The Death of Free Dining?

[HopperFan]

The line that I bolded and underlined is key. Normally when there is free dining, no other discounts will apply, regardless of where they are from. You will ONLY get the free dining.

There will be no room discount. There will be no way to get tickets from another source. You are paying full price for the room and tickets, but hey, you can eat for "free".

They are not trying to stack discounts, they compared the amount saved on RO discount vs the amount saved by not spending money for dining. In their situation it is def a great deal if the DDP meets their eating desires. Tickets, yes there are a few places that offer minimal discounts but not so much that it would negate the value of Free Dining.

We have done "complimentary" dining many times with four adults and it's was a great deal even with the tips added. Last year it was only two of us, we tried value and for the first time QSDP. Hated it, not for us. To do again I would have to go value plus upgrade or moderate and for the two of us it didn't work. For the first time in many years we decided against bounceback and will go this fall with discounts and our way of eating with TIW.

With the right numbers and the right price point for your room it is a great value, but doesn't work out for all.

 

[mousehockey37]

It's not free. Everyone knows that. It's a discount. It's a bigger discount than a room only offer or any other discount that I've ever been eligible for.

It's a real way to save money. It's not imaginary or a trick of some kind. No one cares that we're paying rack rate for a room because the overall price of the package is a great deal.

It's a real way to save money in certain situations. As I stated in an earlier post, for a single person or a couple, it more than likely isn't worth the discount. You would have to constantly be eating at all the big $$$ locations for every meal to get that benefit of the "free dining".

Now for a family of 4+, it's going to be easier to see that discount take effect. Granted you have to remember for 6+ people you automatically see the gratuity added to the bill and such, but 4+ people will be able to "eat" to the discount of free dining.

And yes, it CAN be a trick. It all comes down to your eating habits. A family like the PP, who it seems is normally pretty light on the eating, will be enticed to go and eat more than what they are used to at more expensive places. This is making you spend more time in the dining facilities and not out enjoying the parks, but because it's free dining, you feel compelled to have to eat. This in turn can cause there to be higher out of pocket gratuity and if you're staying for an extended period of time, 3 big sit down meals a day for an entire week, will eventually add up in gratuity alone.

So it's all a matter of planning how you eat before you sign up.

 

[Vidia2]

We only stay value, and we are 3 "Disney adults" and 1 child. The QSDP fits our eating style perfectly, so FD is by far the best deal for us. There is no scenario in which a room/ticket discount would be a better deal for us, so yes, our free dining is 100% FREE. The whole "free dining isn't 'free' " spiel is so stupid. It is free (as in you are not paying for the actual food), but it isn't always the best deal. It's all about where you stay, your party size, the ages of your party, your eating habits, and the other available discounts at the time. You have to do the math to see what works for you.

As a revised version on what I said above, I'm agreeing with you. It is free. We're all so used to some kind of discount so when we see rack rates it's somehow like paying extra to some. Free is free.

As for the naysayers, I don't really understand why some people care what other people spend their money on. If someone doesn't think it's a good deal, they don't have to sign up.

 

[smitch425]

As for the naysayers, I don't really understand why some people care what other people spend their money on. If someone doesn't think it's a good deal, they don't have to sign up.

Exactly! I detest when people claim that FD users are "suckers" or that FD is a "scam". Ummm...no. I'm quite capable of logical thought and doing basic math. No "sucker" getting "scammed" here.

 

[Art 1]

WDW released their fall discount offer this morning and it is NOT free dining, for the first time in several years. They have been threatening for years to take it away, do you think they actually did it this time? If so, do you think we'll see a drop in fall attendance when it has been steadily growing during the fall?

If that's true, good. I'd love to see free dining done away with.

