appys when they took them off the basic DDP. We enjoy eating at signature restaurants a few times during the trip. We always bought the mugs before and ended up buying OOP meals as well. We had a GREAT time with the DXDDP, and who doesn't love one extra snack credit per day??!!

Were we full on the DDP...yup. Were we full on the DXDDP...yup, but we were eating better quality food. We didn't have to eat counter service as much. I say pick what you think works best for your family...

 

[dbarker]

We did the Deluxe Dining for the first time last year...and we loved it. We are used to eating 3 meals a day. I'm also a little OCD about planning and budgeting. I love the idea that everyting is paid for before we leave home. I even make up tip envelopes and already have the tip money in them (adjustments are made as needed).