Plaza Inn Birthday Party review

[Eeyorecln]

We just got back from our trip and I'll try to post a trip report later recovering from 16 hour drive today. I just thought I would let people know what we thought of the Happiest Birthday Party at Plaza Inn as a lot of people have asked about birthdays at DL. Let me start with the fact that our family is probably a little larger than most. My DH, myself, and 4 DS's (6, 5, 4, and 1). So the Birthday party was $50(they didn't charge for the baby). Was it worth it? IMHO No. This was to celebrate our son's 1st Birthday and oldest's 7th in a couple weeks. They seat you and pass out cups with juice and cake to decorate. Now my DH who is very artistic took his time and actually decorated his cake the rest of us just slapped it on. Pat E Cake spent less than a minute at our table to say Happy Birthday to my 2 sons. Then supposedly the servers were supposed to come around and judge the cakes. They walked around the room not even pretending to look at all the cakes or even comment on them(My DH, a kid at heart [think Peter Pan] was a little taken aback noone noticed his cake, after all he took his time to make it look cool) Then Mickey and Minnie came and the 2 birthday boys with DH stood in line for the picture while I got ready to take it with the digital camera. My group was the last in line so when we got up there They were in a hurry(And made it obvious) They didn't wait for me to get a good shot with our camera and they took the baby's so quick without trying to get him to look up and smile. They wouldn't let Mickey or Minnie sign autographs just a quick picture. We had bought a special first birthday autograph dog and were hoping to get Mickey and Minnie to sign.(we already had quite a few from our lunch at Goofy's Kitchen but we had the birthday party to see Mickey and Minnie, without the long wait at their houses) They also wouldn't let my other 2 DS's in the picture with my oldest(only birthday people? yet they charge the same amount for them) We sat down to eat our cake and they handed us to go boxes and started cleaning up. Fastforward 2 hours and the cake is crumbly from walking around and a mess. So the breakdown is $10 for a cake you aren't given enough time to eat(and from what I did try wasn't that good just basic, not bakery good), no autographs, and a quick picture that they really don't seem to care if turns out well. They don't interact with you much except for singing a Happy Birthday song and another song at the end. My DH's comment was they took your money tried to rush you through so they could get another group in to take their money. A little cynical but this time I would have to agree. My older kids wanted to know why they couldn't eat their cake while we were there and my oldest was disappointed by the lack of attention on anyone's part(Pat E Cake, Mickey, Minnie, even the cake judges) It just wasn't very magical like I thought it would be. The $50 would have beter been spent on better souvenirs for their birthday gifts. And you ended up waiting in line for autographs and better pics. with Mickey and Minnie anyways. This has the possibility of being really neat and is a wonderful idea. But the reality is it is run badly and is not worth the money when they don't even pretend to be interested in providing something in return. Just one family's opinion and maybe it was an "off day" for them and normally it's better. I just know what we experienced was not Disneyish at all. And was really quite disappointing for the cost.

 

[kjh]

How bad of them to rush through, especially since it is for birthday celebrations. I am glad that we're not going to do this while we are there. I thought about it but since most reviews I saw reported that the cake isn't very good I figured better to save the money and just get the sticker at City Hall and a free dessert at a sit down restaurant. Thanks for letting me know!!

 

[Tink33]

I would send this post in email form to Disney.

I am sorry that the birthday party was so "unbirthdayish".

 

[caimakale]

I went a few weeks ago for my daughters birthday. Personally for $10 I think I got what I paid for. $10 compared to the other character interactions is cheap. I paid $100 for goofy's breakfast and only got to see two or three characters. To pay $40 for the birthday party and get to see pat e cake, mickey and minnie, was a much better value and experience in my opinion.

