Comments on: Ask DSM Readers: How Do You Save Money at Disney World?

By: Alicia

Alicia — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 11:02:53 +0000

Disney has a little-known policy that any food seller in any of their parks will give you cups of ice water for free. You just have to ask!

By: joy

joy — Sun, 04 Sep 2011 21:46:06 +0000

MEAL PLAN! LOVE IT! They have several different plans so you can customize it

By: Joane Terrace

Joane Terrace — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 01:00:15 +0000

Great article. Waiting for more.

By: Stacey

Stacey — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 16:05:46 +0000

We are going to Disney in October and i am trying to save where i can! :) I saw your post on Dealseekingmom. What or where is "DOM or Jewel?" And are these just visa gift cards or actual disney gift cards?

By: Cristalle

Cristalle — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 19:40:44 +0000

We spent a week at Disney World back in 2008. We didn't have access to a car, and the cost of a taxi was outrageous! I found a local grocery store online that delivered directly to the resort. I spent a little over $100 and had breakfast and lunches for my family of 4 for the entire week! While this is more than we would usually have spent, it was MUCH less than eating out for every meal. We also bought drinks and had brought our small cooler with us, so we brought our drinks and lunches into the parks every day.

By: Cherie

Cherie — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:48:52 +0000

Fast Pass is free. Overheard a family recently say they couldn't get the Fast Passes because they didn't buy them. Universal charges for theirs but Disney does not. They simply issue so many per hour until they are all gone for that ride. You are given a time to return, although if you get stuck somewhere (ie. eating, in another long line) and your time expires, they will still honor it. For example, your fast pass is to return between 100pm and 200pm but you don't get there until 230pm. They will still let you use the Fast Pass.

By: Cherie

Cherie — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:44:24 +0000

http://www.allears.net has menus for all restaurants, including quick service to help you plan for pricing, places to eat, etc.

By: Cherie

Cherie — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:42:33 +0000

Remember too that tickets get cheaper with the additional days purchased. The difference from a 4day to a 7day ticket is only $6. Don't add on park hopper if you can plan to go to one park per day. Planning is key. http://www.mousesavers.com has links for discounts on tickets. They are usually free shipping. Buy the tickets a little along. They do not go into effect until the first day you USE them. We recently stayed at Sheraton Vistana Villages for $86 per night. It's a 2 bedroom CONDO that sleeps eight. There are great deals to be found out there I promise. Not to say that some planning and saving might be necessary but the memories made will be worth it.

By: Cherie

Cherie — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:38:39 +0000

Get the burger combo which all come with two burger patties and get an extra bun. Some places will allow you to get 2 slices of bread and there is peanut butter and jelly over by the condiments. Cosmic Ray's at MK has a full chicken/mashed pot/green beans that two can share. :)

By: Cherie

Cherie — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:33:17 +0000

We have gone recently and they will allow any drinks that are in plastic containers, no straws at Animal Kingdom (so no juice boxes or Capri Sun), drinks are $2.50 including water. There are several places in each park that have fountain drinks with free refills. You can bring just about any non-perishable snack into the parks as well. You can take advantage of Free Disney Dining Plan and save quite a bit of money. http://www.mousesavers.com and http://www.allears.net are both great sites for deals and discounts. The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World is a great book for everything Disney. Magic Strollers has discounted strollers for kids up to probably 3 or so. (i guess i should say they are discounted compared to Disney's). Also, pay for your strollers for the entire stay....it saves you $3 per day. And if you're really brave :) you can get a Disney Visa. THey offer special discounts, 1% back on all purchases to be used for everything Disney, and give you 6mths no interest to pay for your DIsney vacation when you book a vacation package. Also, use Small World Vacations to help with travel planning. I use Angela Dail. Most of the agents are SAHM's. It is free for you to use their service. Try to go in the fall when it's cooler and less crowded.. You will get more for your money this way. http://www.touringplans.com has Crowd Calendars that can tell you the crowd level for any given day of the year as well as has touring plans that really work.

By: Emerald

Emerald — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 21:25:28 +0000

I am a single mom and I am taking my two children next feb with a large group of other moms. We are staying in a beautiful resort, renting vans, getting the group rate on park tickets, cooking all of our meals in room, and I am getting a good deal on airline tickets from CA to Orlando. Expected price tag? $1200-$1500 for a weeklong vacation. Not too shabby if you ask me. And definitely within my budget.

By: Heidi

Heidi — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 18:45:06 +0000

I just returned from our 1st ever Disney trip ! We all earned the free vouchers through the Give a Day, Get a Day volunteer opportunity. This saved me a TON of money! I am hoping they do it again next year.. I would highly recommend jumping on the opportunity in January. This year, the program was already over by March 15th!
Also, I would say DEF bring a small cooler. The website tells you the dimensions of the cooler you can bring in. We spent probably $80 just in drinks the day we went. The cooler would be a great idea. Put in some drinks and some small snacks. That way you can save on food too. Also my husband and I ordered kids meals... that helped save about $10 or so each time we ate.
The Mickey ears are a MUST... but forget anything else. Balloons are $8. There is SO much to see with all the different characters and parades going on... Shouldn't need anything else!

By: Shelley

Shelley — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 16:25:03 +0000

Tour Guide Mike- www,tourguidemike.com was the best money (not too much)I spent. 3 others that work with me were on family vacations at WDW at the same time I was. They said that they had to stand in line forever. We used TGM and walked on every ride!

Stay on property and watch for code on http://www.passporter.com, http://www.disboards.com to save even more.

