Meal Deals, and meal deals

[Rivertown Rider]

They were on the meal plan.  I think they were only available during the Peanuts celebration but I don't see why they couldn't have them all the time.  

[angiemacc72]

So my family and I (4 of us) are headed to KI next week. We are planning to buy ONE $29.99 meal deal. One time, we will buy one meal and split it between either 2 of us or all 4 of us depending on what it is. Then 90 minutes later buying another meal and splitting it among us and so on. Is this really doable and if so where are the best places to be able to get the most food in one meal? Also say my husband is the one who buys the wristband - does he have to wear it and be the only one who "purchases" the food or can he give me the wristband so I can go wait in line for food and he can go on a ride with one of our kids? Not trying to be tricky at all - seriously just trying to understand how this works. We will comply with whatever the rules are. 

[IndyGuy4KI]

Welcome to KIC, hopefully others can share their experience on how the all day meal plan works. We will not discuss how to cheat the park by sharing food. We comply with all park rules.

 

[King Ding Dong]

The person who purchases the wristband must wear it and be the person who orders and picks up the food.   Once you have the food in hand you may pass it off to whomever you want and not violate any park rules.   No switching wristbands.  

How feasible is it to get a meal exactly every 90 minutes?  If it is a dead day and you are not standing in any ride or the food lines when that 90 minute cool down time hits, sure.  But that is not why you are at the park.  So we want to ride Diamondback but the line is 45 minutes but our cool down ends in 25 minutes.  So do you ride Diamondback or go sit down and twiddle your thumbs for 25 minutes?   That is up to you, but kind of a waste.   

If I were bringing my family if 4 and didn’t have the all season meal plan I would do one of two things.  

A. Get 2 All Day Dining wristbands to give us some wiggle room and not have kids whining or fighting becuase they are hungry or want to ride and just be able to have a better experience. 

B.  Pack a cooler with some nice subs, chips, cookies and drinks.  Then go out to the car every 4 hours or so and use the savings to buy the kids Blue Ice Cream, Funnel Cakes, Pretzels, Dippin Dots or whatever strikes their fancy.  Maybe a beer or two for Mom and Dad.  

Also I would get 2 souvenir cups for sharing between 4 people.   I have done it with 3 and it is a little rough.  Or just drink water.  

Next year, get gold season passes and the $30 all season drink plans for each person.   Then you can go whenever you want, leave whenever you want, not have to worry about the weather ruining your only trip of the year and enjoy all the other benefits that go along with it.  Most importantly if the kids are acting up you can head for the exit and really mean it. It only takes once.  

What food choice gives you the most bang for your buck?   In general I would say chicken strips with fries from Rivertown Potato  Works or Chicken Shack in Action Zone.  Generally a ton of fries.  

[Stoan]

I am starting to feel that despite the hype that came with the new restaurant this year, overall the meal quality in the park actually went down slightly. I feel like there is less waits overall, purely because they are making more food earlier and just about everything is old.

[King Ding Dong]

Born and raised in St. Louis and spent most of my adult life there.  Never heard of this.

 

[LuvingKI]

I ate at Reds for the first time ever yesterday. My wife and I had neither stepped foot in that place in all the times and years been going to Ki. Wow it's big, very clean and nice. Anyway I had the reds legs burger I believe it's called? And it was delicious! My wife had chicken caesar salad and it was huge and very good too!  Good place to eat

I haven't been to Hanks or Chicken Shack yet either.... I have no clue why..  May try to eat at both of them next weekend

[Magenta Lizard]

Just a warning of reports I'm hearing: Panda Express has had new signage up for awhile with meal #s, which are each a combination of two entrees. Previously, they've just been suggested combinations. However, now apparently they are enforcing that you can ONLY get one of these preset combinations using your meal plan. I know many of their current options (like egg rolls or Rangoon) aren't even part of one of those combos so I don't know if they plan to limit their offerings to the six (I believe) entrees from the combos, or keep the other food around getting stale for the rare non-meal-plan customers...

