Afraid I’m having to throw the towel in on these due to mixture of stress, being overworked, genuine menopausal pain & feeling pretty close to nervous breakdown etc with no real outlet (sadly a blog about unrealistic corporate wankers is not an outlet).
I’m still convinced lovely Duck faced (in an adorable way) Dani should win this having been the only candidate (other than the foolishly discarded cannon fodder Greg) to have shown initiative and adaptability throughout the tasks. Joe and Simba have their charms (especially Simba – I’m impressed at someone casually closing a deal in mandarin), Rochelle seems astute and likeable, but Dani is the woman to beat.
This week I mainly felt for Bradley who project managed a task to advertise an electric motorbike (having been elected PM due to his knowledge of the market) but his Caf-E racer suggestion was ignored in favour of Avi’s truly awful ZIÆ ZAÆ (damn you Webdings) and Shazia’s insanely terrible branding & picking an actress who couldn’t ride a bike for the video (having bullied Brad into leaving her in charge of the branding team) so the advert was all about how easy it was to wheel a bike into a cafe and mansplain to a lady how it would work if only they weren’t trapped in a cafe – all of which lost in Lord Sugar’s eyes, but I can’t help feeling that the true loser was Marnie’s “vision” of “Soldier” which was branded like Trojan condoms was being advertised in a local cinema ad, with added faux leatherette plait flicking from Marnie herself in the billboard video.
Shazia unsurprisingly went home – so we are left with this lot. My money is on Reece, Avi or Mark to go home next.
All you need to know about this episode is Palourde is pronounced Pal-yu-ord and is a type of Clam. Not that the producers seem to care whether we know or not.
“Is that a fish?” asks Joe. “Could be,” agrees Rochelle. Nobody phones a fishmonger and spells it to them. It’s pretty much the strategy of the day – blind stabs in the dark, giving up or in Reece’s case not actually listening to a word anyone says. I’ll get to him.
Well it’s scavenger hunt time in lovely Brighton, and including the clams, the list looks very much like a pervert party shopping list. Just add poppers.
The rest of the items are:
A Cast of a Body Part of a Candidate (we get Joe’s slightly discounted lips – despite Avi allegedly insulting the body part cast maker of Brighton – for Affinity and Sohail’s full price belly button from the same bloke whose now randomly decided to not give big discounts for Excelsior).
Affinity end up paying £110 after being quoted £160
Excelsior pay £144 as the maximum this man says he ever drops is 10%
A Puppet.
A “Lace Frontal” which Salon owner Rochelle confidently identifies as a wig. Sadly she’s not the only beauty savvy candidate as Denisha also identied this and managed to pay over £70 less for it.
I heart Denisha’s little smile.
A Sussex Trug, which is the sort of basket upper middle class AirBNB hosts might pop you some breakfast croissants on. Affinity literally walk past one in a flea market. Mind you Karren does put her resting bitch face in the way.
Nautical Barometer. Bradley correctly assesses that this is one used on a boat, so one with a horseshoe on it is confidently rejected. They get Rachel to save one for them at her Bazaar where it’s snaffled by Meghan before Affinity can get there.
Awkward
I do love Megan’s face in the boardroom as Simba mentions losing the barometer to her shenanigans.
There’s only one very unseaworthy barometer left, which they rush back and grab and then get fined for having bought the wrong one. Alas cruel fate.
The 1974 Eurovision Song Contest Single on 45 – included just to make me feel old as nobody knows what a 45 is. In fact this whole task highlights things millenials don’t know. Considering one of these is apparently reading a map I’m reassured that if Logan’s Run became a reality nowadays (look it up Youngsters!) that the under 30s would be too lacking in orienteering skills to ever hunt me down. Never mind confusing them with barometers – they’d be baffled by compasses. Not even Never Eat Shredded Wheat would help them out. In fact it’s only Dani who has any semblence of strategy in this task by suggesting one team find and go for more remote items (found through phone calls) and they work their way towards the centre. She definitely saves Simba in this task. Denisha goes for completely slipshod randomness but does allocate her subteam the items which she recognises.
It’s also a Tale of Two Record Shop Owners. Al who, when Mark (leading the Excelsior subteam of Victoria, Marnie and Meghan rather rudely interupts Victoria’s negotiation to suggest £2 was too much for a record and he was going to offer 50p but
So Al decides to teach Mark and his faux cockney bants a lesson – he reels him in..
And sucker punches him.
I like to think that had Al picked up on Mark calling him “son” he’d have said £1.95 (Karren does bust Mark’s balls in the boardroom by stating that Al would’ve sold the record to Victoria for 75p and the trug they missed was only a tenner).
Then there’s this the rather louche Alex who definitely saw Shazia coming.
Somehow she sort of gets away with this and with saying it is a special record for them (has nobody taught this woman to haggle?) and she gets the record for £2.25 after complimenting Alex’s tie. It’s almost a sympathy discount.
Sahara Desert Rose Asparagus Picked Fresh that Day
Let’s include these latter two under the heading Reece’s folly and deal with them now. I started off quite liking Reece. He combined things I tend to feel positive about – theatre, smiling and Scottishness. As the weeks have gone by this sheen has worn off and now I’m on the verge of loathing the man (in only a ranty blogger way – I am sure he is a delight) because his persona seems like a veneer to hide the fact that he takes himself incredibly seriously and will not consider listening to anyone else. I hope he proves me wrong. Perhaps there’s lots of people with regional accents who work in the arts who are actually monsters. In fact – perhaps I am a monster!
However if you phone a florist who is obviously googling and they say this:
Don’t pretend you heard her say “Thistle” and then not mention “thistles” at all. Don’t assume the woman who earns a living selling flowers knows nothing about flowers and don’t ignore the other woman who makes a living selling flowers who says roses are literally her favourite flowers but she’s never heard of that.
What’s more annoying is Sohail repeats the word “fossils” in a wait, what sort of way and asks if it’s NOT a flower only for Reece to not allow him to get an answer and demand the phone to go on about bloody flowers.
So that’s Reece not listening and only hearing what Reece wants to hear exhibit one.
Here’s exhibit 2. “The Asparagus Situation” as Reece termed it.
