Disney's Club Level (CL) Information & Questions

[GADisneyDad14]

So they did actually rearrange the bathroom in at least 4911. Here’s a pre-refurb video I found of it that shows a totally different bathroom than your pics. I think I like the new version better, especially since it’s just DH and I so while we like the separate toilet room, we don’t absolutely need it…unlike double sinks, which are a lifesaver sometimes.

My goodness, what a huge upgrade. But darn, I missed the bidet.

 

[ninafeliz]

Tonight was the same cheese/meats, crudités and dip, then then there were chicken soft tacos, quinoa salad, tomato/mozzarella plates, mini hot dogs with (stale) buns, apple slices with caramel, a bread selection, some salmon, and some corn dish. Sad to say, we went through around 5:30 on our way out the door, and it was just as bad as it was this morning. The vegetables were completely gone, no meats left and the cheese was picked over, apples were gone and only caramel was left, one sad taco remained, I might have been able to scoop a serving of the quinoa salad. My son took a hot dog to go, which is why I know the bun was stale. He threw it away as we left the hotel. I was going to let this morning go, but I believe I’ll have to say something in the guest survey when it comes. They’re certainly not understaffed; I wonder if people are a.) letting their children in unsupervised to have at it; b.) using the lounge as straight-up dinner and taking huge portions; c.) hoarding food. They seem woefully unprepared - they have to know how many people are in these rooms.

Just to chime in- when we stay club level we do often pretty much make it dinner, and there are 6 of us so we take a decent amount just to take one of something for each of us. Until
Disney actually puts a limit on what you are allowed to take; you can’t blame people for that. The CL staff at pretty much all CLs have also frequently walked around encouraging us to allow more, or asking if we need anything else.

now having said that; we never go through the food like a whirlwind and try to be respectful, and I supervise my kids. We are also not huge esters, so for example when we are at the Innkeepers club usually one each of the 3 main dishes and some of the other stuff will mostly fill me up. Add to that the staff are often walking around encouraging us to take more. Sorry, it just gets under my skin when people act like eating the lounge food isn’t allowed! You are even allowed to take it down to your room for later- this is encouraged as well. I will certainly agree that messing the entire place up shouldn’t be done, though. There is no defense for that, but running out of food is all Disney’s fault.

 

[Runnsally]

Please don't blame the customer. It is Disney's responsibility.

80/20

 

[Dispro1]

Tonight was the same cheese/meats, crudités and dip, then then there were chicken soft tacos, quinoa salad, tomato/mozzarella plates, mini hot dogs with (stale) buns, apple slices with caramel, a bread selection, some salmon, and some corn dish. Sad to say, we went through around 5:30 on our way out the door, and it was just as bad as it was this morning. The vegetables were completely gone, no meats left and the cheese was picked over, apples were gone and only caramel was left, one sad taco remained, I might have been able to scoop a serving of the quinoa salad. My son took a hot dog to go, which is why I know the bun was stale. He threw it away as we left the hotel. I was going to let this morning go, but I believe I’ll have to say something in the guest survey when it comes. They’re certainly not understaffed; I wonder if people are a.) letting their children in unsupervised to have at it; b.) using the lounge as straight-up dinner and taking huge portions; c.) hoarding food. They seem woefully unprepared - they have to know how many people are in these rooms.

Wow! I am so disappointed to hear this! I've always liked the look of BC, and we love SAB, but we haven't stayed there in years because it has always been a bit noisy and busier than other resort CLs. Recently, reviews have been good (even your previous one if I remember correctly), so I actually booked a split stay in a suite there in early July and was really excited to try it again! The suite was my attempt to limit noise since we would at least not have a connecting door and the suites are on the end of a little hallway which should be pretty quiet. But the lounge experience is really important to me, especially once it gets hot in the summer since we will be spending a lot of time at the resort during the day when it's hot! This week and next week are the spring breaks for all the schools around us at home, so I wonder if that explains some of the craziness? That is no excuse on the part of Disney though because every room has been sold out on the Disney site for weeks now! They should've been prepared for spring break crowds and more kids being there than normal too (even though parents do need to watch their kids)! Perhaps I'll be keeping my BWI deluxe room instead of trying the BC suite. Very disappointing! I really hope they get things under control again! Maybe things will get better before summer...

