Dining plan worth the value?!?!?!?!

I'm not sure how that is insulting? The OP asked for opinions and that has been my personal experience: requiring stuffing ourselves to the max and calculating to make sure we are getting our money's worth. Good for you if that isn't your experience.
I think Disney almost calculates the prices now on the most expensive cost, because a lot of pepople feel that you do have to order the most expensive meals and deserts to get your money's worth. There seems to be three different categories, number one. Those who use it because it saves time and piece of mind. I can totally see that, then those who feel in order for this to be a deal, they have to get the most expensive of all to get their money's worth, or get a deal as they can SAVE money, and then those who do the math and just pay out of pocket.

I have only ever had it on the free dining plan, and for the first year or two, I felt I had to get the most, or close to most expensive thing. It took me a year or two to fall into the other category of, I'm just going to enjoy myself and not stress, but now that I've joined DVC. I'll probably just mosey into the next one and just do the OOP. I know that one of these trips I take by myself I'll do the regualar dining plan, just so I can try new restaraunts. But right now I'm trying to explore new places to eat and make sure to to to at least one or two new restaraunts a trip. I like the go with the flow, and only scheduling one or two meals a trip. But thank you, everybody, for your feedback.
 
This is such a hard question, the first time we went years ago we had the regular dining plan, one TS, one QS and I think 1 snack along with the mug. Then a couple years ago when we went they started offering the Quick service dining plan for value resorts. At first I was thinking we would miss the TS meals, but in reality my hubby and I did great with the QS meals, we did have one TS meal and went to BOG for breaky one morning but other than that we just ate when we wanted.

Now this year, I am waiting to see if Free Dining comes out and have to decide if I want to take that or stick with the rate I have. I had to lessen my trip by one day in order to get a promo from the travel agent and I added the Quick Service Dining plan and it came up close to $200 more than what I would pay if Disney drops free dining and I can add my extra day back. But if I drop the free dining the rate is quite a bit lower than disney's rack rates. :confused3 Soooo now I am crunching numbers trying to decide if we should get the dining plan or not.

I think I am leaning towards taking free dining if it is offered and booking directly through Disney, but if it isn't available then I will drop the dining plan with the travel agent and see how we do without it.
 
This is such a hard question, the first time we went years ago we had the regular dining plan, one TS, one QS and I think 1 snack along with the mug. Then a couple years ago when we went they started offering the Quick service dining plan for value resorts. At first I was thinking we would miss the TS meals, but in reality my hubby and I did great with the QS meals, we did have one TS meal and went to BOG for breaky one morning but other than that we just ate when we wanted.

Now this year, I am waiting to see if Free Dining comes out and have to decide if I want to take that or stick with the rate I have. I had to lessen my trip by one day in order to get a promo from the travel agent and I added the Quick Service Dining plan and it came up close to $200 more than what I would pay if Disney drops free dining and I can add my extra day back. But if I drop the free dining the rate is quite a bit lower than disney's rack rates. :confused3 Soooo now I am crunching numbers trying to decide if we should get the dining plan or not.

I think I am leaning towards taking free dining if it is offered and booking directly through Disney, but if it isn't available then I will drop the dining plan with the travel agent and see how we do without it.

Do you think you do better going through Disney instead of a regular Travel agent? We are going next February and the calendar isn’t available to book yet. I think we’re going to,try Pop Century and pay OOP. Disney offers free dining sometimes? And we’ll just pick up gift cards and pay for meals, etc..
 
Do you think you do better going through Disney instead of a regular Travel agent? We are going next February and the calendar isn’t available to book yet. I think we’re going to,try Pop Century and pay OOP. Disney offers free dining sometimes? And we’ll just pick up gift cards and pay for meals, etc..

For the past few years, free dining has only been offered during late Aug, Sept, and Dec. However, there is usually a Stay, Play, and Dine discount in February that's not as good as free dining, but still a decent discount.

As to whether to use a TA or do it yourself, depends on your personality. I prefer to do it all myself, so do it online or through the phone with Disney...more control over it all. A TA can do as much or as little as you want them to, but they hold your resort reservation and you can't do anything to change that part of your reservation yourself. So if your dates change, a promo comes out, you decide you want a different room preference, only your TA can make those changes. The price should be about the same either way.
 


I'm not sure how that is insulting? The OP asked for opinions and that has been my personal experience: requiring stuffing ourselves to the max and calculating to make sure we are getting our money's worth. Good for you if that isn't your experience.

Stuffing yourself silly means stuffing yourself without judgement. I think you meant it with honest intentions, but that's how it sounds (and what the phrase means).
 
Do you think you do better going through Disney instead of a regular Travel agent? We are going next February and the calendar isn’t available to book yet. I think we’re going to,try Pop Century and pay OOP. Disney offers free dining sometimes? And we’ll just pick up gift cards and pay for meals, etc..

I honestly have never used a travel agent before, this is totally new for me. In all my years of travel I have always booked it all myself, but she was able to get me a great room rate which brought my costs down. If I switch over to the dining promo at pop century I can add an extra night and get the dining for $800 more. The rack rate is around $200 for the extra night, leaving us paying an extra $600 for the dining package for 9 nights... I feel like I am going cross eyed :earseek:
 
I honestly have never used a travel agent before, this is totally new for me. In all my years of travel I have always booked it all myself, but she was able to get me a great room rate which brought my costs down. If I switch over to the dining promo at pop century I can add an extra night and get the dining for $800 more. The rack rate is around $200 for the extra night, leaving us paying an extra $600 for the dining package for 9 nights... I feel like I am going cross eyed :earseek:


Curious what is this dining promo?
 