Despite them not confirming the veggies are freshly picked Reece gets everyone to drive miles out to the farm shop and ONLY then double checks the provenance of the asparagus.
Upon hearing the asparagus is older than required Reece goes all red and kicks off. You can almost see the veins on his temple start to throb.
That passive aggressive Thank you very much performed along with a proper flounce off – that’s Reece..
But not content with a flounce he also calls the retailer back to have a bitch to them like a big Karen. And he holds the phone like he’s Morrissey singing about injustice.
“Oh mother I just came up to get the asparagus spears! I thought they were young and full of hope. But when I got there they were dead and the smell of them decaying fills my nose like [UNINTELLIGLE SHRIEK AND DAFFODILL DANCE] *Morrissey “The Asparagus is Dead.
“WHY DID YOU LIE!? ABOUT THE ASPARAGUS! I HOPE YOU DIE. OR CATCH A VIRUS” etc etc
Anyhow after penalties and NOBODY finding clams Affinity win, which seems to send Avi onto an insane spiral of undeserved self belief.
Less said about the reward the better… truly the creme de la Menthe of prizes.
With nobody else in the theatre this seems excruciating.
Unless you’re Bradley. Say no more.
Denisha proves she has some nous by bringing in the two people who messed up most (well apart from herself): Reece and Mark. It’s not enough to save her as she had to prove her worth after being made to lead this week (and obviously be punished for ousting Gregory. I will NOT forget!).
Here’s my ratings
Should win: Dani
Like: Simba, Rochelle, Joe, Sohail,
Evil Genius: Megan
Meh: Marnie, Avi, Victoria
Stil Not Convinced by: Bradley,
Barking Mad: Shazia, Avi, Mark
Close to Loathing with an Intense Flame (or just mildly irritated by): Reece
Well there’s late and there’s only catching up on the show 6 days after it aired due to illness. Honestly I’d recommend you check out this fantastic Apprentice blog https://ariadnereviews.com/ which is not only actually timely, but written much much betterer. I’m not reading the latest till after I’ve posted (so I can see everything I missed –although this blog will be short and sweet – with a lot less photos as they seem to really take it out of me. I’m too old for this game – unlike Avi who responds to this week’s 4am call summoning them to the Regent Street Cinema by doing push ups – clearly a psychopath!). So it’s going to be a creative task, which has Mr Theatre Reece practically gushing, whereas Simba is keen to try out his dramatic voice over potential. “IN a WORLD” he intones ominously, “Where ALIENS EXIST!”. Nobody tell Suella Braverman.
Every series there’s an attempt at Sugar Washing our grumpy, belined shortarse git of a Lord into something sexier, more youthful or even likeable – be it as a VR avatar or in this case as a cartoon silver fox/Cockney barrow boy in a short piece celebrating the BBC’s centenary.
This bit is awkward.
Poor old Karen and Tim don’t get to fill those cartoon chairs, but have to stand at the sides like empty handed usherettes. Maybe they weren’t sure if Claude would be well enough to be taking part when the animation was commissioned?
So the task is to create a preschool kids cartoon with a new character and an original storyline and pitch to CBeebies.
Teams are jiggled with Dani, Shazia and Marnie joining the boys team. Simba, Gregory, Reece and Joe are sent to the girls where Rochelle suggests Excelsior as the team name…
but Joe suggests the “less of a mouthful” “APEX”, which sounds cold and clinical to me, the sort of name a corporate dickhead would suggest, but of course everyone listens to the new men, and Rochelle looks sad.
She’s not forgetting this.
Reece jazz hands his way to team leader and perhaps it starts going wrong here as having created a theatre school, nobody seems to challenge him too much. “We need kids to see themselves. A human in the real world going through real life situations” he begins, and proceeds to define kids as only adults speaking about kids can; forgetting what children might enjoy in favour of “teaching about kindness” and inclusion – all of which can be done extremely effectively but presumably little kids, who are generally kinder and less likely to discriminate than bigger kids (based on the 2-4 year olds I know & have known – and me many decades ago I’d have been arguing for monsters and fart gags with disabled or non-white characters included but not as the hub of the story) need entertainment to even engage. I agree with Reece that disability inclusion is huge and often forgotten (anyone using public transport should be aware of this). Rochelle, as a parent, argues for inclusion of a darker skinned family as well as “a child in a wheelchair” (because that’s shorthand for disability – oh dear there’s so many cans of worms opened in this episode). Reece puts himself in charge of the story team (“As that’s what I specialise in”) and asks who would be happy designing. At this point Gregory foolishly pipes up “I haven’t a lot of experience in this industry but am happy to go in either”. Denisha puts herself forward claiming “I’ve really got an idea of what we can create”. She then adds her credentials “just to give you an idea.. I’m the eldest of my brother and sister I’ve got plenty of experience with kids and all and things like that”. Ouch. It’s like she’s seen people bigging themselves up and thought she ought to and this is what she had to go with. Later in the episode Gregory is judged harshly for NOT bullshitting. Just saying. She leads Simba, Meghan and Victoria in the character subteam at Hocus Pocus studios where her first challenge is to find “one girl name and one boy name” which they agree should be alliterative. Denisha suggests “Femi and Faye” but Victoria finds Faye a bit “generic” whereas “Fifi” would be catchier. Denisha chooses to die on the hill of Faye (“Fifi sounds like a pets name I’ve never come across anyone called Fifi” – er doesn’t that make it original?!) and spends a good amount of time slapping Victoria into line by insisting on Faye. When it comes to actual ideas she’s clueless. They presumably spend ages coming up with a wheelchair bound Faye then simply copy and paste bits and change the colour and hair for Femi
which Simba ends up leading whilst Denisha changes the colour T-shirt and signs off on these two children of courage.
“The main thing is they have faces you know” Simba tries to focus on the bright side like a doctor breaking to parents that their kids have lost their feet in a terrible photoshop threshing machine accident. Look at it this way – shoes are expensive!
Denisha completely freezes as Victoria and Meghan do all the work advising the infinitely patient graphic designer on the layout of the title page interjecting only to add “Yeah”.
Malfunction!
The graphic designer does perk up when it’s time to show Reece the characters.
Muhawawawa!
