Nickelodeon Picks Holiday Inn for Kids Hotel

ORLANDO-In a bold $20 million experiment aimed at challenging Walt Disney World’s supremacy in the family destination market, New York-based Nickelodeon and owners of the 800-suite Holiday Inn Family Suites Resort are converting the seven-year-old property to a children’s-themed hotel expected to open in first quarter 2005.

The New York-based children’s cable television network is partnering with Holiday Inn principals Henri Landwirth, a legendary hospitality entrepreneur who bought his first Holiday Inn franchise 25 years ago, former astronaut and US Sen. John Glenn and Terry Whaples, who joined the Landwirth-Glenn team in 1975.

The converted property will be renamed the Nickelodeon Family Suites by Holiday Inn. The site is one mile from the entrance to Walt Disney World and about the same distance to the 18-month-old, $450 million Gaylord Palm Resort and Convention Center. All three locations are 15 miles south of Downtown, off Interstate 4.