We have one stay at the Poly CL and one stay at PBH under our belts. Outside of the area, we always stay CL at Starwood and Marriott properties so I have experienced many, many lounges over the years.
The only true difference between them is that the club room for Portofino is off of the lobby area. Your room could, in theory, be anywhere in the resort. So the walk to the club room might be an issue (and more so if you have kids that want to use it themselves). The plus to this is that the club room is easy to get to when returning from the parks as it is so close to the lobby.
The other two have club rooms on a floor where all the rooms are assigned for club level. We were put on one floor lower once, and the room key was encoded to allow the elevator to stop at the club floor. When we stayed three doors down from the club room, the teens just kept using it to pop in and out the whole stay.
And all are great, you will not regret either choice.
I was worried about being too far from the lounge during our stay but it wasn't an issue. We weren't super close but the proximity to the main area of the resort was such a plus, we used the lounge coming and going every day.
We have stayed at many of the CL rooms that you mentioned at Disney (BWI being our favorite) and at the Portofino at Universal. I love the BWI CL but the CL food at Portofino just blows Disney out of the water. Breakfast is scrambled eggs and hash browns along with a large variety of muffins, bagels, and cold cereals in individual boxes. They also have a large variety of fresh fruit and a selection of cold meats. Afternoon snacks are individually wrapped Peppridge Farm cookies and bags of chips. Night time offerings are easily a meal and though they do pour the wine for you they often walked over to our table offering to top off our glasses. They always had at least three hot offerings and a couple of cold salads along with cheese and cold cuts and a variety of crackers. My only complaint is that the cans of soda and bottles of water are sitting warm on the counter so you are forced to pour it into a cup and add ice to it.
Have a great time!
The staff was extremely generous with the wine and beer offerings. During our stay, they were always walking around offering refills. Considering these were included, I was very surprised by how generous they were with the pours. Someone on this forum mentioned they would get to-go cups and I am very happy I learned that before our trip! Most nights we got another wine to go and walked around the property before dinner or going back to the park.
My thoughts on Disney vs. Loews/Universal CLs:
Staff at both worked very hard. At the Poly, the hoards of people pillaging the buffet every morning was just too much for them to keep up with. At PBH, the staff was able to keep everything filled.
Food offerings. This is an area where expectations differ. I view the lounge as a place to grab a quick, basic breakfast, a pre-dinner snack and drink as well as an area to relax outside of the room. I don't expect or want to use it as a real meal. All that being said, I thought Poly's offerings were good enough, on par with a basic Marriott. I thought the PBH were on par with the higher end hotels in the Starwood and Marriott brands with more selections and better quality of food - the hot offerings and baked goods in particular. I really disliked the plastic and paper products at the Poly and appreciated real plates, flatware and glasses at PBH.
My husband really dislikes lounge breakfasts and he willingly ate at the PBH every morning but one.
Both stays were over the same time period - Thanksgiving week. the Poly in 2015, PBH in 2016