I have to say Reece’s face drop is a beaut.
“Does he have no feet?” asks Rochelle. Reece chooses to ignore this and focus on what the characters can do in his epic tale of a disabled child being unable to play on a slide so an able bodied boy playing pat-a-cake (hands free version) with her instead. Ironically the missing feet cock-upheld within it the resolution to Reece’s awful patronising storytelling by maybe making them both disabled. So they can’t play football but can lie on the grass shaking or something instead.
But sadly no. The clap is still in.
Wash your mind out! And it looks like a proper slap fest.
I’m also not sure why Femi has to go and push Faye’s wheelchair here.
Is that part of the game? If only Faye had hands she could return the “favour” by patting Femi’s afro maybe?FFS.
Gregory tries to get some input by moving a tree so they can see the sun coming up and goes on a long technical explanation whilst I zone out, but I think by now everyone knows the tree is the least of their worries. He could have done better not drawing attention to himself or taking up time.
The other team just agree to be Affinity – there’s no arguments, presumably because nobody has a dictionary. I wonder if someone just mispronounced Infinity. Sohail and Avi lock horns over who has most experience working with children or having been a child ever in order to be PM, with Sohail having run his own martial arts business actually working with kids, but Avi aces this because since 2002 his Dad has run a nursery. Erm. Avi explains (well not really) that he’s worked directly with little kids and not just acquired skillz through family osmosis. So even though Sohail has actually created a brand for kids, Avi is voted leader. I actually like Avi’s laid-back style where he accepts people’s expertise (and presumably will let them be foisted on their own petards if they’re bullshitting). Dani, also looking for an inclusion angle, suggests the main character should be a giraffe worried about being too tall for school (I’m out – but carry on), with the moral being that everyone is different but we all come together in harmony – which actually does work better for the age range. Marnie argues for a bad-tempered camel called Grumpy Humpy (which I can DEFINITELY identify with). “That’s teaching children if you moan about something you get what you want” Dani objects (so it’s pointing out how unfair life is!). Sadly the shit of the desert is outvoted in favour of the horizontally challenged giraffe. Avi selects Mark, Bradley and Dani (sub team leader (as the story team whilst he leads the rest on character. Shazia’s not ready to be outdone on wokeness (she undergoes a terrifying character transformation in this episode and simply will not leave off on her mission, forgetting the actual aim of the task) and suggests a female giraffe of ethnic descent which is encapsulated by putting a pink bow on the giraffe’s head and calling it Yogita. Nobody thinks it sounds like a bacterially enhanced yoghurt. In design everyone nods whilst Dani gets the graphic designer to move jungle plants about on screen like she’s a pro. Visionary. Shazia gets the grumpy hump about the lack of intersectionality or protected characteristics in the story but Dani sticks to her guns that it’s easier for kids to understand physical differences. The story involves Yogita getting an elephants ball down for a tree for them at school and thus making friends despite her nerves. Nobody considers the plight of the shortarse elephant – a sector that I can very much identify with. Are we doomed to wait for Giraffe saviours to rescue our balls from trees, or should the lesson learnt be (pretty much like footless Femi and Fay) to simply avoid ball games. So much for the social model of ability! Woke only works when you include the people affected by an inequality or barrier – and come up with practical solutions based on removing those barriers rather than patting people affected on the head.
Anyhow the best bit of this episode is the market research session. Well aside from Mark being terrifyingly intense again.
Yogita gets this reaction.
There’s some concern the kids can’t say “Yogita” but they give it a damn good go, which aint a bad sign.
However Femi and Faye sends most of the kids to sleep so the mum’s lay in on the crap production values and patronising story. Or as Denisha puts it to Reece.
The positive was the sleeping children…
So the candidates pitch their cartoons to CBeebies and there’s nothing that can be added from this that hasn’t been said already so we need to talking about Avi’s evil monkey trousers.
Not only the stuff of nightmares but I like how as they go along the team gets slightly less on board with the animal theme.
Avi seems to think he’s Russell Brand so over-punctuates and leaves long useless pauses for no reason (not laughs definitely) but Dani’s enthusiasm and the whole not being as shit as the other team wins it for Affinity who go to drink cocktails in a ballpit. Stop that!
Reece is manipulated into bringing back Gregory as it’s all about input not about quality of input. Denisha is bought back too for the missing hands and feet, but ultimately Gregory is doomed which I’m not even going to rant about. *Swears copiously for an hour – or as Marnie would say:
Sorry I’m so late, but last week’s headache is still clinging on and has crawled from the base of my skull to behind my eyes from where it glowers malevolently, occasionally pinching my shoulders. I actually managed to see my GP(!) who thinks it’s a sinus infection and has given me antibiotics, but having foolishly consulted Dr Google I’ve been too scared to sleep most of the week.
Anyhow the remaining 17(!) candidates are summoned with a low-key stereotypical gong sound to Hutong Chinese restaurant up the Shard, where the task is to create and sell Bao Buns – sweet ones to a corporate client and savoury to Joe and Josephine Public.
I never knew Bao Buns could look like this.
Sad to say that Claude was unwell during filming for this episode which means Tim gets to hover benignly – hope Claude is/was better soon.
Rochelle’s a big bun fan
and is keen to lead the girls team, but she’s challenged by Victoria who runs a pick and mix, and in her trolley dolly days was erm aware of exotic food (cue hacky face from Rochelle). Then Megan steps in with her extensive restaurant experience including currently running a sweet & dessert company (when does that ever win the apprentice?) and both Victoria and Rochelle pull hacky faces.
Megan wins, but cannily puts Rochelle in charge of the kitchen & market sales team with Dani and Victoria, which makes Rochelle happy that her food skills have been recognised – but is probably a trap. Rochelle needs someone “comfortable with numbers” to help keep costs down and Megan turns to rabbit in the headlights Shannon, who short of saying 1+1=3 does everything to try to get out of doing hard sums.
Victoria offers to swop as she does costings in her business, but Megan’s not listening or changing her sub-team (despite Victoria actually being in the same fricking sub team!) so Shannon it is. She looks ecstatic.
Bradley (despite it not being his “bag”) as another bao lover who claims to enjoy cooking, puts himself forward tentatively as PM for the boys, giving them several chances to put themselves forward instead, and is met with tumbleweed.
