by Matt Walstatter, undergrad

An '80s pop song proclaimed "Elvis is everywhere." The King certainly left a major legacy, but the truth of that statement is also a result of the work of public relations specialist David Beckwith, '78. Beckwith has clients ranging from Graceland and the Elvis estate to the world-famous Spago Beverly Hills restaurant.

If you heard anything about August's Elvis Week -- the celebration of Elvis's life that also commemorated the twentieth anniversary of his death -- you are familiar with Beckwith's work. He was behind the scenes at Graceland, orchestrating the week-long event, which was attended by about 40,000 fans. Activities included concerts, riverboat cruises and a candlelight vigil on the eve of the anniversary of King's death that continued into the next morning.

Beckwith started planning for this year's celebration early. "I started aggressively alerting the media last January," he says. "I made an effort to stress that it was the twentieth anniversary of [Elvis's] death. It seemed to snowball; by June it became apparent that we were going to have something huge on our hands."

It turned out to be the biggest Elvis Week yet. One hundred and fourteen television crews and nearly 200 print and radio journalists covered the event, including CNN, MSNBC and the Fox news network, all five of Germany's major networks, three from England and three more from France.

"Every continent except Antarctica and Africa was represented," Beckwith says. "We had somebody going live 24 hours a day for the entire week -- there were so many satellite trucks on the property that we almost ran out of space."

Beckwith never intended to go into public relations. "It wasn't something I studied in college," he says. "I just stumbled into it. I didn't even know what PR firms did."

After graduating from the School of Journalism in 1978, Beckwith moved to Los Angeles, where he spent 11 months trying to break into the advertising business. "Through contacts upon contacts," says Beckwith, "I finally got an interview with Warren Cowan, who is one of the legends of entertainment PR, and I lucked out. I didn't even know who he was, but he hired me on the spot and told me that I should be paying him to work [for his firm]. In retrospect, he may have been right."

Beckwith started off as Cowan's personal assistant. "I answered phones. I picked up his laundry. I handled his life. Not a glamorous job." But he benefited from Cowan's hands-on approach to running the firm. Since Cowan was involved with almost every aspect of the firm's business, Beckwith was also involved in a great deal, he says. Within four months, Beckwith was assigned his first clients. "[Cowan] trusted me," he explains. "I was very fortunate because I was exposed to a lot very fast, and I just took it and ran with it."

He worked in entertainment PR for the next three years, until Cowan's partner, Henry Rogers, decided to build a corporate division within the firm. Beckwith asked to be transferred to the new division, where his success continued.

"A lot of what I was doing was getting products placed in movies and on television, which has turned into a sophisticated industry. I also started expanding with the corporate clients, creating charity events, events that involved celebrities -- anything to get publicity for their products. When you have a celebrity involved with a client, it's easier to get the product in People magazine or on Entertainment Tonight," he says.

It was at the beginning of his stint in the corporate division that he began working with his most famous client, the Elvis estate. The estate hired him in 1982, just three months before Graceland opened to the public. His first assignment: to generate publicity, spread the word that Graceland was opening and bring in the tourists. But along with this came an unexpected hurdle. The initial reaction of the press to the opening of Graceland was fairly negative. They were upset that Elvis's family was making money from the King's legacy.

Beckwith says he never fully understood the negative reaction. "What else are you going to do with Graceland?" he asks. "[Elvis] is buried there. It's not like you're going to turn it into condos. It's very educational. You can look at it and make fun of the shag carpets and the way it's decorated, but it's a piece of American history."

Since that first year, the Elvis account has grown. "It involves coordinating and handling the mass media, as well as fanning interest in Elvis domestically and internationally," Beckwith says. "This can be a huge job."

Beckwith also works a great deal with licensees creating various Elvis products, ranging from movies to ballets to the "Barbie loves Elvis" two-doll set. "A good example of that was in '93 with the Elvis stamp," he says. "The post office wanted to unveil the stamp at 10:00 a.m. the morning of Elvis's birthday in a hotel near Graceland. I came up with the idea of doing it at midnight as it turned into his birthday. And I said, 'Let's get a rock and roll band. Let's get a gospel band. Let's put up a huge tent, have fireworks, make an incredible event out of this.' And it worked."

In 1991, after heading the corporate division of Rogers and Cowan for more than six years, Beckwith decided to strike out on his own, forming the Beckwith Company. To remain on good terms with Rogers and Cowan, he didn't actively solicit any of his clients. But most, including the Elvis estate, decided to stick with him.

Now, six years later, Beckwith is at a turning point once again: his business is growing fast. "My whole idea when I started the company was to be as small as I could and still be profitable. If I continue to grow, I can't be as personally involved with each client, and that's one thing I like about the way it is right now."

Although he only has one other full-time employee, he has eight freelancers, some of whom work exclusively for him. "I have people working on every client's account, but I still am able to maintain close relationships with each client and remain involved and travel to some of the events."

He believes that this personal involvement is the key to his continued success, and he has even turned away clients, because he didn't think that he could give them the attention they deserved.

Whether he expands or not, Beckwith will certainly continue to work in PR. "I love working with clients, coming up with ideas and executing them. That's what makes it fun for me. What I like best about my job is the variety. I can go from Elvis to dealing with the New York Film Festival to the Golden Globes in Hollywood. I could never get bored, and that's the good part."