Value Resorts are great and you are hardly there so your room doesn't really matter!

By: Carrie

Carrie — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 10:55:01 +0000

We JUST returned on Friday from our trip. I have to say that hands down, the biggest money saver for us was staying on property and the Quick Service Dining Plan. We were able to stretch our meals enough that we could eat breakfast at our hotel the last two days. We brought donuts and muffins from home for the first four days, and then we had enough meals left on our dining plan to get us breakfast in the hotel, as well as lunch and dinner the last two days. The buses from the resorts to the hotels are no brainers, and we never waited longer than 20 minutes. We had 8 snacks left on the last day, and cashed them out for the car ride home-small boxes of cereal, pop tarts, cookies, etc. all count as snacks. Also, the refillable mugs come with the dining plan. We would fill them everyday, many times, because we'd come back to the resort for breaks in the middle of the day. With each meal, you get a drink, and they are almost always bottled. We saved those up for in the parks, etc., and drank from our refillable mugs most of the time. We actually came home with about 6 bottles of pop/vitamin water, etc. Another perk with staying on Disney property is the buses. They run constantly, and going back to the resort in the middle of the day to rest, go to the pool, or do some of the resort activities can provide a much needed break from the parks. The resorts, even the Disney value resorts, have nice quick service food courts, as well as playground and many have more than one pool. We didn't want to schlep around a cooler, along with the backpack with baby essentials, as well as the stroller. Since you have to park your stroller well before getting in line, leaving our cooler with it didn't seem very appealing. We've done the taking our own food before, three years ago on our last trip, and will never do it again after doing the dining plan. Have fun!

By: Millie

Millie — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 16:36:25 +0000

You can always get water for free at the parks. Don't bother packing bottled water and drinking from the fountains (which taste rather gross). Most walk up food eateries will give you ice water in a cup...some can't give you water but will at least give you ice in a cup. The cups are the same as the sodas - so you feel cool for walking around with it - and the water tastes great!

Also - bring your own lunch OR if you really want to eat there choose the sit down places for lunch and do a walk up place for dinner. Otherwise it's quite pricey.

Be sure to grab the free pins at the front of the park - it's a fun way to get a free souvenir!

By: LeShelle

LeShelle — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 14:42:17 +0000

If staying on property get the dining plan. The basic is more than enough. People are saying there's too much food, but I didn't think so. For breakfast we would go get a one meal to share between the two of us. The same for lunch or dinner. We did this a few times and save up for the few restaurants that took two sit down tickets. We never went hungry. And the cost is cheap, about the cost of one sit down dinner per day, you get a sit down, a fast food and a snack. Not bad.

By: Patricia

Patricia — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 13:10:36 +0000

As an frequent Disney guest, I agree with some of the statements above, (getting free ice water at the soda fountains, buying a case of bottled water to supply the trip, walmart having cheaper disney merchandise, bringing in snacks). I am also a HUGE fan of the outlets. While the Lake Buena Vista store doesn't have a great selection, you can sometimes walk out with a good amount of stuff, and the premium outlets and prime 1 outlets each have a character premiere store where all theme park exclusive merchandise is often 50% or lower. There have been times when I see current park merchandise in the store for half off! I try to buy most of my souvenirs there and my and my hubby often take note of what we like at the parks and try to find it on our next trip at the outlets (and we've been successful). We go about 2x a year so we catch the season clearouts. Buy discounted pins here and trade in the parks. Take advantage of character dining rather than racing across the parks and waiting in endless lines for a quick photo and autograph..it's much less stressful for them to come to you. On our last trip, we had a WDW tote bag and white pillowcases that we had characters sign (put the pillowcase in an embroidery hoop for even coverage). They made great birthday gifts to little disney fans back home (we're disney newlyweds so no kids for us just yet)! They are always in view unlike an autograph book...If you want any more tips don't forget to visit the disboards at disboards.com.

By: Stacy

Stacy — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 02:57:57 +0000

There are many restaurants with big breakfast buffets with discounted coupons in the area. We ate a big buffet style breakfast around 9-10Am then headed to the park. Tke kids were still full and ate a snack about 2-3Pm and we left the park arount 5 or 6 and ate dinner back at the hotel (order pizza, sandwich, etc) and went swimming in the evening. We were there about a week.
(The first day we ate a continental breakest and lunch in the park and it was twice as expensive than eating the breakest buffet. I have three kids and food it our biggest expense when we go on vacation.)

By: Margaret

Margaret — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 01:52:58 +0000

Many people complain about the water there but it does notbother us. At any counter that serves fountain pop, you can get a glass or more of ice water for free! This is great on hot day.

By: Carolyn

Carolyn — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 01:29:44 +0000

I don't mean to be controversial here, but one of my family's favorite parts of going to disney world is the food. We usually bring our own bagels for breakfast in the hotel room, but we always eat at least 1 nice meal at the parks a day (in a sit down restaurant). The atmosphere and food is so good and is really part of the whole experience to me. (especially when I went pregnant and couldn't ride or with little kids who can't ride the rides anyway). We do bring snacks in (string cheese, crackers, etc...) but we always budget for the food and make reservations ahead of time so that we can make sure to eat at our favorite restaurants. (we like pretty much every one of the countries' restaurants in epcot. In Disney Studios we love prime time and the brown derby, though the brown derby is more expensive. Ohana at the Polynesian resort is awesome and at animal kingdom, we always go to flame tree barbecue. It's a counter service so it's cheaper but it's so good!) Have fun :)