Thanks to social distancing measures and much lower than usual attendance, visitors on the first day were, dare we say, graced with an unusually intimate Elvis experience.
If Graceland is back in business, can Memphis — and America — be far behind?
But if marketers and tourism officials had at least one eye on the big picture, Graceland visitors during the attraction's first day of operation after nine weeks of coronavirus-motivated shutdown were focused on a portrait of Elvis presented — unexpectedly — in extreme closeup. As a result, visitors — or"guests," in Graceland parlance — found themselves in tour groups with as few as six people. This enabled them to spend alone time with their thoughts — and with the narration provided by their iPad audio tour guides — as they contemplated Elvis' white piano, his peacock stained-glass windows and his Jungle Room zebra stripes.
There was a family of four from Denver. A man in a Trump 2020 camo cap from Houston. A tan blonde from Newport Beach, California. And that was just in Thursday's first half-hour of operation. Most visitors were first-timers, but any returnees would have noticed several unromantic coronavirus-related changes to their"Date with Elvis" .
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