FREE Disney Parks Vacation Planning DVD (+ Tips to Save on Disney & More!)
[protected-iframe id=”39f3b600bf55d5875f84d28a3d441df8-29351879-27929027″ info=”https://strk.enlnks.com/aff_ad?campaign_id=62&aff_id=174&format=iframe” width=”300″ height=”250″ frameborder=”0″ scrolling=”no”]
If you have yet to request your FREE Disney Parks Vacation Planning DVD, it is still available! Just click on the banner above and fill out the short form.
Your FREE Vacation Planning DVD will include:
* A complete tour of the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida
* A tour of the Disneyland Resort in California, including 2 enchanting Theme Parks and 3 Resort hotels
* Affordable ways to play and stay during your Disney vacation
* Pocket-sized planning guides, planning tips, and information on special events, and more!
Note that this offer is only available to U.S. and Canadian households. One per household.
(Thanks, Savings Done Simply!)
And check out these comments left by Hip2Save readers on a recent post for ways to save at Disney…
Bring a water bottle and refill at drinking fountains! Take a break in the middle of the day. Sign up for the Earl of Sandwich club for freebies if you’ll go to downtown Disney. And pack snacks- there’s no reason to buy them there, they’re no tastier. I just got back and it was HOT- bring umbrellas for portable shade & rain!
We brought a small cooler (purse-like cooler) and filled it with ice & drinks. We also brought our own snacks and some Subway (they have $5 footlongs this month!) to save on eating costs. Because we decided to do this, we saved TONS of time (the lines were always long at the Disney food places to eat) and a lot of money. We used that money to go to Typhoon Lagoon instead. The Disney water parks AND Aquatica are A BLAST (and I’m picky!)!
Ride the popular rides when the park first opens the lines will be the quickest in the morning. Eat before you go the park. Food can be expensive in the park. Bring a poncho it rains a lot and it will be cheaper to buy one outside the park rather than having to buy one inside the park. Local Walmart sells Disney souvenirs for a lot cheaper than if you were to buy souvenirs at the park.
A tip for anyone ever going to Euro Disney (Paris): If you get a ISIC (International Studend ID Card, $25) you get 50% off Euro Disney tickets.. plus TONS of other discounts. So, if you have kids.. buy one of them a ISIC card and you get all the tickets for 50% off. I’m planning a 3 month trip around Europe and was excited about that. 
Also be sure to check out these informative guest posts (and all the comments!):
* Hip Tips to Maximize the Value of Disney FREE Dining
* 20 Hip Tips to Save at Disney
* Hip Tips to Save on a Disney Cruise
* Hip Tips to Save at Disney
Do you have any additional tips?! Please share them with us below!
What do I click on?
Click on savings done quickly
You can click on Savings Done Simply link or click on the banner that Collin posted in the blog post 🙂
The banner – get a free dvd
Hi, does anyone know good deals or discount for Hershey park ticket and hotels. TIA
AAA and local grocery stores in the Hershey area have discount flyers at customer service! As for hotels, try staying a few miles away from hershey in Harrisburg or Elizabethtown to save money.
Thanks Colleen for your answer:)
The grocery store chain “Giant” is a few blocks from Disney and they always have discounted tickets. I believe that all of them do, but if you don’t have that store near you, go to the one near the park before you get there. There’s a picnic area just outside the entrance. If you bring a cooler with lunch in your car, you can get your hand stamped, leave the park and eat at the picnic area and then go back in for the rest of the day.
Don’t forget to do Chocolate World, it is free and a fun little ride. It is outside the park and always a good time. It dumps you out into a food court area and a very large gift shop, so this is good to do at the end of the day.
Also, if your kids are older, the Wild Cat is a wooden coaster and really good but it whips you around hard and your neck will probably hurt after it. It didn’t hurt when I was a teenager but now that I’m in my 30’s, it hurts!
Emily…I think you are referring to Hershey Park and not Disney. 😉 Hershey Park has Chocolate World.
I did it. Click on saving done quickly
I was just reading the post about the Disney dining plan from two years ago. Do they offer a free dining plan every year? my family is looking at going to Disney World in September.
