I thought I would share my experience last week using the deluxe dining plan.
we were doing a split stay at pop century 2 nights/yacht club 3 nights so I thought it would be a good way to test out the deluxe dining plan during our pop century stay.
I paid $690 for 3 adult plans (DH, me, DD11)
Did we get our money's worth? yes
would I ever do it again? hell no - reasons below
Here's the breakdown:
3 mugs = 56.85
12 snack credits average 5.50/each = 66.00
Meal 1 - Skipper Canteen: $170
tip OOP: $35.00
Meal 2: Spice Road Table: $130
tip OOP: $27.00
Meal 3: Coral Reef: $140
tip OOP: $29.00
Meal 4: Yak & Yeti: $128.82
OOP because my child did not want to eat a full meal: $13.30
tip OOP: 28.00
Meal 5: Frontera Grill $145
tip OOP: $29.00
Meal 6: 50s Prime Time Cafe $130.00
tip OOP: 26.00
Meal 7: Chefs de France $175.00
tip OOP: $35.00
total "value" of plan: $1340.00
"profit" $450
tip OOP costs: $209
Why wouldn't I do it again?
- we hated being slaves to our reservations. we ran from park to park because the restaurants we wanted to eat at did not align perfectly with the rest of our day. We didn't have a car (magical express) so that eliminated a lot of the resort restaurants from our list, and we were staying at pop century, which doesn't have a nice onsite restaurant.
- It.was.too.much.food. I thought we were big eaters. we are not. this is ridiculous! we started having them pack things up right away for us to take to go - but that meant we needed to hustle back to the hotel to refrigerate it. However, this strategy worked to enable us to use a lot of the saturday food leftovers during the rest of our stay, lowering the overall cost for food on those day.
- The prices on the food in these restaurants is just absurd. I'm sorry, these meals were NOT WORTH $150 for 3 of us. I know it's disney pricing, but honestly I would expect to pay maybe $75.00 for most of these meals for the 3 of us at home. The food is...fine. My husband liked the steaks he got. I thought most of the food was middling.
- The feeling you HAVE to order everything you are "entitled" to, which raises the overall cost and the ultimate tip you leave. OOO costs for tips add up FAST.
- Because of the ridiculous amount of food at meals, we did NOT use our snack credits for the most part, except for some starbucks drinks and caramel apples. I found myself in the hotel shop buying stupidly overpriced bags of beef jerky and cookies at the last minute. These did come in handy in the days after, though.
So there you have it - fun to do it once, never again. YMMV. I'm glad I chose a split stay to experiment with because I would have died trying to make it pay on the full 5 night trip. We would, however, consider the regular dining plan, which would fit our park style a little better. Hope this is helpful to anyone contemplating it.
we were doing a split stay at pop century 2 nights/yacht club 3 nights so I thought it would be a good way to test out the deluxe dining plan during our pop century stay.
I paid $690 for 3 adult plans (DH, me, DD11)
Did we get our money's worth? yes
would I ever do it again? hell no - reasons below
Here's the breakdown:
3 mugs = 56.85
12 snack credits average 5.50/each = 66.00
Meal 1 - Skipper Canteen: $170
tip OOP: $35.00
Meal 2: Spice Road Table: $130
tip OOP: $27.00
Meal 3: Coral Reef: $140
tip OOP: $29.00
Meal 4: Yak & Yeti: $128.82
OOP because my child did not want to eat a full meal: $13.30
tip OOP: 28.00
Meal 5: Frontera Grill $145
tip OOP: $29.00
Meal 6: 50s Prime Time Cafe $130.00
tip OOP: 26.00
Meal 7: Chefs de France $175.00
tip OOP: $35.00
total "value" of plan: $1340.00
"profit" $450
tip OOP costs: $209
Why wouldn't I do it again?
- we hated being slaves to our reservations. we ran from park to park because the restaurants we wanted to eat at did not align perfectly with the rest of our day. We didn't have a car (magical express) so that eliminated a lot of the resort restaurants from our list, and we were staying at pop century, which doesn't have a nice onsite restaurant.
- It.was.too.much.food. I thought we were big eaters. we are not. this is ridiculous! we started having them pack things up right away for us to take to go - but that meant we needed to hustle back to the hotel to refrigerate it. However, this strategy worked to enable us to use a lot of the saturday food leftovers during the rest of our stay, lowering the overall cost for food on those day.
- The prices on the food in these restaurants is just absurd. I'm sorry, these meals were NOT WORTH $150 for 3 of us. I know it's disney pricing, but honestly I would expect to pay maybe $75.00 for most of these meals for the 3 of us at home. The food is...fine. My husband liked the steaks he got. I thought most of the food was middling.
- The feeling you HAVE to order everything you are "entitled" to, which raises the overall cost and the ultimate tip you leave. OOO costs for tips add up FAST.
- Because of the ridiculous amount of food at meals, we did NOT use our snack credits for the most part, except for some starbucks drinks and caramel apples. I found myself in the hotel shop buying stupidly overpriced bags of beef jerky and cookies at the last minute. These did come in handy in the days after, though.
So there you have it - fun to do it once, never again. YMMV. I'm glad I chose a split stay to experiment with because I would have died trying to make it pay on the full 5 night trip. We would, however, consider the regular dining plan, which would fit our park style a little better. Hope this is helpful to anyone contemplating it.
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