IVAN FOUND the main ballroom at the Manchester Grand Hyatt had an open date on the second Saturday of March for nearly half the rental fee Lucina had expected. So he secured the date immediately and went into hyperdrive with all of his staff, friends, partners, and new business associates to begin preparing for his big, breakout event.

All of the website advertisers and sponsors were solicited for sponsorship and gift bag contributions. The liquor sponsors were contacted. The radio station ad spots were bought. The catering menu was set. Security teams were secured. A liquor license was applied for, with a bar staff to be hired. All of Lucina’s girls were alerted to spread the word to their contacts in and around the San Diego area. Event tickets were created and set for a sale date, three weeks before the big event online, at selected ticket outlets, and from IDPromotions.com.

On the website, Paul and Jeff set pop-up banners on every page to ask their viewers the questions: “Who Is Ivan David?” “What is an I.D. Promotion?,” and “Where is the big party?”—all to be answered through the upcoming interviews Ivan had set up with the print media.

In the meantime, Julio had solidified his Aftermath Entertainment connection in L.A. So Ivan told Lucina they would do two celebrity events as preludes to his birthday party.

“Who do you have lined up?” she asked him over the phone.

Ivan spoke to her while admiring the view from his balcony again. “Eve and Busta Rhymes are both willing to come down,” he answered. “You know they both work with Dr. Dre now. Then we can go after Xzibit later. He’s real popular with that Pimp My Ride show on MTV now. Maybe we can do an afternoon car show with an after-party tie-in and get some of the car magazines, local dealerships, and automakers involved.

Lucina told him, “I have Nelly Furtado and Timbaland. They are supposed to be working on new projects together.”

“Okay, so we do an event with them after Eve and Busta.”

Lucina paused. She said, “You’re spreading yourself too thin before your big party.”

Ivan brushed it off. “Naw, what I want to do is make sure we take plenty of pictures with them and get my staff writers to interview them for the website. Then I’ll just talk about it all. That’ll only make my birthday party stronger. We’ll make these other events part of the hype.”

Lucina warned him, “I’m just trying to make sure you don’t take all of the customers’ money before asking them for fifty dollars next month.”