 

[SkyGuy]

Just to chime in- when we stay club level we do often pretty much make it dinner, and there are 6 of us so we take a decent amount just to take one of something for each of us. Until
Disney actually puts a limit on what you are allowed to take; you can’t blame people for that. The CL staff at pretty much all CLs have also frequently walked around encouraging us to allow more, or asking if we need anything else.

now having said that; we never go through the food like a whirlwind and try to be respectful, and I supervise my kids. We are also not huge esters, so for example when we are at the Innkeepers club usually one each of the 3 main dishes and some of the other stuff will mostly fill me up. Add to that the staff are often walking around encouraging us to take more. Sorry, it just gets under my skin when people act like eating the lounge food isn’t allowed! You are even allowed to take it down to your room for later- this is encouraged as well. I will certainly agree that messing the entire place up shouldn’t be done, though. There is no defense for that, but running out of food is all Disney’s fault.

We take plates back to our room quite often. My comment wasn’t so much the food was gone - although it was quite annoying that it was on two occasions in the same day, which does make me wonder if some of the same groups were rope dropping the lounge, it was more that the place was a disaster. I wasn’t going to mention kids specifically, but as I was looking at the pastry selection, or lack thereof, a young girl came up and took a chocolate chip muffin off her overloaded plate and put it back on the stand with her bare hands. I quickly removed it and threw it away in the trash cans by the elevators. Since the lounge was very animated with children both times, I suspect unsupervised children were the culprit, but since I didn’t witness it first hand, I didn’t want to be accusatory. Last time we were here we did not have this issue. The club lounge had just opened, and there weren’t very many young ones on the lounge floor. This time, there are plenty. I am booked here again the end of April for a pre-grad school trip with my daughter, so I’ll have three trips in a pretty short time frame, but I’m not going to lie, after the experience yesterday I came back to the room and looked to see if Innkeeper’s Club was available for our dates!

 

[Eastern]

We take plates back to our room quite often. My comment wasn’t so much the food was gone - although it was quite annoying that it was on two occasions in the same day, which does make me wonder if some of the same groups were rope dropping the lounge, it was more that the place was a disaster. I wasn’t going to mention kids specifically, but as I was looking at the pastry selection, or lack thereof, a young girl came up and took a chocolate chip muffin off her overloaded plate and put it back on the stand with her bare hands. I quickly removed it and threw it away in the trash cans by the elevators. Since the lounge was very animated with children both times, I suspect unsupervised children were the culprit, but since I didn’t witness it first hand, I didn’t want to be accusatory. Last time we were here we did not have this issue. The club lounge had just opened, and there weren’t very many young ones on the lounge floor. This time, there are plenty. I am booked here again the end of April for a pre-grad school trip with my daughter, so I’ll have three trips in a pretty short time frame, but I’m not going to lie, after the experience yesterday I came back to the room and looked to see if Innkeeper’s Club was available for our dates!

otoh, I have seen adults do this as well. In one instance it was a family staying in the Steeplechase Suite. The grandmother would come out of the room with the coffee tray and literally load it up with everything available. We were standing next to her during one episode and she told us to take some cookies now because she was going to take the rest. And she did so. It was amazing to see. The staff seemed to know them and btw those cookies were not replaced. They told us when they're gone, they're gone.

Every time I have been in a lounge it has been monitored by at least a couple of CMs so maybe they are understaffed. This doesn't negate the fact that you were inconvenienced. A word to the manager can alert them to the current state of things and avoid inconvenience to future guests. You don't have to accuse anyone, just state that when you went there, things were chaotic. Pictures do help.

At $700-$1500/night all of the lounges need to step up their game.

 

[kylenne]

otoh, I have seen adults do this as well. In one instance it was a family staying in the Steeplechase Suite. The grandmother would come out of the room with the coffee tray and literally load it up with everything available. We were standing next to her during one episode and she told us to take some cookies now because she was going to take the rest. And she did so. It was amazing to see. The staff seemed to know them and btw those cookies were not replaced. They told us when they're gone, they're gone.

Every time I have been in a lounge it has been monitored by at least a couple of CMs so maybe they are understaffed. This doesn't negate the fact that you were inconvenienced. A word to the manager can alert them to the current state of things and avoid inconvenience to future guests. You don't have to accuse anyone, just state that when you went there, things were chaotic. Pictures do help.

At $700-$1500/night all of the lounges need to step up their game.