It seems like a terrible idea to me, but what do I know? I'll be registering my complaint with guest services once I actually encounter it myself. 

[disco2000]

1 hour ago, Magenta Lizard said:

Just a warning of reports I'm hearing: Panda Express has had new signage up for awhile with meal #s, which are each a combination of two entrees. Previously, they've just been suggested combinations. However, now apparently they are enforcing that you can ONLY get one of these preset combinations using your meal plan. I know many of their current options (like egg rolls or Rangoon) aren't even part of one of those combos so I don't know if they plan to limit their offerings to the six (I believe) entrees from the combos, or keep the other food around getting stale for the rare non-meal-plan customers...

It seems like a terrible idea to me, but what do I know? I'll be registering my complaint with guest services once I actually encounter it myself. 

Be ready to get attacked by those on here that will tell you that you should have read the fine print and the FAQs, etc. on the meal plan that options and locations are subject to change, blah blah blah...  (cross-referencing the thread where BoddaH got attacked for his post about the drink plan...)

All kidding aside, it does suck that the options change this late in the season...and clearly after purchase...but the fine print allows it....

[Magenta Lizard]

I will accept that they have the "right" to change it, but I also have no qualms about expressing my displeasure about the change in the proper forum (at guest services).

I have a feeling it will be a terrible week to work at Panda Express because they are going to have a lot of angry people who aren't willing to wait to complain elsewhere... it is so disheartening that they are going to put those low level employees on the line for enforcing a change this far into a season. The people who I am hearing about this through said they were told that Panda Express corporate came in to tell them they need to do it this way.

[LuvingKI]

52 minutes ago, Magenta Lizard said:

I will accept that they have the "right" to change it, but I also have no qualms about expressing my displeasure about the change in the proper forum (at guest services).

I have a feeling it will be a terrible week to work at Panda Express because they are going to have a lot of angry people who aren't willing to wait to complain elsewhere... it is so disheartening that they are going to put those low level employees on the line for enforcing a change this far into a season. The people who I am hearing about this through said they were told that Panda Express corporate came in to tell them they need to do it this way.

So you're saying I won't be able to get Rangoons with the meal plan?

[Magenta Lizard]

If they continue the new policy as I've heard it, no, you cannot get rangoons on dining now. 

[King Ding Dong]

Hold on here.   I thought you got two entrees and your choice of white or fried rice on the all season meal plan.  Period.   Am I to understand there were other options available?   

 

[harmony29]

I always got orange chicken and potatoes stickers or egg roll w noodles, I do not care for any of the other entrees so my days of eating there are done.

[Magenta Lizard]

4 hours ago, King Ding Dong said:

Hold on here.   I thought you got two entrees and your choice of white or fried rice on the all season meal plan.  Period.   Am I to understand there were other options available?   

 

You could get either fried rice, white rice, or noodles, and your choice of two entrees for most of this season (they tried early on to change it to one entree and people rebelled enough they switched back).

One egg roll, two spring rolls, or three rangoons counted as one entree choice. 

The change, as I'm hearing it, is that one is no longer allowed to pick a side, they give you half fried rice and half noodles. And your entree choices are limited to the pairings that are listed as "numbers" on their sign (no more double orange chicken which has been in my experience the most common order of people around me in line).

I will take pics later today when I'm at the park to clarify what those pairings are and kind of hang out to see what people are being told, since I wasn't planning on getting Panda myself today (burnt myself out on it earlier in the season).

[King Ding Dong]

I had no idea.  Ryan would have eaten there if he could just get rangoons and rice, in fact one time he did eat there.  Just white rice.  

Forcing chow mein on people is not going to go over well.  

 

[BoddaH1994]

Dominion does one entree and side. It’s a similar amount of food because you get more rice.

