All Inclusive vs Self Catering

[Happyinheels]

Hi!

I am looking at holidays abroad for me and my 2 teens this summer. I just wanted to pick your experiences re all inclusive vs self catering.

We did the all inclusive experience a couple of years ago. It was great not having to think about food shopping, cooking and cleaning up!! Also, barely needed any spending money. Obviously the cost of the holiday is huge compared to self catering.

I'm looking at places to go. I don't have lots of money. Self catering is much cheaper as a holiday price but realistically does it work out cheaper in the long run?
I hope you're following my waffle here 😂🙈

Any tips or examples of your experiences, places to go would be so appreciated thank you 😊

We usually SC, because we like to have the space of entire house or apartment and I read reviews to make sure that there is a supermarket nearby. Can you save money SC? Yes, absolutely, if you're prepared to buy in stuff and eat in your accommodation at least some of the time. We tend to eat out one meal a day and in the other two. The disadvantage, of course, is that it's more work for you and it's less relaxing. You have to shop, serve and clear away meals, but if it makes the difference between going on holiday and not, then IMO it's definitely worth it. We've never done AI, but we've done HB a few times, and it is nice to just turn up at the restaurant and it's all done for you.

I think with teenagers AI is would be much more suitable they can then go get themselves drinks/snacks all day without having to keep asking for money.

I always went self catering as a kid and can remember the first time going AI age 12 and I thought It was amazing then I could go to the bar/restaurant myself

We always go AI, just much easier with the kids not having to worry about food and drink

We went to olu Deniz in turkey this year and found the cost of food and drink outside of the hotel really good value for money

I go AI for a couple of reasons.

I’m on holiday, I don’t want to have to cook and clean. Therefore if we have ever gone SC we eat out every meal anyway so it ends up just as expensive as AI.
DS is a fussy bugger, so AI means we can just puts bits on his plate we know he’ll like, and get something different if he won’t eat it.
DH and I like to have a drink on holiday so AI tends to be cheaper for us rather than paying bar prices.
I make sure I find a hotel that has apartments or family rooms/suites for the extra space. This isn’t common but they are available for AI.

Downsides are being tied to the complex for meals and depending where you go the buffet restaurants can be a bit poor quality. This isn’t too much of a problem if you choose a decent complex with good reviews, a choice of restaurants and at least 4 stars (although I’ve been to really good 3 star too)

Choose somewhere with a few pools, decent activities and close enough to the beach to be able to pop back to the hotel for lunch.

Where as I’d never do AI. It’s killing tourism and local businesses. Love to self cater with the option of how, when and where we eat.

Could think of nothing worse than being stuck in a resort. But could also think of nothing worse then being some where with loads of brits either.

Each to their own.

For us, it worked out cheaper to go AI. But if we go SC, we don't cook. We might eat breakfast in but lunch and dinner would be out, so it does work out more expensive. We went AI last year, we had one meal outside of the hotel so we spent about £100 in a week on top of the holiday cost.

We always choose the breakfast only option. We like to be able to choose a local restaurant for dinner and don't drink so all inclusive would usually work out really expensive for us. The one time we did do it was in Sri Lanka where we stayed in an eco resort away from everything and there weren't any restaurants etc about.

We always go on all inclusive with 3 DC.. just find it easier not finding somewhere to eat to suit everyone and works out cheaper!

Like Stringofpearls we do breakfast only option or self cater.
We enjoy the freedom and act of strolling out to restaurants and different bars.
The AI places have more in the way of facilities for teens in terms of water slides on site but the compromise is meals are like whacky races a buffet scrum with every meal tasting the same as the last. The good thing about AI would be you know the cost upfront. I think tiu’d Have to pay a lot to get a really good one particularly in school hols.

We did AI several times as it is easier if you stay in the resort.

But, we also like to go out, have trips away from the resort and like to try small restaurants and go for lunch and dinner. So, in most cases we paid extra but as it was a 50/50 split between time at the resort and trips I was prepared to pay for the luxury not to worry about an extra drink or ice cream.

I personally do not really like buffet style, regardless how nice the food is. I like sitting down, being served from a menu and relaxing and not standing in a queue and missing eating with my family. So after 2-3 nights we really need to go out.

We already told DD (now 11) we will do bed and breakfast in October and then see how we get along as we will be outside the resort more than staying in.

We also love self catering. There is nothing better than buying on a local market and just sitting down with a nice glass of wine and fresh food. In the villa we normally just did cold meals, cured meat, fresh bread, cheese or similar. I hardly ever cooked apart from throwing meat on the bbq.

It might be cheaper to go mid range AI than SC/B&B and eat out, but you're not really comparing like with like.