Kevin says they’ll back Bradley 100%. Bradley’s all about the meat
and Gregory is happy to support Bradley’s meat.
The boys all agree that meat would be most popular.
Oh grow up Simba. (and me – sorry!)
Despite Bradley’s cooking claims, he sticks himself in charge of the corporate sales sub team. Reece, Avi, Mark and Gregory are consigned to the kitchen (& market selling) with Kevin as their sub-team leader. Kevin blinks, “I’m obviously an accountant, I don’t have experience in selling or making food” he starts, but Bradley explains he thinks Kevin will keep on top of timings and raise morale in the kitchen with his loveable Irish charm or something and Kevin admits defeat.
Meanwhile the girls brainfart ideas without actually confirming anything. Rochelle’s keen on fishy bao as she thinks fish is cheaper. Where does she shop? The Faroe islands? Dani tries to bring them back to the notion that the task is all about profit so veggies would be the most cost-effective filling. She’s right, so of course she’s outvoted & fish it is.
Rochelle argues, fish can be seasoned to taste more delicious. Which is why first thing in the kitchen she’s aiming to mix it with Katsu Curry AND Sriracha. Just in case there’s any risk of tasting some actual fish.
THE FISH SHOULD BE THE OTHER FLAVOUR YOU OVER-SAUCY MINX!
(She’s worried that otherwise people will know they’ve used basa fish and not cod. It’s not like they’re going to advertise it as cod is it?)
It quickly descends into the sort of chaos you’d get from a hen party having a free for all at a Mongolian BBQ with ingredients getting chucked in all over the shop.
A scowling Karren lurks, wondering if anyone’s writing down quantities or costs.
Uh oh!
They eventually decide on a flavour and everyone wants to taste test, but Karren snaps as they’re nearly at the deadline to order ingredients.
They work out they need 45g of dough per bun for 400 buns. Then it goes downhill.
You literally have a pen and paper there! What the hell is happening. Why not times by 100 then by 4. In fact Rochelle’s sub-team phone must have a fricking calculator on it!
They work out it’s “1800” as Karren sadly shakes her head.
Eventually she explodes suggesting they redo their maths and eventually after that SUBTLE clue they realise they were missing a zero.
Karren’s got no patience now and demands they make the order there and then (“The shop is closing and whatever you say now is going to be ordered for you”), so it’s 20kg of dough and “How much basa?”
Despite Victoria’s concern they go for the 1kg, only realising the error after Karren closes the metaphorical shop.
Yes a twentieth of the dough as a filling should be erm, nicely meagre. To be fair there’s a similar ratio of bread to filling in any supermarket prawn sandwich nowadays.
Reese efficiently bosses the boys kitchen talking through the most cost-effective ingredients and moving on – ending up in three straight moves with something I would eat (harissa, chicken and chorizo), that’s actually been costed and taste tested by Mark. Bosh! Kevin’s worked out the total cost – it all seems to be going smoothly.
Too smooth if you ask me. Rochelle would have added those orange segments and olives by now..
Simba pep talks the boys on the way to the corporate pitch at kids travel brand Trunki. It’s all about rapport.
Bradley insists on leading the pitch, finding out what they’re prepared to spend then working backwards. Joe suggests agreeing a set price to start with and Simba agrees they should be starting at £8, but Bradley just wants to play it by ear. ie. not listen to them.
Trunki’s 16th birthday is looming and they have a dinosaur Trunki coming out. Bradley asks what their budget is. “I don’t think it’s relevant” sighs Trunki Trevor before insisting he could buy 6 buns for £3.95 on the high street, before leaning back and passively aggressively sipping from his near empty beaker of water. Ooh. Tough guy!
Bradley meekly suggests that bespoke buns start at around £8 each and Trunki Trev’s still giving it the fighting talk.
At which point Bradley utterly caves in and offers £4, halving their price in one fell sweep. Simba looks on in horror.
Trunki guy says they could take up to 50. So Bradley undercuts himself again offering £3.80 whilst Tim tuts in the corner having almost been put off his game of solitaire.
Bradley breaks it to the kitchen that they’re going to have to ensure the buns cost a lot less than £3.80 each to make, and also suggests a dinosaur theme. Rees becomes the Frankenstein of confectionary, devising a dinosaur with a marshmallow spine a green bun and fruit inside.
Avi worries it’s a bit complex to actually have dinosaurs. But Reece won’t be stopped – he will be as a GOD to these lizards a GOD! Muwahahaha!
Megan’s sub team pitches to crazy golf venue “Swingers” (ugh) who are having a big party to launch a new course so Megan’s immediately all about how “instagrammable” it will be,
and I start to go off Megan. She scares me. They all tell Matt from Swingers how great this dessert will be and he looks happy. Then they suggest it will cost £10 per bun and his face sort of freezes like this.
He says he can go for 70 if they bring the price down and the product is “premium” and agrees 70 at £9 each.
I love Shazia’s face here.
I also like to think Megan actually said “The new Krays” here as part of a dessert based protection racket. Megan calls the kitchen team and stresses that the quality has to be high. Denisha makes her one input saying she’d been thinking of a golf theme (at no point did the client request this but it becomes somewhat of an obsession for the rest of the production process).
Scared of going ambitious and failing the girls decide to keep the dessert bun simple (because that will scream value to the client!) and whilst it looks sweet, considering they now have more than enough dough and the dessert doesn’t require fish it’s a bit miniscule.
Definitely not too much babes.
Next day after a 5-minute bao making masterclass the girls start work on their primordial slurry of a bao dough.
Megan’s non too pleased about the Spinal-Tap-eqsue fish miscalculation, but Rochelle bulks it out with bean sprouts (which Victoria kicks off about for some bizarre reason I still can’t work out).
The girl’s dessert buns look nice and they’re just preparing to sprinkle on gold flakes and flowers when Marnie “chips” in.
Oh for gods sake – just say it’s the “rough”.
Anyhow I think they look sweet.
Megan counts 128 savoury buns to sell to the public. Karren really has it in for this girls team (perhaps unsurprisingly).
