Do you eat breakfast in your Walt Disney World resort room to save money?
My first thoughts of this occurred during a stay at the Pop Century. On our fourth day, fed up with the long crazy lines and mass hysteria of the food court, my family tried to come to eat earlier to help avoid the massive crowds in Everything Pop. In addition to the annoyance we felt for the crazy lines, the cost of the breakfast for my son was $5, around $10 for myself, and around $10 for my husband. We finally found a table after braving the beverage bar. The entire process took us nearly an hour! I decided then to begin bringing our breakfast.
Some items that I found easiest to pack were muffins that I had made at home, breakfast bars, fruit, cereal (to use with the half-gallon of milk I purchased from the gift shop/food court), pop tarts and doughnuts and oatmeal. Some of these items are easy to grab and go, while others require plates or a bowl. The plates and bowls are available in various places throughout the food court or can be brought with you.
If bringing food is not your style, maybe instead try buying items in bulk in the gift shops there in the Disney hotels. The items included there are loaves of bread (perfect for toast), doughnuts, and cereal. These items can be purchased soon after check-in so you do not get caught with bulk amounts of food with you throughout the day.
For my family, we average a 5 night vacation. I am not saying that we eat on the fly every day. However, if we do this on 4 of the mornings, we save $100! Also, grabbing our food and eating in the food court we save about 30 minutes per morning. That is 30 minutes of EXTRA sleep I know I need while at WDW!
Here are 10 tips to save money on your Walt Disney World vacation.
Learn more tips and tricks for your next Walt Disney World vacation. Destinations in Florida can also help you add tips and tricks to your next vacation.
Natalie has been visiting Disney World and Disneyland with her son (currently age 5) and husband for her theme park fun since 1997! Natalie’s passion for Disney continues even when she is not in parks! She is the owner of MeetTheMagic.com where articles chronicle her adventures in the Disney parks and aboard the Disney Dream. In addition to Meet The Magic
We brought a toaster and had bagels. I also brought one of those breakfast machine things. The one that you can make ham, egg and cheese on English muffins. Used them the entire time we were there without a problem.
You can also order from Amazon Pantry and have it delivered to your room.
Are there refrigerators and microwaves in the room?
Eating in-room saves time and money, but watch out bringing things like toasters. The resorts all have heat sensors in the room and setting those off will have security banging on your door right quick. If you want grocery type foods, Garden Grocer will deliver groceries right to your hotel (www.gardengrocer.com).
While the math is the article is fishy at best (how are you saving $100?), the article inspires some thoughtful ideas.
If she said they spent $25 at breakfast, then decided to eat in-room with their own stuff for 4 days, there’s the $100. As a mom, I consider that all the stuff they ate (bagels, breakfast bars, milk, eggs, etc) is stuff that probably would have been bought on a normal grocery week anyway, so it’s not really an extra budget line.
Planning our first trip coming up and I had an idea of buying one of the small crock pots to make some steel cut oats overnight while we sleep. I do it regularly at home and it cooks overnight. Due to my daughters multiple food allergies, easy things like pop tarts and bagels are not an option. Has anyone else ever done crock pot breakfasts?
We’ve rented a car out last two trips and it’s been the best decision we’ve made! We stop at Super Target and load up on drinks, breakfast foods and snacks. It’s a big time saver. We eat breakfast as we get ready in the morning. My go-to’s are cereal, bananas, apples, almonds, string cheese, peanut m&ms (my guilty pleasure) and small bags of chips. I grab milk for the cereal, bottled water and sport drinks (not something I normally drink, but I need it when we visit over the summer). Super Target also has a nice Disney section, so you can pick up sme souvenirs for a little less than what you’ll pay in the parks.
We always pack food fro teh room. The past two times we have had the dining plan ,but still packed some food. Usually we had gone one night of the trip and used some of our snack credits and picked up some fruit and other snacks in teh food court before one of teh parks. We also bring snacks and waters for the park so we can save some of our snack credits for the night before we left to pick up some fresh food and drinks for teh way home.
We ordered from Gardengrocer.com! Great idea you can order all types of breakfast food, soda, water and snacks and more to your room. They deliver it to your room on the day you arrive. You can even order diapers, shampoo,razors, etc.
We always pack some food to go with us but also make a grocery run when we get there. we do breakfast in our room and usually one meal of sandwiches that we either eat in our room when we go back to our room or we take them with us and eat while we’re out. I actually prefer to do that then eat out all the time… I enjoy the food more!
And a tip, if you’re packing things like granola bars or nutri-grain bar type things, buy some cheap hard sunglass cases (I found them on the dollar aisle at Target). They work great at keeping them from getting crunched either in your luggage or in your park bag (or in your everyday or diaper bag for that matter!).
We always like to bring our own foods for breakfast. I usually like to make a variety of mini loaves of breads. I do this a few weeks prior to the trip when I do my usual baking and then just freeze one or two of each kind of loaf to take with us. We like pumpkin, banana,lemon poppyseed, etc. With juice and milk, they make a nice breakfast. Even if this didn’t save us money, I’d do it to save us the time.
We always rent a car when we visit WDW. I try to bring some breakfast and snack items with me, but we usually end up going to McDonald’s for breakfast. Our 3 yr old daughter gets up around 6, so that leaves us plenty of time to go to McD for a quick and relatively cheap breakfast before going to the parks. I know it’s not as cheap as bringing your breakfast, but sometimes it’s nice to have something hot for breakfast too.