My experience wasn't much different from yours, we didn't get a whole lot of attention, but nobody did. When we went, mickey was climbing the matterhorn when we started, and then when we left the parade was starting. They don't want mickey at the birthday party and on the matterhorn at the same time. The same goes with several of the other characters. The cake decorating was just a contest where everybody wins. I definitely thought it was worth the $10 per person, which is cheap compared to many other things in the park, and will definitely do it again if we visit during one of my daughters birthdays.

Is it possible you had too high of expectations going into it? I realized it wasn't going to be very one on one when I seen the amount of people during our visit, that were celebrating birthdays. It seemed like 1 out of 10 people had a birthday sticker on. Maybe that is a little over doing it, but it does seem like a ton of people were celebrating birthdays.

Thats my $0.02

 

[Eeyorecln]

I went a few weeks ago for my daughters birthday. Personally for $10 I think I got what I paid for. $10 compared to the other character interactions is cheap. I paid $100 for goofy's breakfast and only got to see two or three characters. To pay $40 for the birthday party and get to see pat e cake, mickey and minnie, was a much better value and experience in my opinion..

It is cheap compared to other meals, but at Goofy's Kitchen they come to your table(you don't have to wait in line) and they do sign autographs as well as take time to pose for pictures. We got some great ones there.
I don't think I had high expectations(ie I expected the cake not to taste great and knew we wouldn't get a lot of time with Mickey and Minnie.) I expected at least 5 min. to get an autograph and a good picture. I got 1 minute to click off a picture and no autograph. And while I understand Mickey and Minnie can't be there long why on earth can't we eat our cake we paid for? Even at a fastfood place they don't kick you out of your table before you finished your fries. Of course this is just my opinion.

 

[caimakale]

I don't know why they didn't allow you to eat your cakes. We ate our cakes, well all that we could stomach, they weren't the best cakes in the world.

 

[Amy&Dan]

I am sorry your experience was so negative! We had the exact opposite experience and thought we got our money's worth and them some. In fact we recently watched the video we shot and all agreed it was a lot of fun. I would definitely contact Disneyland and let them know of your experience. I did notice they didn't really judge the cakes and I can imagine that they would especially not take time to put much emphasis on an adult's cake. I got the impression everybody was meant to be a winner. Since we are a family of very unartistic means, I guess we lucked out they didn't judge our cakes! I still think for $10 its not a bad deal. After all to get a cake for everybody and a drink plus some character interaction is not bad by Disneyland standards. Sorry you didn't enjoy this since it was after all for a special day. I would tell others who may have this booked to maybe give it a try, hopefully the OP caught it on a really off day. I also cannot imagine why you wouldn't have been able to eat your cake since the restaurant is still open before, during and after the celebration. I would have stayed put and told them to clean around me!

 

[tlovesdis]

Sorry to hear your experience was not good! We celebrated my 36th birthday last December in Disneyland and we (party of 3 adults and 3 kids) did the birthday party and we all loved it! I thought for $10 it was a cute way to celebrate and meet one of my favorite characters, Mickey! Granted the cake was not the greatest, but I think it's a well spent $10 in Disneyland and we would definately do it again!

 

[Eeyorecln]

I agree $10 would be cheap for some character interaction. Except for one thing when we went, there was no character interaction, a quick picture and move along. My oldest DS(7) wasn't allowed to stick around long enough to hug Mickey after the picture. If it had been some character interaction(however short,i.e. a hug) I would have been OK with the party. And they should let you know, no autographs ahead of time.(I saw a lot of disappointed kids with their autograph books.) I certainly hope this isn't what others experience and that it was an off day. I think if a birthday child isn't even allowed to hug Mickey, then something's not being run right. All in all I wouldn't discourage others from giving it a try, just do so by making an informed decision. Having done character meals at WDW and DL, I thought we would at least be allowed a hug and a few minutes to get a "good" picture. This was not the case that's all. We were paying really for the Mickey/Minnie part of the experience(as Mickey isn't at any character meals at DL now) So that's just my experience, I just think it's always best to have all info. when deciding how to spend/budget your vacation money.