I think this is a capacity thing more than it is a budget thing, although I don’t think the benefits outweigh the cost if that’s the case. I don’t know if this has been discussed but you also can’t go to the register at Chicken Shack if you have the meal plan. I asked a friend of mine about it who’s a manager and they said it was an attempt to increase capacity - although you still need to go to the register for the drink plan, so who knows. 

[Magenta Lizard]

So those are the options

[harveyhaddixfan]

So basically you can’t get the sweetfire with kung pao. But why force people to take rice and noodles instead of one or the other? That’s just plain dumb. Would be like forcing you to take greens with Mac and cheese or fries with baked beans and not having a choice.

[Stoan]

What if I wanted steamed rice? I am sad to see the Bangkok Beef gone. Everything else they offer tastes like Asian Inspired Sugar.

[King Ding Dong]

For comparison.  

We all know in many cases CP offers smaller portions on the meal plan than KI.  Kiefer ate at the Panda there for the first time last week and was offered 1 entree, choice of white or fried rice or chow mein and either a spring roll or egg roll.  

[harmony29]

5 minutes ago, King Ding Dong said:

For comparison.  

We all know in many cases CP offers smaller portions on the meal plan than KI.  Kiefer ate at the Panda there for the first time last week and was offered 1 entree, choice of white or fried rice or chow mein and either a spring roll or egg roll.  

Now honestly I would be much happier with that, I could still get my egg roll and 1 entree, I don't like any of those combos.

[LuvingKI]

Agreed, I just want orange chicken and rangoon 

[spooky21]

I just want a taco bell....

[LuvingKI]

1 minute ago, spooky21 said:

I just want a taco bell....

Me too, had it a few hours ago. Could eat it everyday. 

[spooky21]

2 minutes ago, LuvingKI said:

Me too, had it a few hours ago. Could eat it everyday. 

Honestly Taco Bell has been more quality than most stuff I've had at KI here lately.

[BoddaH1994]

Currently at Canada’s Wonderland, reported by @CPFoodBlog

 

[TombRaiderFTW]

Oof.

They sell food passes at dirt cheap prices and create an overabundance of demand for almost all dining options. In the meantime, they swap out head food folks and see wait times dramatically increase because of an apparent change in process due to the new people.

To reduce waits (and, in the meantime, to adapt to a decreasing number of workers), they digitize part of the order experience. Keep people in the kitchen to make food. It makes sense. The wait times decrease but are still noticably long.

How do they combat that further? By increasing the price of food passes to decrease demand and thus further decrease the negativity of the experience of waiting in line for food? Nah. Pay employees more to keep more of them, to enable higher expectations of employees, and to attract new ones? Nope.

They push the people who have the most experience (and thus the most to complain about) to the front of the line.

I'm not upset about it; I just have to say that that's one heck of a band-aid. Given how quietly this was implemented, it doesn't appear to be something they're planning to advertise as a perk. I'm incredibly interested to see how the dining experience changes in 2019. If this doesn't come to KI next year (or even this year), I'll be shocked.

I also really, *really* have to wonder if there were any common comments from people who didn't choose to be passholders this year across one or multiple parks...

[BoddaH1994]

24 minutes ago, TombRaiderFTW said:

I also really, *really* have to wonder if there were any common comments from people who didn't choose to be passholders this year across one or multiple parks...

Yes. A resounding, “Yes.”

Remember how Haunt was going to be an upcharge a few years back and they back pedaled on it? That wasn’t for charity. Once something becomes a part of the season pass package it’s difficult - if not impossible - to take it away.

Now the meal plan is simply part of the deal for many people. If they choose against purchasing a meal plan they are also choosing against purchasing a pass. That is why 1) they are stuck offering it and 2) much of the appeal of the passes teeters on the dining experiences.

 

[King Ding Dong]

2 hours ago, BoddaH1994 said:

Currently at Canada’s Wonderland, reported by @CPFoodBlog

I have seen a photo of that sign on here before so it isn’t new.  My question then was is it really an express lane or a standby line for meal plan holders since they already have your money.