Curious what is this dining promo?

Disney has been doing a dining promo for the past years, with your room, tickets including park hopper you get the dining package added to your room. Some hotels and or certain rooms are not eligible for the discount. Sometimes a room discount works out better than a dining promo just all depends on how many are in your party and how you dine while in the parks.
 
Ehh to be Honest its all a wash to me, Me and My wife enjoy the Dinning aspect of disney we tend to do at least 2 sitdown meals a day but we are also AP holders and tend to eat at some of the restaurants that also give AP holders 10 percent discounts. In the end we break about even on the Dining Plan, I have run the number several times for several different trips, the only time it actually saves us money is if we plan on doing any Drinking, then we save about 10 to 15 Dollars a day , that can add up over the longer trips but that much of savings isnt really a big swaying point for us. Only exception to this rule is during free dinning, then the discount is worth the time
 
Disney has been doing a dining promo for the past years, with your room, tickets including park hopper you get the dining package added to your room. Some hotels and or certain rooms are not eligible for the discount. Sometimes a room discount works out better than a dining promo just all depends on how many are in your party and how you dine while in the parks.
THe only promo for dining now is the kids one. Is there an adult one out?
 
THe only promo for dining now is the kids one. Is there an adult one out?

No the kid one is the only dining promo out, but there is a decent room discount out there too.

If they have an adult one, it should be announced by the end of this month and it will be for travel dates in late Aug-Sept and part of Dec with the possibility of a few dates in Nov.
 
No the kid one is the only dining promo out, but there is a decent room discount out there too.

If they have an adult one, it should be announced by the end of this month and it will be for travel dates in late Aug-Sept and part of Dec with the possibility of a few dates in Nov.

Are these the only months that any promotions are given?
 
We went in October and had the DxDDP for the first time we used other planes but wanted to try this . I saved all our receipts and added them up after we got home and we saved over $400 or more on what we ordered. so for us it was well worth it and it also made us relax a bit knowing we can order anything we wanted felt good not having to worry about prices.
 
We spend more money on dining and cocktails than we would if we purchased the Deluxe Dining Plan and stuck exclusively to it.
But, there's no interest in being locked in to the entree, dessert, and one cocktail closet. That's not how we dine.

As a family of four adults and an infant, our food order will usually include salads and apps, entrees, maybe a couple of desserts to share, and drinks. One of us may order two apps instead of an entree. None of us order an individual dessert at every dinner.

Also, we enjoy several restaurants that take two credits, and that definitely isn't the way to maximizethose credits.
 
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I’ve done the math too for our next trip and the dining plan won’t work for us. We did the dining plan once when it was free. It included an app, entree, dessert, and non alcoholic drink. We went with our 3 children. We ended up with unused counter service credits that we could trade in for 2 snack credits each. After trading them in we had something like 23 snack credits left over. On check our day our kids went bananas and brought their friends and teachers home treats. I want to say this was in 2007.

This next trip is just DH and myself. For table service we are planning on dining at California Grill (brunch), Jiko, Yachtman Steakhouse, Tusker House (breakfast), Il Mulino, Raglan Road, and Boma (breakfast) or Homecomin’. Neither Il Mulino or Homecomin’ participate in the dining plan. We are also planning on Nomad Lounge, drinks and apps around the World in Epcot, Hollywood Brown Derby Lounge, Trader Sams, and any other sort of lounges/bars that look appealing. We share at every meal, always have, and generally order a cocktail, (we don’t share these) an app or pasta as an app, a salad of some sort, an entree, and a dessert. We also like a glass or bottle of wine with dinner and maybe an after dinner drink or cappuccino. We’ll generally stay away from quick service as well.

I think the Tables in Wonderland card will work best in our situation.
 
I think I saved money last trip by not doing a DP. I was solo but I'm not that big into desert, so that's why I didn't sign up for it. I will eat at a few signature restaurants since I love steaks etc but I think I feel like I'm forced to eta snacks up and down the whole trip. I do love a mickey pretzel but I just hate the ideal that I must eat and eat. I like bringing crackers and my protein bars as well. Just my two cents. Any other solo traveler out there, use the DP?
 
I’ve done the math too for our next trip and the dining plan won’t work for us. We did the dining plan once when it was free. It included an app, entree, dessert, and non alcoholic drink. We went with our 3 children. We ended up with unused counter service credits that we could trade in for 2 snack credits each. After trading them in we had something like 23 snack credits left over. On check our day our kids went bananas and brought their friends and teachers home treats. I want to say this was in 2007.

This next trip is just DH and myself. For table service we are planning on dining at California Grill (brunch), Jiko, Yachtman Steakhouse, Tusker House (breakfast), Il Mulino, Raglan Road, and Boma (breakfast) or Homecomin’. Neither Il Mulino or Homecomin’ participate in the dining plan. We are also planning on Nomad Lounge, drinks and apps around the World in Epcot, Hollywood Brown Derby Lounge, Trader Sams, and any other sort of lounges/bars that look appealing. We share at every meal, always have, and generally order a cocktail, (we don’t share these) an app or pasta as an app, a salad of some sort, an entree, and a dessert. We also like a glass or bottle of wine with dinner and maybe an after dinner drink or cappuccino. We’ll generally stay away from quick service as well.

I think the Tables in Wonderland card will work best in our situation.

This is how DH and I normally dine as well, we got the TIW card in January and it definitely will be worth it for us this year.
 

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