Originally Posted by
Vito
What 10% hasn't been done? There are already a bunch of non-Disney-operated hotels on property... Dolphin, Swan, and the Hotel Plaza Blvd hotels.
I'm not seeing any appreciable impact. The people who will be staying at the four seasons are generally a different set of people. For the most part, the Four Seasons will be a separate entity from the Disney hotels. The Grand Floridian will still have it's customers - people who want a more upscale environment but still want to stay at a Disney hotel, people who want the convenience of the monorail loop and the magical "Disney Touch."
The people who stay at the Four Seasons are more likely to be people who normally might not even stay on Disney property at all.
If the Four Seasons was going to build a hotel/resort in the Orlando area, why wouldn't Disney want that hotel to have easy access to their offerings? Disney gets a two-fold benefit from this. They not only get the money from the sale of land, but they get the upscale clients that you can't cater to at the Grand Floridian. As upscale as the GF is for a Disney hotel, it's still mostly families and contains a large percentage of "average Disney guests." The new Four Seasons resort will not have very many of those.
The Four Seasons is a way for Disney to tap into a market that they just can't offer themselves. Believe me, Four Seasons and the Grand Floridian cater, for the most part, to a different guest looking for a significantly different hotel experience.