Does the dining plan save you money?

I get the convenience factor completely. It's paid for when we get there. We will be doing signatures and character meals, using the calculator we will save money. OOP I know we would limit ourselves by looking at prices and having that bottom line in mind. Still I never feel obligated to order the most expensive items or even appetizers/desserts each time. DP makes it feel more all inclusive. For our upcoming stay we have 7 nights DxDP, with one night RO at the end. I have only 2 meals a day spread out over the entire stay that include characters, signatures, and HDDR.
 


For me the convenience factor is less about method of payment and more about not having to think twice about prices. Without the DP I'm definitely less likely to order the more expensive things on the menu, even if its what i really want. I hesitate to buy my kids snacks anytime they ask and I wouldn't order them fancy milkshakes with their meals. DP eliminates those hesitations. We order whatever we want without any consideration for price, and there is a certain "convenience" to that that is worth paying for IMO.
 
I still think the idea of there being a right or wrong answer to this one is silly.

Will it save money? It depends. Depends on your party makeup, your food preferences, your travel and dining habits.

Is it more convenient? It depends. Depends on your party makeup, your personality, your budgeting preferences.

And it is disingenuous of the video's narrator to use room-only discounts as a reason not to get the dining plan. I've yet to encounter a room only code that can't have the DDP added to it, so it isn't as though the choice is as they present - rack rate w/ dining plan, room only rate w/o, or free dining.

We do DxDDP. It saves us some money - I haven't put my final modifications into my planning spreadsheet yet so there are 3 meals per person unaccounted for (I usually only leave 1pp free, in case someone wants a quick bite between ADRs), and I'm projecting 12% savings compared to the full cost of the plan. But it also gives me a lot of piece of mind because I'm traveling with three teenagers/young adults who will be on their own at times. They've covering their own spending, I'm covering room/tickets/meals. With the plan, I don't have to keep tabs on what they're spending - their snacks and any counter service they might want between planned meals are covered by the plan, and the young adults' room charging will be going to their own room with their own card on file.
 


It is very difficult to save money when the plan dictates what you eat. We have had it many times, worked hard at maximizing value and done the math afterwards. It is close to break even each time ................. but that assumes we ordered and ate as we normally would. If I calculated what we normally would order, we spend more for DDP.

We are perfectly content with drinking water with meals, so that glass of soda is no plus.
We don't buy resort mugs, we are not there enough to use them, no plus.
We would never get desserts for each of us at each TS meal, no plus.
We very often order an assortment of appetizers, no entrees, no plus.
We are not huge snack people unless substituting for a quick meal, no plus.

So if we add up what we really would have eaten/drank on trips .... it would cost less than DDP costs, and it would be what we really want. Now I do think the alcoholic beverage with meals brings a new level of value to calculate in for those who drink .... and will put some pressure on MK to add it at QSDP locations because there you aren't getting your full value, if you drink.

AND for us add TiW, I can save even more on our meals. I can't make the DDP numbers work, especially given there is no convenience. I can still throw my MB or CC out there to pay .... and I don't even have to keep track of anything .... just order what I want.
 
I never understood the convenience assertion. One uses their magic band to "pay" either way. With the DDP you pay up front, OOP you pay when you check out. Going OOP does not require me to track the credits.

For us, the convenience factor is not having to split the tab when we have guests travelling with us. Or worrying about sticker shock - they know the cost upfront. Most people really don't search the menus before they go.
 
We had free dining on our last trip and loved having the dining plan but we won’t have that this trip. It didn’t matter how many times I crunched the numbers I just couldn’t make worth it for us this trip. I did some rough menu calculations to get a budget and it would be an extra $250 to go with the dining plan, even choosing more expensive items. Being Canadian that works out to even more for us so definitely not worth it. We’re just putting money on gift cards before we go so it’ll still be prepaid. Just as convenient for us and cheaper than getting the ddp.
 
I did the calculations and bought the DDP. I thought we’d save $200-$300. Instead, we broke even. But, there was a TON of wasted food. We would’ve ordered differently OOP and probably could’ve saved $300-$500. However, we also had three dessert parties. That was our mistake! It was too much w the parties. The days we did a Breakfast and dinner, snacks at lunch, and no parties were the days we had the correct amount of food. Doing lunch and dinner was too close together. For us, I don’t think we’d do the diningplan again. We ended up bringing 20 snack credits of stuff Home w us too.
 