If you eat out at least once a day, at a proper restaurant where they serve you at a table, the experience and food is likely to be much nicer. You have to decide what you want to do - put in a small amount of effort, but have nicer food, or risk the AI buffet, with a worse experience and food.

We tend to go B&B and eat out at a restaurant at least once a day. Third meal either at the accomodation or big ice cream/snack.
Couple of supermarket runs for drinks, snacks, ice creams and easy food like barbecue, pizza, salad, bread, ham, cheese, olives etc.

Everyone pulls their weight with food preparation and clearing up - there are 4 of you so should all share equally. No cleaning required except keeping the kitchen usable and even some apart hotels will do bed making/bathroom cleaning etc anyway.

I didn't see reluctantbrits post before I posted, but great minds think alike

I just can't think of anything worse than an AI package holiday. That's probably not helpful!

Self catering where you cook at least 50% of the meals is much cheaper than AI.

If you eat out every meal there might not be much difference.

Not all AI are bland tasteless food however. And theres a lot to be said with the convenience with kids. If they don't like whats on their plate, no problem get something else. If they say they're not hungry at meal times, no problem come back later for a snack. Makes things so easy.

We tend to do half board or B&B. DH doesn't drink so AI holds zero appeal for him.
We did it once in Varadero, Cuba but after the intensity of Havana it was quite nice to just chill around a pool (and drink frozen daiquiris all day for me).
Breakfast is always fairly late so we hold out until dinner, if we do go out for dinner we will have an earlier breakfast and use our half board for lunch.

I thought AI would be terrible until I tried it, found it was great, excellent, well presented food & ideal with a teenager. But it was quite an ‘upmarket’ resort . DH had been the previous year to a different place & he said meal times were a total scrum.

So it really depends where you go.

I’ve had years of S/C holidays and am just so sick of the same old having to think about & cook meals that it is great to just not have to be responsible for meal planning for once. Even if you go out to eat you have the debate & compromise about what restaurant to choose (first world problem I know).

The AI holiday we had didn’t include alcohol (sadly ).

I like AI where there are different places to eat...
it means I’m not mean mum in the ‘no’ game- you can do all the activities and eat all the food and cruciallyvtry new foods
With teenagers turkey will be best bet otherwise you pay adult prices whereas there I think it’s to 13
Magic life hotels would be good for teens

Tried both, much prefer SC. We'll eat out about every other evening and most lunchtimes.

With AI you feel beholden to stay in the resort/hotel as it's a waste of money otherwise, and that puts a huge dent into being able to enjoy wherever it is that you are. You miss out on so much by not doing the local eateries.

I love AI

It didn't stop us from eating out at all if we fancied it last summer. As both my teens are over 12, we pay for 4 adult prices. Compared to self catering, we would only 'save' maybe £800 over a 2 week period had we chose SC. Then that money of course would go on eating out, supermarkets, plus the hassle of cooking, buying bar drinks. Nope.

The other thing about AI resorts is they are often in the back of beyond so it is a trek to potter about and explore the area. We did AI twice wheb the kids were younger but after 3 or 4 days it felt like a prison and I was fed up of largely the same big standard fare.

We go AL but also eat out a couple of nights to mix it up

Horses for courses really. We have done both over the years. We found AI good for when we went on holiday with the DC so there were all the sports facilities/activities/endless snacks to occupy them/others to play/hang out with. If they're happy, you're happy. As they got older they enjoyed more sightseeing/culture so we started to do S/C which can be pretty relaxing in a different way. We would do a big shop at a supermarket at the start so we had stuff in for breakfast/plenty of snacks, and eat out too. It gave us a lot of flexibility as we could go out sightseeing without thinking we were missing our AI lunch that we'd paid for. It was also lovely to try different restaurants. There are aparthotels where they have pools and things like tennis courts to keep them busy but you have an apartment with a kitchen so you can eat in to save cash if you want to. Maybe that would suit you.

Hate AI, don't like eating buffet food, don't drink and don't want to be surrounded by people who are, and there's just too many people in these places for my liking. Much prefer SC and eating in local restaurants. Main reasons being I like to know exactly where I'm staying/the view etc.This year I've booked a private apartment in the canaries with excellent reviews, the complex is part holiday lets, part private owners. No sunbed wars, it has a proper kitchen, a king-size bed with decent bedding, comfy sofa, good shower, flat screen TV/UK channels, dvd player, wifi and sunloungers on the balcony. 3 pools/poolside bar/tennis courts , gym and supermarket next door, waterpark and beach 5 min walk away. £330 for a week in july and I got the last remaining week left this year! It's just me and DS and this sort of holiday suits us perfectly.