 

[3boysNagirl]

We were newbies last yr & LOVED FD so much so we booked BB for 8/14 with FD. We decided even with upgrade its totally worth the $ so I called on ADR day for such. I will vouch the CMs were VERY careful not to lose my ressie as it took me 3 to do the upgrade. Each stated "Oh, no we don't want to lose this somehow as its not offered any longer." We will happily be returning for 7 days w/ PH at a Value tho it may be a while before return with no FD

 

[SPOERLX3]

It's not free. Everyone knows that. It's a discount. It's a bigger discount than a room only offer or any other discount that I've ever been eligible for.

It's a real way to save money. It's not imaginary or a trick of some kind. No one cares that we're paying rack rate for a room because the overall price of the package is a great deal.

It is like any other promo, you pay rack rate to get FD and save
or you get discount room rate to save or any one of the other Disney promo's. We choose the promo that gives us the best savings. For our family it has always been the FD so I hope it is offered again this year

I have noticed that free dining for the general public was offered less last year than in the past, based on the historical data on mouse savers:
http://www.mousesavers.com/historical-information-on-walt-disney-world-resort-discounts/
so it may be that they will be offering free dining less to the general public and more via PIN codes. None of us know for sure and all we can do is hope. Pixie dust for us that want FD and for everyone else that is looking for a promo that works best for them

 

[Fracfam4]

Interesting conversation. We got FD on our trip in November 2012. We stayed in a moderate and there were 4 of us so it saved us money. We did character meals and ate wherever and whatever we wanted. It was easy and already paid for when we got there. I looked at the bills from the TS meals and I think that I might have had a panic attack if I had to pay the bill then. I enjoyed my trip a lot more not worrying about it. I am sure Disney makes up the difference somewhere else but that's ok. I am hoping for FD again this fall since I now have a DS turning 10 that eats everything.

So, I am guessing that if you stay in a Deluxe, the FD is not as good of a deal and it might be worth looking into a room rate discount. Does that seem to be true? I am wishing for a good deal to book The Wilderness Lodge. Should I be looking for other discounts besides FD?

 

[smitch425]

Interesting conversation. We got FD on our trip in November 2012. We stayed in a moderate and there were 4 of us so it saved us money. We did character meals and ate wherever and whatever we wanted. It was easy and already paid for when we got there. I looked at the bills from the TS meals and I think that I might have had a panic attack if I had to pay the bill then. I enjoyed my trip a lot more not worrying about it. I am sure Disney makes up the difference somewhere else but that's ok. I am hoping for FD again this fall since I now have a DS turning 10 that eats everything.

So, I am guessing that if you stay in a Deluxe, the FD is not as good of a deal and it might be worth looking into a room rate discount. Does that seem to be true? I am wishing for a good deal to book The Wilderness Lodge. Should I be looking for other discounts besides FD?

You need to run the numbers for every available discount to see which is the best option. There are not always multiple discounts running at the same time, so it just depends on availability.

 

[SPOERLX3]

We were newbies last yr & LOVED FD so much so we booked BB for 8/14 with FD. We decided even with upgrade its totally worth the $ so I called on ADR day for such. I will vouch the CMs were VERY careful not to lose my ressie as it took me 3 to do the upgrade. Each stated "Oh, no we don't want to lose this somehow as its not offered any longer." We will happily be returning for 7 days w/ PH at a Value tho it may be a while before return with no FD

I'm not sure if the CM was referring to FD in general. The CM was right, they haven't had FD in August since 2012 and that was only offered starting on 8/25. In 2011 they offered FD starting 8/19. And if they lost the BB you have, that specific BB isn't offered any longer.

I may be totally wrong about all of that but I did get several PIN's for Free Dining thru March 5. Starting in October, I got one every month thru January reminding me of my PIN so I know they still have FD. It just appears they offer it less and less every year so that may have been it. We can only wait and see.
One of my dear friends from church is a Disney Travel agent and she was told to be prepared to work a lot of overtime mid March because of the promo's coming out. With that being said, I wouldn't expect September promo's coming out in March since that seems to be a little early. The last time a promo for September FD came out in March was in 2012, they normally come out end of April/first of May. But I could also be wrong about that too

 

[smitch425]

