Pin Trading on the Disney Cruise Ships

Pin Trading on the Disney Cruise Ships

       For those of you who love pin trading you will be happy to know there is pin trading on the DCL. You will find a selection of pins, both Cruise Line Exclusive and general Disney in the shops. There are open edition and limited edition pins for the cruise line. There are even special pins only available on Disney’s privet island Castaway Cay, these are not even sold on the ship. They do have Pin with Purchase mystery pins you can buy for a fraction of the price of usual pins if you make a purchase above a certain amount. These come sealed in a black plastic bag so you can’t see what it is before you purchase. Often these are completer pins for sets.

       You will find Officers and Crew around the ships and on Castaway Cay with pins to trade. You will also see other guests with lanyards, bags and books of pins to trade. Every night between dining times there is pin trading in the lobby. They bring out rolling pin displays where you can purchase pins to this and other locations. They do announce the time and location of the pin trading events in the Personal Navigator you are given every day so keep your eyes open.

       One evening of your cruise a good number of the Officers of the ship stand in the lobby and trade pins with the passengers. It is a lot of fun trading with them. They all line up in their Dress White Uniforms and chat with passengers as they look over their pins. As in the parks Officers and Crew with lanyards will trade any pin you want for any pin you wish to trade. The other guests can and often do say no thank you to trades.

       I will be honest there is less trading on the ships than in the parks but it is still fun and I suggest you pack traders to take along. You never know what treasure you will find or how you will make someone’s day with a trade. Even if other passengers will not trade with you the Officers and Crew will.

       We took about two hundred pins with us on our last cruise. We did not trade many but we sure made a few kids happy. We have a little game we play. When my DH finds a child who does not have a pin to trade but would like one of his pins he sends the child over to me with a request. The child walks up to me and says, “Your husband needs a pin to trade. He asked me to get it for him.” I pull a pin out of a little bag I carry then tell the child to take the pin back to my husband and trade it for any pin they want or keep that pin if they wish. I think we gave out twenty or thirty pins that way on our one week cruise. What a joy to see the happy faces! The parents enjoyed it just as much as the children.