Cedar Point Dining Plan

I just read an article that SF Great America will be offering a dining plan for an extra $70 on top of your season pass for 2013. This includes a lunch and dinner every time you visit the park. I know that Disney has also offered a deal such as this as well.

Would this be a good idea to put in place for all Cedar Fair parks? I would definitely buy one! Thoughts?

I rarely eat in the park and when I do it's either Famous Daves our Pinks. Last season I took advantage of the awesome french fry deal at Happy Frier on more than one occasion because I considered it worth my money. If a dinning plan like the one Six Flags is offering came to the Point, I'd buy as long as the terms seemed like a good deal to me.

The way food quality and pricing currently is in the park, I just don't see eating there as ever really being worth it. I'd love to have the Six Flags deal though.

I think they should also add it on to a normal ticket as well as a season pass. Maybe like $30 per person for unlimited meals. I know Busch Gardens has that and it was really nice.

Last season the park already had an add on to regular tickets that would get you a meal and a souvenir cup. I could see more inclusive dining options offered for ticket holders and resort guests in the near future.

As for pass holders, the deals they had last summer went a long way in getting me to buy food in the park. If anything, I think the deals they had needed to be better advertised, as I wouldn't have known about them if not for this website. I haven't read too much about the rewards program they piloted and KI last summer, but on the surface, something like that seems like a good idea for pass holders as well.

I also just read this morning that SF Over Texas is now doing the same thing for 2013. So, it seems like all SFs will probably have this next year. I really hope CF parks will have this, but I hope it will work like a Platinum Pass. I am going to CP, KD, and Carowinds next year and this would be a huge deal for myself if I could use the pass at all 3 parks.

Does CF have a suggestion email box to submit this idea?

Any park that is going to offer any kind of a dining plan is going to do something like what Six Flags and Cedar Fair do already: a special meal deal with park ticket. A Major Theme Park used to have an all-you-can-eat wristband deal available, and what they found out was that abuse of the system was outrageous. I'm sure parks aren't real happy when a family of four shares an all-you-can-drink wristband. But they aren't really losing money on that deal. When a family of four starts gaming the food deal, though, the losses can add up pretty quickly.

What I would like to see Cedar Fair do is to tweak some of the food deals to make them actually useful for people who *don't* have families with them, or for groups who *gasp* don't all want to eat the same thing. That is, give me a discount option instead of a BOGO. That would make me much more likely to take advantage of the deal.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

I just read the Six Flags deal just before this thread was started. It sounds like a good deal.

Depending on what time your pass is scanned for entry it adds one lunch and one dinner, or just one dinner onto your season pass. You then use your season pass to "pay" for your meal at participating stands/restaurants throughout the park. When you buy the pass they add a logo or sticker to your season pass so it is all on one card.

It really seems like they are trying to limit/eliminate abuse.

When I read it I thought it would be a great thing for Cedar Point. It did seem very limited in choices though. Mostly burger and fries, chicken tenders and fries, etc.

Wicked Twister T said:
I just read the Six Flags deal just before this thread was started. It sounds like a good deal.

Depending on what time your pass is scanned for entry it adds one lunch and one dinner, or just one dinner onto your season pass. You then use your season pass to "pay" for your meal at participating stands/restaurants throughout the park. When you buy the pass they add a logo or sticker to your season pass so it is all on one card.

It really seems like they are trying to limit/eliminate abuse.

When I read it I thought it would be a great thing for Cedar Point. It did seem very limited in choices though. Mostly burger and fries, chicken tenders and fries, etc.

You took the words right out of my mouth... I thought the exact same thing when I read the details in the articles. I'm crossing my fingers they do something like this for 2013.

RideMan said:

What I would like to see Cedar Fair do is to tweak some of the food deals to make them actually useful for people who *don't* have families with them, or for groups who *gasp* don't all want to eat the same thing. That is, give me a discount option instead of a BOGO. That would make me much more likely to take advantage of the deal.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Amen, Dave. As good a deal as the fry deal was (compared to paying full price) I rarely got it because it is no deal at all for one person. You need at least two people to get any value out of that deal, otherwise, tight seat belts on certain rides are in your future! :)

Would getting a basic season pass and getting a season long meal plan be a good idea for employee's at the park to potentially save money on food. Basically for roughly $200.00 you could eat the basic junk food meals provided in the park either on a break or before or after your shift. Do you think that this will be allowed?Since you can add this option to a season pass for $84.00 it seems like it could be worth it.

I can't say for sure but I would think that an employee purchasing the all-season dining plan would be a violation of the policy.

Coaster Freak, The employees already get a steep discount if you eat at one of the employee areas. I think you'd be better off just doing it that way.

Oh, I think you could get away with it. Anyone can buy a season pass and a dining deal, they get your ID and stuff but you'd have to not mention you work there, and they'd probably be none the wiser. Then you'd probably have to take your meals out of uniform to avoid detection, so that means a quick change or two every day.

But why would you want to? Eat that park food 2 meals a day? I'd imagine the employee cafeteria at least has a salad bar, a hot dish, and a vegetable or two, right? And you already have access to the park, so there goes a season pass for nothing. Sheesh.

I just got my mind blown trying to get food at the new Farmhouse restaurant. Apparently you can only get two meals per day!? We've been passholders for years, and also have gotten dining plans as well. Typically we would try to get food at 11am to start the clock on the 4 hour interval between meals. We would try to get our money's worth by eating at 11am, 3pm, 7pm, and if we got lucky; 11pm. Not because we were hungry, but just because we could. Now to my amazement, there was a gentleman who appeared to be training a new cashier at Farmhouse and informed me of the two meals policy.

After being confused, I left without my third meal of the day and started looking up past meal plan info on CP Food Blog. And the guy was right. So I went from being mad to be confused. Yesterday, we got three meals and no issues.

I wonder if it was only because he was training. Has anyone else experienced anything similar?

I've never even tried because I have known for years it's two meals per day with a minimum four hour break in between.

Anyone ever have one of those days when you’re pretty sure you’ve finally heard everything?

I've always known about the 4 hour intervals, but somehow for years I've missed the 2 meal maximum per day. I wonder if they got updated computers that finally enforced the rule, or if it was because they were training employees. Because seriously... We've been getting 3 meals a day for years!!!

I had the same experience, but a few years ago. I remember a season where just about every weekend, I'd get 2 meals then grab a sub at subway on the way out for lunch on monday. I also remember the advertised 4 hours actually only being 3 1/2 hrs in the system.

Not sure when it changed for me, was before 2020, but I did unsuccessfully argue with guest services about it.

So they just were not enforcing the rule?? That's why I think I'd lean towards only getting "caught" because they were doing training

The system knows. My guess is they simply did an override, either because they didn't want to deal with a hassle or because that's what they are/were at one time trained to do.

One time my pass didn't scan in properly and therefore I was not eligible to redeem a meal because I had never been scanned in. Since I was standing there and matched my photo, I watched them override it, and then I went out and came back in the next time I walked by an entrance gate to make it easier on them for a future meal.

Next time you try and scam a 3rd meal, look at the screen and see if your meals have a blue "Valid" or a red "Invalid" that they then override.