We were newbies last yr & LOVED FD so much so we booked BB for 8/14 with FD. We decided even with upgrade its totally worth the $ so I called on ADR day for such. I will vouch the CMs were VERY careful not to lose my ressie as it took me 3 to do the upgrade. Each stated "Oh, no we don't want to lose this somehow as its not offered any longer." We will happily be returning for 7 days w/ PH at a Value tho it may be a while before return with no FD

The CM was referring to your bounceback offer not being offered any longer, not free dining. Changes made to bounceback reservations can only be done by certain CMs (which is why it involved so many people). Since they are not public offers, they are only accessible by certain CMs. In no way was the CM stating that free dining is no longer happening.

 

[Colleen27]

It's a real way to save money in certain situations. As I stated in an earlier post, for a single person or a couple, it more than likely isn't worth the discount. You would have to constantly be eating at all the big $$$ locations for every meal to get that benefit of the "free dining".

Even for a couple it can be a very good deal, if the DDP suits their travel plans to begin with. DH does NOT want to do our adults-only trip without the DxDDP. He knows he'll be reading the menu backwards and skipping things he wants to try because of the price if we go without a dining plan because he fights that tendency whenever we travel. In addition, we don't really do counter service, we eat mostly signature dinners, and we enjoy being waited on and having time to converse at meal times. We don't drive, so eating off-site isn't an option. Basically we're the ideal deluxe plan audience. So for the two of us, moderate resort, king bed, DxDDP, the most likely room only offer would save $51/night (25%). Free dining saves us $117 per night.

Now if you want to talk about all the ways we could eat more cheaply, of course we could do better than the bottom line price of a DxDDP package regardless of what discount we book with. But for the way we want to travel free dining is far and away the best offer for us.

 

[scard192]

We only stay value, and we are 3 "Disney adults" and 1 child. The QSDP fits our eating style perfectly, so FD is by far the best deal for us. There is no scenario in which a room/ticket discount would be a better deal for us, so yes, our free dining is 100% FREE.

The whole "free dining isn't 'free' " spiel is so stupid. It is free (as in you are not paying for the actual food), but it isn't always the best deal. It's all about where you stay, your party size, the ages of your party, your eating habits, and the other available discounts at the time. You have to do the math to see what works for you.

so true. for my family of 3 staying at a Value, the best RO I could hope for is 20% = no more than $30/day. I can't feed the 3 of us for $30/day. FD is the most economical discount for my family.

 

[3boysNagirl]

The CM was referring to your bounceback offer not being offered any longer, not free dining. Changes made to bounceback reservations can only be done by certain CMs (which is why it involved so many people). Since they are not public offers, they are only accessible by certain CMs. In no way was the CM stating that free dining is no longer happening.

Makes sense Thanx! We fell in LOVE with WDW yet I'm a wanderer lol so my DH & I agreed 1 trip to explore in spring then fall trip to WDW for a few yrs if I can swing it financially making me VERY hopeful for FD

 

[Ava]

We'll be 2 adults, a 5-year-old, and a 1-year-old next trip, and I think FD would still be the best possible discount for us. Even if we got a 20% room-only discount and bought tix from UT, we'd only save $300-$350 for a 6-night trip. It would be really hard to feed even the 3.5 of us for that at WDW.

 

[crazymomof4]

It may not be "free", but it's still a great deal IN CERTAIN CASES. It really, really irks me when people dismiss it out of hand as a bad deal that's only for "suckers"--which I've heard numerous times. Please, someone explain to me how this is not a good deal for my family.

Let's look at numbers! My family is me, DH, DS13, and DS11, so 4 Disney adults. If we stay at a moderate resort, we'll get maybe a 25% discount (if we're lucky) on the room under RO discounts. Okay, let's say a room is on average $200 a night. That gives me a $50 per day discount. Right now, Disney is throwing in an extra day to your tickets. Well, with a 6-day ticket, that's a whopping $10 per person. So that's $40 they're letting me save, total, so less than $10 a day on a 6-day stay, but let's round up to $10. Now we're up to $60 per day. Now, another argument is that the DP forces you into larger tips than you would normally do. So let's say for our one TS meal that day, we need to leave a tip of $25. So now we're up to $85 grand total for the day that I could save with a room/ticket/no forced tip discount.

