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This Just In

Bill Peeper to Retire from Orlando CVB at Year End

HIL ANDERSON, SENIOR EDITOR

Orlando, FL – Ending a two decades long career in the convention business, Bill Peeper announced June 26 he would retire on December 31st as the only president the Orlando/Orange County Convention & Visitors Bureau (Orlando CVB) has ever had.

A search committee headed by Mark McHugh, the chairman of the bureau board, will name a replacement for the venerable Peeper by the time he leaves the office at the end of the year.

Peeper, who was there when the Orlando CVB became operational in 1984, previously was president of the Greater Hartford Convention & Visitors Bureau and also worked for the New Orleans Tourist & Convention Commission and the Dayton Area Chamber of Commerce.

Under his leadership, the Orlando CVB grew from a staff of two into a 150-employee operation with four satellite convention offices and five overseas tourism offices.

Peeper is a former chairman of the Florida Association of Convention and Visitors Bureaus and the Destination Marketing Association International. He was inducted into the Florida Tourism Hall of Fame in 2002.

He said that at age 63, he wasn’t quite ready to call it quits and was exploring his options. “I’ve been doing the same thing for 25 years and it’s time for a bit of a change,” he told Trade Show Executive magazine. Peeper plans to remain in Orlando, noting, “This community has been so unbelievably good to me and I am very committed to staying here.”

Reach Bill at (407) 363-5872 or bpeeper@orlandocvb.com; Mark McHugh at (407) 855-5496.

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