Try cutting up fruit in bite size pieces. Freezer in quart sized freezer bags.I try to freeze as flat as possible to save space without damaging fruit. Some fruit I use, any type of melon, berries, grapes, pineapple,etc.. Pull out your bag to start to thaw before bed and you have a healthy breakfast in the morning that can be eaten on the go. Next time I’m thinking of trying to freeze canned fruit to save $$. Maybe fruit cocktail in natural juice for the kids:)
When we stay at pop, we pack up a box before we leave and mail it to ourselves at the hotel. it’s always there before us and either in our room of waiting for us at check in! We will it with breakfast items as well as a $5 toaster (when they are on sale) that way we can have eng. muffins with peanut butter etc and can leave the toaster there and not have to feel guilty about it. After all, the cost to ship the box and the toaster pays for itself not having to buy breakfast and before bed snacks. And it saves time in the am by not having to walk ALL the way to the food court, then ALL the way back to the room to get ready to go out for the day! Last year we brought an extra suitcase with us and filled it with a 24 pack of water (we took 2 out for the weight for it to be free) We used the empty case to bring home laundry and it worked out great!
How do you mail it to yourself?
Last year was our first year driving down. So it was the first year I actually brought some food with us. And I have learned that this August I will cut down.
We really only needed some cereal for the drive there and back for breakfast (daughter has food allergies so anything aside from mcdonalds, BK, etc. is a little scary for us lol). And then some little bags of snacks and waters and juices. Last year I think I brought just waaaay too many snacks and too much cereal. We were also on the free DDP.
The best thing I did do though was made sure we were prepared, we had plastic bowls, spoons, napkins, etc. Those are things people tend to forget.
We usually go for pretty long trips in August every year (between 14-20 days). We do tens to pack a small or medium suitcase worth of snack and breakfast items but I have to sat that we rarely eat them and end up giving them away to others checking in. We have had the free dining plan for a few years now and my 5 year old daughter and I usually share a meal for lunch so we have had extras to share for breakfast. I do bring some candy snacks because they cab be pretty expensive down there too
We always book at a hotel that is known for having a full, hot breakfast. Last time we went to Disneyland we stayed at the Staybridge Suites. Their breakfast always satisfies and it saves us money. We also take our own snacks into the park and avoid buying from the concession stands.
We went to Disney last November for the first time. We stayed 5 nights, 6 days and had the meal plan which gave us two meals a day so we decided to eat breakfast in our room every day. We were SO happy with this idea and how it worked. I brought poptarts, english muffins, bagels, granola bars and some fruit. We brought our toaster along. We were able to wake up, eat breakfast and make it to the parks for the opening ceremonies. We are going again this August and while I want to eat a breakfast once for the Mickey waffles (I know my daughters will be so excited) we plan on eating breakfast in our room every other day.
Best thing I ever did was learn from my mom about bringing food. I brought everything for us to eat except for one solid meal a day on our last Disney 4 day trip. Since I live in FL my drive is only 2 hrs so prepping at home & transport was easy but these are things you can get & take with you even if you are flying/driving in. I brought 3 soft coolers. 1 Big with wheels, 1 medium hand bag size & 1 lunch bag size.
– Night before I put 1 case of water bottles in the freezer (now I didn’t need to bring ice)
– Juice boxes, capri suns etc. in freezer also
– boil up eggs for breakfasts & peel before bagging
– snack baggie grapes, carrots, apples (I sliced & put a squirt of lemon before bagging them), goldfish, etc.
– made a big bag of trail mix (peanuts, m&m’s, raisins, almonds, dry cherries, dry cranberries, & whatever seeds I had available)
– bought a bag of prewrapped snack size cheddar cheese
– 1 pack of hummus to go (I could have made it but was short on time)
– 1 bag of bagels
– 1 small peanut butter
– 6 luchables
– fruit leather, bananas, and raisins
And of course, baby food for my little dude.
@ Target cost me about $65 for everything & I try to buy as much organic as I can
Now here is a little secret I learned from a Disney chef, the food served at the quick dining is prepared the same way as the sit down meals. So while we were @ Epcot noshing on some killer Taco’s & Margaritas outside, someone was inside the restaurant eating the same thing for $10 more.
We stayed @ The Contemporary & enjoyed the complimentary morning coffee and I think my husband got a few night time cravings for a burger and they have real easy dining there.
My daughter’s bday is coming up & I reserved a table @ Cinderella’s Castle. Can’t wait for that :)
We ate at Cinderella’s Castle on our trip and my daughters loved it (and my husband and I had fun too). The only way we could think to describe it is “Magical”. Have fun!
thanks for the tips on what to bring. we would be driving 19 hours to get to disney (without stops, so even longer) and there were some things on your list i didn’t think of. even the fresh fruit would just be great for the car trip snacks and i can buy more at the target when we get to disney!
This is GREAT! Thank you. I’ve been brainstorming what to bring for our upcoming trip. We’re planning on breakfast AND lunch in our room (during a midday break I know the little ones will need), and this was a wonderful list to get me going!
We bring our own coffee pot because the coffee is just not good at the resorts. And, I have to say, I see people even at Animal Kingdom Lodge bringing their own food. It’s just too expensive for multiple days and the quality’s sometimes iffy for breakfast.
Completely agree. I usually mail myself a box of breakfast items and snack items. We eat breakfast in our room some days even if we have the dining plan. We then use the snack credit for ice cream or something of the like during our trip instead. Plus it helps to have this food in the room in case the kids are up and hungry before everyone is ready to leave the room.
We usually bring food with us and on one trip when we stayed for 5 days we went to the local SuperTarget to buy groceries.