I wish I could say I was surprised but I'm really not. I don't knock people for trying to "get their money's worth" but I really hope folks who do that sort of thing are actually eating all that food. I remember years ago when the Royal Caribbean ships first got Johnny Rockets on board it was included in the cruise fare. People were so doggish filling up 2 and 3 plates (for themselves, not their families) and leaving food to waste, even as a kid I thought it was weird, OTT, and embarrassing.

I don't think it's just Disney slacking on their club lounges while charging obscene sums though. Last week a co-worker invited a group of us to a Nets game in the Qatar Airways club lounge seats because her daughter has a hookup. For reference we were sitting practically behind the Nets bench, close enough to hear Kevin Durant arguing with the refs lol. I looked it up and those tickets start at about a standard view CL night at Disney. I'm not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I enjoyed the night out and the seats were amazing (even though we bottled the game as usual) but I found it pretty outrageous at the prices they charge that they didn't even have real plates or silverware, especially since the club food wasn't even all that if I'm honest (Audi Club at Yankee Stadium is superior imo). And we were crammed in like sardines, especially as it got closer to game time and more people arrived, it was pretty claustrophobic. Even for free I'm not sure I'd do it again.

I wonder if some of these "upscale" experiences are being leveraged to make up for pandemic losses in revenue.

 

[jemtx]

SkyGuy-hope things were better today.

 

[SkyGuy]

 

[SkyGuy]

Redemption. Things were great today!

 

[jemtx]

Awesome to hear (and see).
Enjoy!!!

 

[focusondisney]

A word to the manager can alert them to the current state of things and avoid inconvenience to future guests. You don't have to accuse anyone, just state that when you went there, things were chaotic. Pictures do help.

Good advice! A family member just returned from a club level stay at the Coronado tower. They had an issue with the buses to MK one day & made them miss the resort guest early entry. She messaged resort management thru the link sent in the welcome email. She heard back quickly & her party was given 2 lightening lane experiences each as compensation. She did not expect or ask for anything, but just wanted them aware of the frustration on not being able to take advantage of this guest benefit. It was great customer recovery & absolutely an appropriate response.

I know that’s not related to club level, but just want to illustrate that it does help to let management know when you have problems.

 

[eeyore81]

We just checked into Yacht Club. The CMs have been extremely friendly and helpful. I will say that Disney does need to improve the afternoon snacks. They are pretty lacking from pre-Covid levels. We move to AKL on Saturday. I’m anxious to compare the two.

 

[trishadono]

We just checked into Yacht Club. The CMs have been extremely friendly and helpful. I will say that Disney does need to improve the afternoon snacks. They are pretty lacking from pre-Covid levels. We move to AKL on Saturday. I’m anxious to compare the two.

No good afternoon snacks. Even gf is meh.

However it is fun to have 2 cl's in one trip and compare! Sangrias are available upon request at AKL fyi. They get them from the back.

 

[DisneyMountainWoman]

No good afternoon snacks. Even gf is meh.

However it is fun to have 2 cl's in one trip and compare! Sangrias are available upon request at AKL fyi. They get them from the back.

I missed the sangrias... but it was not like I was lacking in the drink department I ordered a lot of jungle juice mimosas and wine.

 

[DaviVascaino]

sorry for the stupid question, but this will be my first Disney resort stay. I have always stayed off site, but I wanted to do something nicer for my family. I will rent points and get a DVC BWV studio. Am I eligible to access the club level or that is just for the DVC owners? thanks

 

[FidFam]

We just checked into Yacht Club. The CMs have been extremely friendly and helpful. I will say that Disney does need to improve the afternoon snacks. They are pretty lacking from pre-Covid levels. We move to AKL on Saturday. I’m anxious to compare the two.

Excited to see some pics if you can share of what's being offered at the various times while you're there? We just planned a quick little trip in mid April and booked CL at the YC for a bit of a splurge.

 

[mrsap]

sorry for the stupid question, but this will be my first Disney resort stay. I have always stayed off site, but I wanted to do something nicer for my family. I will rent points and get a DVC BWV studio. Am I eligible to access the club level or that is just for the DVC owners? thanks

I responded to you over on the BW thread!

 

[SkyGuy]

Mac and cheese bar was fun. Too bad the Mac and cheese didn’t taste like cheese.

 

[SkyGuy]