So take that $85 and explain to me how I'm going to feed my family of four at Disney for the entire day, including a TS meal (because we like the break each day and consider it part of our vacation!) with tip.

With the DP, we split meals, use snacks wisely, and end up paying very, very, very little beyond that for food.

So how exactly is this not a good deal for my family???? If my math's wrong please correct me. If there's something I'm missing, I'd like to know. But so many people say I'm being suckered in by Free Dining, yet can't explain exactly how.

Agree completely. We are a family of 5 adults and staying in Alligator Bayou to be able to have 5 in one room (DD is a "disney adult" but petite enough to use the fold down bed) So I would get 1 room discount x 8 nights. NO WAY would that cover what it would cost all five of us to eat for 8 days. My husband is a foodie and likes one TS meal/day. Free Dining is the best discount for us. Whoever wrote on that linked website "YOU ARE LOSING MONEY BY GETTING “FREE DINING” INSTEAD OF USING THE OTHER DISCOUNTS OUT THERE!!!" either doesn't own a calculator or is figuring a trip for 1 or 2 people only.

 

[2009CAN]

Couldn't agree more. We're a family of five. I'm praying like crazy FD is offered in November. Truly, without it, we either won't be able to to Disney this year, or instead of spending 7-10 days there, we'll only be able to spend 3-4. But more than likely, not go.

We did character dining every day of our trip last year thanks to FD. Again, w/o the offer, we wouldn't have been able to afford it.

 

[morganax]

Couldn't agree more. We're a family of five. I'm praying like crazy FD is offered in November. Truly, without it, we either won't be able to to Disney this year, or instead of spending 7-10 days there, we'll only be able to spend 3-4. But more than likely, not go.

We did character dining every day of our trip last year thanks to FD. Again, w/o the offer, we wouldn't have been able to afford it.

this sums up my family as well!

 

[DexLabDeeDee]

Interesting conversation. We got FD on our trip in November 2012. We stayed in a moderate and there were 4 of us so it saved us money. We did character meals and ate wherever and whatever we wanted. It was easy and already paid for when we got there. I looked at the bills from the TS meals and I think that I might have had a panic attack if I had to pay the bill then. I enjoyed my trip a lot more not worrying about it. I am sure Disney makes up the difference somewhere else but that's ok. I am hoping for FD again this fall since I now have a DS turning 10 that eats everything.

So, I am guessing that if you stay in a Deluxe, the FD is not as good of a deal and it might be worth looking into a room rate discount. Does that seem to be true? I am wishing for a good deal to book The Wilderness Lodge. Should I be looking for other discounts besides FD?

Well, I don't know what it is for WL but I just looked up the rates for 4 (and 5) of us through AAA at an AKL Savannah Room and a 1 bedroom villa. AAA saved us $700-$1100!!

Which is awesome. But...we figured out - for us - FD would be the best deal even if we gave up the AAA discount and did the Disney rack rate (assuming that Disney doesn't increase their rack rate pricing).

For the record, without the dining plan we would be eating mostly CS with breakfast in our room and 2 TS restaurants (one buffet and one non-character meal) and FD would still be the better deal.

 

[crazymomof4]

For the record, without the dining plan we would be eating mostly CS with breakfast in our room and 2 TS restaurants (one buffet and one non-character meal) and FD would still be the better deal.

Literally seconds before coming on here and reading this, my DH and I were having this exact conversation. "Plan B" of where to eat if no Free Dining. Yep... we know which CS we like so we will be hitting them for lunch and dinner. Maybe a lunch at Liberty Tree and Sci Fi as exceptions. Granola bars and packaged baked goods for quick breakfast in the room. With NO DDP I will come home with less weight packed on, that's for sure!