Megan moves on – making the best of a bad situation and sets the starting price at £9 per bun and advises not to drop the price out of panic.
Avi’s in charge of rolling out green dough for the boys but everyone keeps telling him to do it thinner.
Overall the boys form quite a chummy production line, it’s just a shame, as Joe points out, that nobody really seems to know what the quantities are meant to be.
Moment of truth for the corporate dinosaur buns.
Don’t look too closely Bradley – last time I saw something like this it squeezed out a baby onto John Hurt’s face.
Bradley decides to pick out the good ones and just give them a wipe with kitchen paper – no harm done.
Erm
Then with the help of some stencils, a fuck load of marshmallows and some food colouring in the boys laboratory an unholy army is spawned.
I love that they sprinkle marshmallows around “for the presentation” and then promptly knock the whole tray around so they all collapse into each other.
Trevor at Trunki eagerly awaits his bright vibrant bao buns.
Then Joe launches his Jedi mind-spin.
Oh Joe – you are truly the King of the Bullshitters.
Still Trevor takes a bite and doesn’t die. He likes the taste and what’s more…
Canny old Trevor knows good publicity when he sees it at only £3.80 per bun.
Matt at Swingers seems underwhelmed with his lovely balls.
Megan points out they must be classy – they have gold on them, like Ferrero Rocher, but he’s not impressed and they have to drop the price to £5 per bun and throw in their extras for free.
The rest of the girls set their stall at Greenwich Market and Dani scopes out the competition, working out they can charge 50p extra. Rochelle upsells sauces and sprinkles like her life depends on it. They even get a chance to take a call from Megan and sneer at her negotiation skills.
I’m not sure if Dani’s just annoyed by Megan or eager to get back to selling, but her wrapping up of the call is a thing of beauty.
Oh it’s so busy I’ll have to call you back.
To be fair Dani becomes a one-woman sales force of nature for the remainder of time at the market.
She also doesn’t panic and drop the price, arguing that nobody’s resisted (resistance is futile with you though Dani!).
I note the Apprentice having given up on DISRUPTOR are now trying yet again to relaunch BOUGIE as a word. I shall never speak it.
The girls to their credit sell all their (limited number of) buns.
Meanwhile at Spitalfields Market the Bao Boys launch their Mr Bao extravaganza! This has got theatre manager Rees’s jazzy hands all over it!
Mark gets worryingly intense and hands on with a woman who admits to having never tried a Bao Bun.
Reach for the mace sister!
After a roaring lunch trade (where Tim points out the boys fail to upsell on sauces and extras) dies down and Kevin allows himself to be panicked into dropping the price.
It’s not like he’s more than halving the price though – and lunch is over right? And I’m sure Bradley may have even encouraged them to cut the price when sales dried up.
I do love how all the boys go for it big time on sales – especially Reece.
Whilst Avi simply shrugs “just maybe go over there check it out?” That’s my kind of hard sell.
The boys have enough left for a snack. And I have a better chance to admire Gregory’s quite gloriously pointless sales outfit.
Simba takes some excess buns to a Chinese restaurant, but just as you think this is selling coal to Newcastle he builds up a rapport….
And does a deal for £48 per box for 3 boxes of 6 buns. It’s just speaking and listening to someone in their language but one of the better (and smilier) moments I’ve seen on the Apprentice.
Back in the Boardroom and before they even start, Shannon drops the bombshell that she wants out of the process, the holiday in St Lucia was very nice but the hard sums and potentially being blamed for them can do one already.
Bless her she looks a little teary and shaky and I hope she’s OK.
Rochelle tries to argue that in hindsight the originally intended 400 buns would be way too much, but Karren’s not going to miss an opportunity to push the girls under the bus.
When quizzed about not choosing the right numbers person Megan goes for the outright lie.
Like she’s forgotten Karen’s in the room.
And then she doubles down saying she didn’t ask Shannon to do the numbers but merely said she should contribute. Shazia attempts to intervene, but Megan snappily shuts her down.
Karren sticks the boot in again over the dough.
Sugar’s not impressed by the grey savoury bun.But at least it gives him a chance to cheer Greg up with a cannon mention.
There has to be a cannon every week – just look at Greg’s little face!
The boys complain that the corporate client was hard to sell to. Sugar’s unmoved.
To be fair Trevor as good as told them to piss off at £8 a bun.
The poor little dinosaur mutant bun is soundly mocked.
Who created me?!!
Mind you the public or should I say pubic bao bun doesn’t fare much better from Sugar.
You heard it here – Homer has crabs. And some terrible chafing.
Anyhow results are in
Boys spent £166.05 – they took £765.40 – profit 599.35
Girls spent £220.40 – they took 975 profit 754.60 – so the girls, against the edit (who’d have thunk it!) win!
The girls get sent to have a slap up Chinese meals and experience what Bao Buns are meant to be like. If it’s any consolation to Shannon, she probably never wants to look at another sodding Bao Bun again.
And the boys end up playing the blame game at the sad café.
Back in the boardroom Avi talks himself into being bought back in along with Kevin for his crimes against doh.
Ultimately Kevin’s fired for dropping the price, despite the PM Bradley having done the same (to greater impact) and he’s sadly fired (the second Irish candidate in 2 weeks – is this a Brexit thing?). He swears revenge in the Taxi of Doom (well says he’s surprised to be the one going home as the girls made a bigger error – er maybe because they won Kev?).
Next week the Teams make cartoons and someone faces gender critique about a cartoon giraffe wearing a pink bow and while I can see the point maybe that a cartoon giraffe is a cartoon giraffe and shouldn’t need an additional identity – I’m honestly stumped to see why it should matter whatever the giraffe wears as long as they’re fricking awesome. I’m not sure I’ll apply for next year’s show – even if there might still be some Antigua budget sloshing about
The 16 (thanks Shannon!) remaining runners and riders
I’m not sure I can do this. I’ve had a tension headache forcing my shoulders through my skull for the last few days, but dutifully tuned into the latest series of sharp suited city rejects only to discover there’s EIGHTEEN of the feckers! 18! That’s practically a Tory party conference. However, I’ve had a few naps since and am giving it a go from my insanely scrawled notes.