I did the calculations and bought the DDP. I thought we’d save $200-$300. Instead, we broke even. But, there was a TON of wasted food. We would’ve ordered differently OOP and probably could’ve saved $300-$500. However, we also had three dessert parties. That was our mistake! It was too much w the parties. The days we did a Breakfast and dinner, snacks at lunch, and no parties were the days we had the correct amount of food. Doing lunch and dinner was too close together. For us, I don’t think we’d do the diningplan again. We ended up bringing 20 snack credits of stuff Home w us too.

That is the one thing I don't like about the dining plan - you really can't do the dessert parties or other special dining experiences on top of the plan. It just ends up being overkill, both in terms of food quantity and number of dining "appointments". I was looking at the Star Wars dessert party for next month but with a signature dinner booked that night, I can't see how we could do it without either being too full to enjoy the party or not hungry for dinner. We've done a few of the parties on OOP trips in the past and enjoyed them, but not so much that I'd cancel Yachtsman to make room for it so I'm okay with the dining plan getting in the way this time... But I'm also glad we do some of our trips OOP to do dessert parties and afternoon tea and other things we can't fit in around dining plan meals.
 
I am trying to figure out the numbers for my fam of 5, only 4 having to pay. With DVC discount, it's 282.38 (103.57 adult and 37.62 child) a night. Say we eat a character buffet every morning, which is 40, 25 times 2, that's 130 tax included. We eat at buffet or nice sit down nightly, average 45 adult and 25 for kids, that's 140. Add in 48 dollars with maxing snack credits, and save 3 per meal on soda or water since it's included with each meal, also 4 dollar dessert at lunch and dinner which can be traded in for fruit or salad, that's already a savings of about 85 dollars a day, and that's without eating the 3rd meal! Granted, we may not always eat at a buffet, but last trip we did (we can eat) and I am sad now that we didn't do this to save a whole bunch of money! I didn't save too many receipts but I wish I had so I could see what our total spend on food was. And we got snacks, lots of them! I'm sure we spent 50 a day easy on snacks. All that walking made us hungry! I think this will be a great deal for our family and I can't wait to present the figures after our next trip. I am going to save everything and do a nice spreadsheet!
 
With DVC discount, it's 282.38 (103.57 adult and 37.62 child) a night

There is no DVC discount. You will pay the 2018 prices which are a bit more than you have there. You'll probably still be way under though as you are in the sweet spot with those 2 kids.
 
@sharonabe, is that discontinued? I just found online where it said it's good this year. And yes, it is a great deal with kids! Like, oddly great.
 
@sharonabe, is that discontinued? I just found online where it said it's good this year. And yes, it is a great deal with kids! Like, oddly great.

The DVC locks in the price of the DDP at the beginning of the year. If Disney raises the price, then DVC continue to use the old price. There hasn't been a price increase yet in 2018, so everyone is paying the same price. I'm not at my desk, so I don't have the current prices, but I know adult DxDDP is right at $116, don't have a clue on the kid's price.
 
Okay at 2018 rate we would break even before a QS meal. So doing a character breakfast, a sit down dinner or show package, a qs lunch and 2 snacks is basically getting lunch for free, which could also be a sit down but most likely wouldn't be.
 
The DVC locks in the price of the DDP at the beginning of the year. If Disney raises the price, then DVC continue to use the old price. There hasn't been a price increase yet in 2018, so everyone is paying the same price. I'm not at my desk, so I don't have the current prices, but I know adult DxDDP is right at $116, don't have a clue on the kid's price.
2018 Cost:
$116.24 per night ages 10 and up
$39.90 per night age 3 to 9
 
I think the longer your trip, the less the dining plan makes sense. Years ago we upgraded free dining to the deluxe plan for a 7 day trip, and it was way too much food. We like doing the plan for one half of a split stay. We are able to plan our more expensive meals during that portion of the trip, start using the credits first thing on day 1 of the second stay, and do things like a desert party during the other half.

Having the dining plan allows us to do thing like CG brunch, HDDR, Paddlefish, and others without getting sticker shock. Our family does tend to choose shellfish and other high priced items, so during a limited number of days we save quite a bit using the dining plan.
 

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