Planning a holiday for 9 adults.... help!

[MouseJen]

Hi all, I'm in desperate need of a bit of help!

Me and my partner are getting married in WDW next June and have booked our trip with all our family. There's 9 of us in total

Apart from me and my fiancé no one else had been to WDW. We have a mixture of Disney fans and some reluctant family members in the group.

We are also planning on at least one day at Universal.

Although I have good knowledge of WDW from our annual trips, I am a bit lost planning for so many when I'm used to only organising the two of us!

Any advice and tips would be really be helpful as I'm a bit at a loss. I was also wondering if there were any trip reports out there from someone else who had planned for a big group.

 

[Canooknic]

The biggest group I have been with is 7, my sister organised it.

She out together her schedule for what she, her hubby and sons were doing and we had the option to join them or not. The only day we HAD to spend together was my nephew's 11th birthday (which none of us objected to!)
She worked out where they were eating probably 90% of meals and again gave us the choice to join or not.

We had an amazing trip, no one had any disagreements with anyone else - it was completely stress free

Not exactly a tip for you, but just how we survived it!!

 

[MouseJen]

Good to know it's possible. It feels like a massive undertaking!

I think our group will mostly want to stick together with them not knowing WDW at all and wanting to come to be with us.

We're on the dining plan in a bid to make it feel easier for them (personally I'm not a big fan of it but I think they will).

 

[Disneynutinlondon]

I'm organising a trip for 18 of us for Xmas 2017 for a group where the age range will be from 2 1/2 years to 85 years old. We (me, DH, DS 21 and DS 19) will arrive about 10 days before anyone else and then the other 14 arrive over 4 days.

During the time we are all together we are celebrating two 21st birthdays with bowling at Splitville and then dinner at their restaurant, DH and my vowel renewal (DFTW) and then lunch buffet at The Attic, Xmas day ( fingers crossed for an ADR at Cali Grill) and NYE at Epcot with a booking at the Mexican restaurant special event, again fingers crossed they hold one.

For the rest of the days I am going to make a dinner ADR for all of us at the same place and that's the only time during each day where we will all be together. We all have MDE accounts so everyone can split into smaller groups and make their own FP+. I expect the youngsters will want to stay out late whenever possible and the grand parents and great grand parents will want to go back to the hotel in the afternoon for a nap.

We are fortunate in that out of the 18 of us only 4 people and the 2 1/2 year old have never been to WDW the rest of us have been many times so know the ropes very well.

I imagine that we'll all end up in the same park during the day but maybe arrive at different times according to each families waking up preference and maybe meet up for a counter service lunch before separating again, perhaps with different people depending on fast passes and who wants to stay at the park or go somewhere else. Obviously as I'm making a group ADR for dinner well all meet up again in the evening and I expect we'll all stay in the same park but again split into smaller groups depending on ride preferences.

Well that's my plan maybe you can take a few tips from it ......... And good luck

 

[Jon84]

My experience with reluctant trip goers would say, before booking anything, you really need to find out:

• What their limits are in terms of pricing for meals
• What their limits are for hours in a park
• If they are happy to do their own thing if they have limits for the above two.
• Find out what the Disney Fans would really like to do, especially if this could be their once in a lifetime trip.

This way you'll really know what can and can't book without upsetting people, and if they don't want to do something you know they'll be happy to look after themselves and not feel abandoned.


It's worth searching the forums for people that have had good and bad experiences with planning for others, some people had it tough, and some get on fine. You really don't know till you get there, as alot of people have different images about what Disney/Universal offer.

 

[MouseJen]

Thanks for all the advice. I really appreciate it.

I think I'm just going to arrange fast passes and ADRs on what I think is best and then give them to them as in "this is what we are planning if you want to join us". I reckon most will join us.

Also planning a lot more rest time than we are used to. We tend to avoid a rest day and just have a lie in and go later to the parks.

I think they will probably like earlier starts so they can avoid the heat and do the traditional go back to the hotel in afternoon touring plan.

As for our reluctant guests, I think they are going to be negative no matter what I plan. Just going to try and not let that get to me. I'll try and make sure that they get some time away from the parks too.

Thought about putting together an homemade brouchure of handy hints and tips so that they might not feel they "have" to stick with us if they don't want to. Things like how the buses/monorail/boats work, how to make fastpasses, what they get in the dining plan etc. Just to make them feel more confident. Especially those guests who aren't Disney people who want to explore other parts of WDW.

Something will go wrong, but as long as everyone has a good time I'll be happy.

 

[Woodview]

Here is an Idea

Think about renting a car for a few days ......... Why ?

Well not everyone wants to be in " Disney " all the time .

So maybe Cut out some of the Tickets & use the money to rent out a car & see / explore Florida

Eat some meals ( Cheaper & Better value ) away from Disney area.

 

[Sarah28]

We also got married at Disney back in February and there was 26 of us in total! We had a welcome brunch for everyone at Boma so that was fun making an ADR for that

Like you mentioned, we put together a booklet that we sent with our invitations to help people with their planning - telling them all the pros and cons about staying on / offsite, transport, ADRs, FPs, ESTAs etc, but left everyone to actually make their own plans if they wanted to. Like you, we had a mix of die-hard disney fans and some first timers, so some weren't bothered about planning too much - everyone's so different!

I felt better knowing I had helped them all I could with the booklet and information, and then it was up to them to decide what they did with it. Don't stress too much about other people (admittedly I did and I wish I hadn't!) it's your special day!