Word of the series appears to be “DISRUPTOR”. It’s what Sales Rep Simba (who comes across as an arsehole in his VT but actually seems relatively sane and normal in the episode) describes himself as. And it’s what most of the girls’ team describe feisty Irish Account Executive (and wannabe glamping entrepreneur) Emma as, after spending some time working with her. DISRUPTOR sounds like something out of a Sci Fi franchise to me, but I wouldn’t know as I’m not quite nerdy enough (sigh).
I think online Antiques marketer and military expert Gregory might know though! Which is why I’m declaring the true word of the series to be “CANNON”. Gregory is quite the expert on big things that shoot stuff out of them, but not in the way filthy minded people might think. And I may as well declare right now that he needs to stay as long as possible in this series to keep me watching. As Greg says “Life is a waste of time. Time is a waste of life. So if you’re wasted all the time you’ll have the time of your life”. Part WTF part “Hidden depths there Greg”.
So our 18 (1fucking8) candidates assemble in the boardroom of doom for Lord Sugar to engage in pre-scripted bants. “Joseph”, he says to a tousled bloke. “You can call me Joe” Joe flirts. Sugar reads from his CV which states the only thing Joe has ever been convicted of is being “devilishly handsome” (ugh) and then turns to former-flight attendant Victoria asking if she’s brought any sick bags. TOP BANTZ etc etc. This goes on for some time. There’s one (oh I forget and my notes are very rambly) who is an elected Lib Dem councillor and Sugar jibes he’s only signed up for this show to have a chance of winning something – when the guy has quite probably won an election to become a councillor (or been co-opted I guess which is just slightly less winny). So shit jokes – check!
Anyhow fuck all that they’re sending the candidates to ANTIGUA on the first task to run Tourist tours. You read me – AN-FUCKIN-TIGUA. I mean there’s better Caribbean islands (opinion only and biased after stay on Tortola, BVI) but I’d have been tempted to sign up, act like a twat during the task so I don’t have to stay in the process and have a bit of fun on/in beach/bars. In fact I’m wondering if the DISRUPTOR of this episode, having been told by the production team they needed to be available for certain flights didn’t just have this cunning idea themselves. I’d apply for next year but I bet episode one is going round garage sales in Dalston or something.
Down on the beach the teams assemble and with the boys there’s the usual tumbleweed when Joe asks repeatedly if anyone wants to be PM – lots of bigging themselves up but retreating when it comes to that key question. Joe reveals he’s a safari guide in Sarf Africa, well why didn’t you say that before? He’s in, natch, although a bit more cautious about pricing than his team (builder Bradley wants to charge 250 to 300 dollars, but Joe insists on 150 to avoid refunds given they’re all new to Antigua – whereupon Brad tells him it’s “Bad business” and does an On Your Head Be It.
There’s no such pussy-footing with the girls and ex trolley dolly Victoria puts herself forward and is accepted as the girls’ leader.
And here’s where it all goes a bit pear shaped for me. At first I just think it’s Victoria talking at a million miles an hour (even as a (relocated) Scouser I struggle), but it’s all the girls’ team, and I struggle to take in any decision making – although maybe there isn’t any. Victoria does go straight in for the catamaran tour, but for some bizarre reason the girls decide to finish that off with a pottery workshop.
The boys plump for a historical island tour (Gregory plays his master card here “Gentlemen, I used to live in Malta” (an island) “and I used to fire cannons”. Put this on a Tinder profile and fill your boots Greg!), followed by (and this should have been the girls’ end game) a rum tasting session.
The girls (Victoria having set their tour price at 130pp) negotiate boat trip prices with a charming lady who hair salon owner Rochelle argues down from 150 dollars to 80 (75 if they fill the tour) before they even get to look at the boat (to Victoria’s chagrin). Bridal boutique owner Shannon asks boat lady what most people get excited about on the tour.
And I understand.
Victoria asks if there is a traditional Caribbean dance. “Anything that moves the waistline” responds our boat queen, before fobbing them off with the Soca Boys.
It’s obviously given Rochelle an idea.
Meanwhile the sales wing of the girls have chosen to harass the few people on the beautiful quiet Pigeon Beach to do the tour. Emma and Shazia, who apparently wanted to try to sell at the airport or at the harbour (you know – where boats are), observe loudly how dead the spot is. Sub-team leader Marnie tries to move on (“We all decided on the beach”). “Apart from me!” leaps in Emma. “I thought the harbour would be better”.
A big old barney ensues which appears to last most of their selling time, despite the efforts of lip-enhanced hair salon owner Dani to chill everyone’s beans and get on with the task. Which is difficult when there’s not even pigeons on that beach. Eventually Victoria calls and Marnie confesses it’s so quiet they were considering moving to the hotel to sell (about 5 fricking bickering hours ago), which of course Vic approves. “Why didn’t they just do that earlier?” asks Shannon. Why indeed.
Meanwhile in town Scottish Theatre School boss Reece luvvies even a teetotal lady to go for the History, Culture and RUM (ad JAZZ HANDS) experience. This could be an awkward question for a recovering alcoholic mind…
Well done Susan!
At another hotel Simba is closing in on a guy booking at $125, but ironically Pest Control guy Mark steps in and drops the price to $100 as he overheard a nearby woman she could get cheaper via her hotel – so she and her 2 mates buy in at that price. Simba seems quite mellow about it.
But you know he’s going to bring it up in the boardroom.
Tour time! As the mic screeches in agony, Rochelle briefly points out vistas of interest, before bringing out that little local dance that’s sure to have them up in the aisles partying.
Bums on seats love!
Oh OK bum stuck out then.
I guess it’s an acquired taste Claude.
Gregory leads the museum tour with a question for our times.
I’m assuming he’s referring to soldiers based on the island wearing woollen uniforms but bless him it’s such a niche concern and I’m assuming he’s a hundred or so years too late for us to start a hashtag #JusticeAndCalamineLotionForWoolAllergySufferersOnStLucia. But at least he raised the issue!
The subteams negotiate commission on souvenirs from their respective second experiences. Brad asks for 25% on rum sales and the rum lady suggests 15%, whereupon Simba leaps in with 17% which is accepted. Bradley gets huffy but I’m not sure they would have got much better with an argument. Besides it’s 17% on sale of booze bottles as opposed to ceramics which sweet shop owner Megan has been instructed by Victoria to request a frankly insane 35% commission on. Which she does and reality bites.