They seem to every fall: September & October
It does seem like they do this every year. We went in Sept of 2013 and had the free dining. I would do some research because you may get a better deal getting a percentage off one of the resorts vs a dining plan if your family won’t eat much in the restaurants. You can view the menus at different restaurants to see if it would be cost effective for you to go that route…it might not be. We opted for the free dining (ended up adding the deluxe dining plan for a little more) it was A LOT of food but well worth it to me. I loved getting to try different types of food I would have never tried if I was paying out of pocket. 🙂 There are many different ways to save at Disney. Have a great time if you do go!! We love visiting Disney!
The general consensus of experts think free dining will be offered for late this year.
All of the quick service counters give free ice water if you do not want to carry around bottles to refill all day long. They are every where all over the park so one less thing to carry. Everyone can now also plan with the fastpass I believe 60 days before their trip on Disneys website or app if you already bought your tickets just link them to your account and you can be in line for less than 10 min for your little girl to meet Elsa and Anna (a 4-5 hour wait!!) or any of the fast pass rides without stressing! Check out extended stay hotels for a whole week stay for less than $450 with a full kitchen. My last tip to save money is Disney outlet store they have tons of toys for half the price as the park one thing we picked up was the Anna and Elsa Animators dolls for $17 each at the park the exact same dolls were $35! The money you will save on $12 bras at the victoria secret outlet could also pay for your trip 😉
Target sells disney giftcards and you get 5% off when you purchase with your target card. You can use these to pay for your trip! We will be saving around $100 by doing this, and we are driving so that will about cover our gas cost.
We went with a large extended family. Staying off staying off site saved a lot of money and the house was nice. I spent very little on food. Most of the time we cooked at the house before and after the parks. We took lots of individually wrapped snacks and ate then in the slow moving lines. This helped keep the kids happy in line.
If you’re wanting a brochure for Disney or any Disney vacation, let me know! Here’s a sample of how I can customize it to your families wants. This was geared towards preschoolers.
disneybrochures.com/hfpj
I would love a few brochures! I’m planning on taking my son in a few years, but would love to start planning everything.
After a TON of research, I found the best deal for my family was to book through Costco! We saved over $500 compared to Disneys website, got a $75 gift card, free character dining for each member of our family! Also, they will price adjust their own website! I have been randomly checking their prices and last week was refunded $305 because the same trip dropped in price! I AM SO HAPPY to have booked with Costco 😉
How much is it for a week with a family of four or just an estimate if you know thanks.
We spent sometime at Downtown Disney just for a down day on one of our Disney trips (we’ve been there several times now). I found that my Discover card has RainForest Cafe as one of their cash back gift cards and there is a RainForest Cafe location at DD!! I also have the Disney Visa so I just save all my Visa points and cash them in for a rewards card which I then use for all our food while on Disney property. Combine these things w a stay during the discounted times and it makes for a very reasonably priced trip.
What else do you get with the Disney Visa? Any special meet & greets or discounts at Disney? Thanks.
I would tell you to head to the Chase Disney site (which I’m pretty sure I was able to navigate to from the actual Disney site) for all the details. I just have the free card–not the one with the annual fee. I’m pretty sure there is a Meet and Greet that includes pictures at Epcot. I also know that I get a percentage off every time I spent more than $50 at any Disney store or certain stores at DW. Worth checking out! But go to the site to get all the full details, please.
(I have also cashed in points for Disney movie tickets)
We are paying for our upcoming trip buying Disney gift cards at our local Kroger. We are using our Disney Rewards Visa to buy them, they paying off the balance on the visa each month. With 4x fuel reward points, we are saving $1.00 per gallon each time we get gas, plus adding Disney Rewards points for our next trip!
We went to Disneyland and we stayed across the street at a castle shaped hotel. It was great! The hotel had free parking and we walked 3 short blocks to the park on a well-lit, nicely paved sidewalk. On the way to the park is an Ihop and Denny’s for an early morning breakfast. The hotel also sold discounted 3-day passes and there’s a place along the way to buy 1-day tickets. We went in February and the hotel for Friday and Saturday night was only $118/night. It has a pool and stuff, but we never used it because we were at the park all day/night. If we go back to Disneyland, I’ll be staying along that road again. Our older family members stayed farther away from the park and used our room to go back to when they were done at the park and wanted to go lay down. It was really convenient.
Wich was the name of the hotel?
We recently went to Disney World and we saved a bundle on our hotel costs by renting Disney Vacation Club points from a member. It’s not for everyone but if you want to stay at a Deluxe Resort for Value prices it’s worth it. We saved $3,000 and stayed in a 2br villa with a Savanna view. It’s a great option for large families or groups. Check out dvcrequest.com for more info.