I initially love ceramics man, but his offers (2% for anything under $50, 1% otherwise) are so fricking mean. Megan does well to argue him up to 10% and 7% respectively, but at this point, even though this series tends to mess with your expectations, I think the girls are doomed – their chance of sales and commission are too low.
The girls apparently have another trick up their sleeve with selling photos to guests (although it later transpires the boys did the same – damn edits!). Financial controller Denisha is meant to run this, but she just sort of freezes so Rochelle steps in with a simple but neat trick of drawing a heart in the sand in front of people being snapped on the idyllic beach.
Over on the boys tour Sohail (runs Martial Arts school, but cannot handle surprise question attacks) struggles when asked how traditional the dessert emporium (er bakery) he’s lead his tour to is. His life hack suggestion is for them to ask the fricking bakers.
So these girls gently slam him.
PM Joe isn’t much better. I mean he starts off well with the expected knowledge.
And you know Gregory is really having to force himself to focus on his PM and not the BIG CANNON.
But there’s always one awkward bastard with what seems like a simple question.
I mean it’s SEA FFS! What does this woman want?
I honestly don’t blame Joe for flailing with this one. There’s actually nothing to see but sea. He picks an ocean and I’m not sure what else he could do. Doesn’t stop the edit showing punters with judgy faces as Joe fails to identify what else but sea he should be noticing.
Fortunately a MAGA hatted Yank saves Joe by asking a military question.
Cometh the hour, cometh the man as here comes Gregory with a fetching little adjustment of his glasses!
I think Joe’s disbelieving spin round to the guy saving him makes this.
Gregory waxes knowledgably about canons as the blokes nod, impressed, and the women smile. OK Karen almost smiles.
The girls turn their pottery segment into a throwdown – rushing punters to complete so they can pick a winner.
I like this fish – but how will they sell inferior pottery fishes now!?
Dani has picked up on Rochelle’s energy and declares a dance off for the winner – cue a tired cent five cent dollar wine rendition, but I do love how happy John the winner is.
The rum tasting seems bizarrely to be completely joyless.
I think it’s Irish accountant Kevin giving out facts (hard to tell with the edit) but as soon as a woman asks a question about rum the lady who’s gig it is has hung around to step in with proper answers – which seems a bit cheaty but maybe she was making sure nobody got poisoned.
Everyone sells stuff. Joe whores for tips. The girls get happy waves from their punters, but will it be enough. Let’s skip the journey back and head
To the boardroom
Where Lord Sugar lays into Joe for being too embarrassed to argue for a cheaper price from his experience provider (I am assuming this is rum lady as walking round an island not being able to answer questions that aren’t about military hardware is not a thing).
The girls get stick for having DISRUPTORS amongst them. Emma agrees with Claude. Emma gets burned badly by Claude.
Scores are in and despite the boys spending shit loads more they made lots more profit than the girls ($989 to $487) so get to go back to the house and have drinks earlier. Meanwhile the girls bitch at each other in the Sad Cafe too quickly and high pitched for me to follow except they’re blaming DISRUPTOR Emma and weakling Marnie for not reigning things in – and by extension Project Manager Victoria for not destroying the DISRUPTOR or something.
After some low-key cat-fightery back in the boardroom Victoria brings back DISRUPTOR Emma and weak sub team leader Marnie and it’s not even worth going through the usual Sugar misdirection tactics – Emma is fired for being a DISRUPTOR – slurs out a shocked thank you to “Lord Shergar” and has had a quick break in Antigua, a stint on telly and publicity for her business. So nice work.
Next week might upset me as the candidates design and sell Bao Buns (I love Bao Buns but maybe this might encourage me to diet).
Anyhow here’s the 18 as I rate them. Fucking 18!
LOVE: Gregory
Like: Rochelle, Joe, Simba, Megan, Shazia, Dani, Reece, Victoria
It’s interviews week! Get your business plans in and let’s sift through the bullshit.
Harpreet beats Brittany easily in the best use of downtime.
The call comes giving them erm a full 24 hours to deliver their business plans to the Gherkin. Whilst Brittany is shitting a brick with nerves Harpreet seems remarkably chilled, revealing that she might well be delusional.
Proof that croissants are better for you than exercise.
We get some completely scripted “We’d best prepare our business plans”,” Big day ahead” filler from Stephanie and Kathryn.
Nobody exits a room like this apart from Alan’s Angels
Then it’s time for a Business Plan montage. Kathryn has come dressed to slay.
If that sailor playsuit is part of her “on trend” PJ range I’m in – no matter how many exploited orphans have wept into the stitching.
Brittany, a hotel front of house manager, has ever written a business plan, but to prove she’s serious about her “high protein alcoholic drinks” she’s hopped back onto the exercise bike to read it whilst saying stuff like “370% markup ok” as though it’s completely reasonable.
Harpreet thinks after 5 years it’s time to scale up her café and has full belief in herself.
That whipped cream there represents growth.
Stephanie’s apparently only been fully functioning for a few months.
Bargain Sex Robot
I’m not sure I’ve ever been fully functioning. Her business idea is a posh kids eBay – selling second hand designer childrens wear online. Now I understand why she wasn’t worried about having “DIES” on her baby food – she’s got to get those hand-me-downs somehow.
At 70 St Mary’s Axe they hand their plans to Lord Sugar who assures them his “Most trusted advisors” (well most available anyhow) will find any skeletons the candidates are hiding.
Sugar goes a bit Columbo.
He reveals gleefully that Claude is back at which Brittany excitedly fan-girls.
It looks like only her and Steph know who Claude is.
In the lift to Interview one, Kathryn backs against the wall like Amelia Stone bracing for a prison dust-up.
She’s the first victim of Knitwear Mogul Linda Plant, who, worryingly for Kathryn knows a thing or two about how the rag trade works. Kathryn explains her aim to expand her business to create matching pyjamas (“solely” designed by her using her expertise) for the whole family. Including dogs!
Is it wrong that I want to see a dog in pjs now?
“How did you get your design expertise?” asks Linda leadingly, and Kathryn backtracks. “When I say I solely designed by me, I mean as a whole” revealing that she really just does the “shape” of the pyjamas. Which to be honest is quite the skill. Kathryn’s forced to admit she didn’t design the prints as Linda pulls out Exhibit B, an identical pair of PJs to her Jaguar Print collection from “A High Street Store” (which is weird as I googled and couldn’t find them anywhere I’d consider High Street).
“Have you designed anything yes or no?”, Linda pushes and Kathryn looks so busted.
She’s not getting away that lightly though as Linda now questions Kathryn’s decisions to import PJs made in China. Her excuse is “A lot of companies have manufacturers in China” and Linda points out they might not use “Ethical and Sustainable” as their USP (or they might and just be evil”. “I’m learning as I go” is Kat’s excuse, but that don’t cut it with Linda.
Back in the lobby Kathryn sums up the experience as “Savage” as Stephanie gasps gleefully and Brittany looks on the verge of vomiting.
It becomes a running theme that each candidate focuses on one thing the interviewer did that was harsh or “unfair” whilst either twisting or neglecting to mention genuine issues with their business plan or CV. So Kathryn says Linda used the PJs to claim she wasn’t unique when in fact she was pointing out lies about the design and manufacture.
No mention of using Chinese sweat shops either funny enough.
Next Kathryn goes to see Media Bigwig Claudine Collins who is quick to pick up on the “Sustainable, ethical” message and asks where these righteous PJs are made.
On the defensive, Kat explains that she was going to have them made in England but it costs a fortune so she did “research” into Chinese factories instead and found an “ethical factory”. This is how I imagine Kat’s research went.
Or maybe she googled Boujie manufacturers?
However she hasn’t picked up on the “sustainable” part as Claudine asks about the carbon footprint.
And Kat is stumped. Either that or she’s pretending to be Amelia Stone being violently interrogated.
Next Kathryn faces the wrath of Claude, who’s obviously still recovering from his accident, not to say he’s not completely brutal, he’s just very soft spoken with it. Which makes it somehow harsher. He points out the headaches of stocking lots of different sizes and shapes for each design whilst importing from China.
There are only 5 different sizes of dog
Next he poopoos her pie in the sky numbers. She promises to grow the business from a frankly unconvincing current £90k turnover to £750k. “It’s impossible” Claude says. “Who says it’s impossible” Kathryn hackles. “I do” says Claude. Kathryn seems to be harbouring the fantasy that adding investment and staff will magically grow the business without thinking about increased costs involved. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being ambitious” Kathryn gripes. “Ambitious is one thing, unrealistic is nonsense” Claude slams before pointing out that on £750k turnover Kathryn’s business would actually make a loss of pretty much the entire £250k investment. He dismisses her plan as “the rantings of a lunatic” and no amount of mythical Year 3 profit reward for Lord Sugar will sway him.
So that went well.
Finally Kathryn goes to see dour media millionaire Mike Soutar who asks what her website is called. As soon as Kat responds www.myeverydaypyjamas.co.uk you just know what’s coming next, and sure enough the old fox has bought literally every domain name she might have wanted to use.
I think Kathryn’s soul finally leaves her body at this point in her ritual beasting.
Sensing she’s broken Mike offers her the opportunity to prove she’s just learned the valuable business lesson of never wasting time when she needs something (and never to trust a smartarse) and gives her the web domain names with a warning not to leave everything to chance in future.
Next for the ordealathon is Brittany who trudges in to see Claude who seethes that she hasn’t put a full profit and loss breakdown in her business plan as “unless you’re making it in your bath” someone will manufacture the 99-calorie protein bevvy. To miss this is a “serious flaw” so thus endeth the interview and if I was Brittany I’d hide in the bogs for 20 minutes.
Seriously though after all her earlier fan-girling she must be devastated.
Next she endures Mike, who’s followed her recipe for the suspiciously cloudy protein vodka and indicates for her to take the first taste like it’s poisoned.
Although to be fair it does look like someone’s milked a tramp.
Brittany suppresses her gag reflex and claims it tastes good.
However Mike thinks it’s “chalky and quite bitter” (like Jim Davidson’s career then). She also effectively points out that it’s not Masterchef and people obsessed with high protein content will drink things that taste foul. “I don’t think it tastes bad enough for people not to purchase it” she adds. Put that on the poster.
Her business plan comes under scrutiny and rather than tear it apart Soutar just waves the offending item at her and asks how she’d do it differently. She realises it’s a massive own goal to have flicked through it whilst doing cardio and tears spring to her eyes.
Mike softens a little bit “You’ve done really well in this process” but adds “but is this investable?”
It’s Brittany’s turn for a bit of revisionism after wafting the tears away. If she is trying to sell a drink someone needs to tell her that liquid does not waft.
“I cried in the lift” she confesses to Kat, who asks if she kept it together in the interview.
The lies!
Next she’s confronted by Linda who dismisses her business plan as a “glorified brochure “ and pulls up Brittany’s lack of experience in making drinks or keep fit. Brittany declares she’s a “target consumer”. “I buy clothes” snaps Linda, but “it doesn’t make me a dressmaker” (it does make you a knitwear entrepreneur though love) before revealing yet another incriminating purchase of a protein drink that’s been out since 2008 in the states (“the reason you haven’t heard of it is it wasn’t a hit”).
Crush that girl’s dreams Linda!
I must have missed Brittany’s interview with Claudine unless they didn’t show it because it was just Claudine sticking needles into Brittany and claiming to be looking for the devil’s mark.
Our next lambikin to the slaughter is Harpreet who’s made a bold move wearing white. Claudine leads with a personal jibe “You don’t come across as someone I would like to work with”, always a good move in a real interview if you want to be slapped down by ACAS. Harpreet brushes it off with a practiced customer services SORRY YOU FEEL THAT WAY smile barely disguising a snarl, but makes a mental note that her bossy ball-breaking act might not be the best way to secure Lord Sugar’s dosh.
She’s actually written in her CV that her rule is “No emotions before 7”. Presuming that’s intended to mean pm. She confesses that she’s annoyed with herself for saying that as underneath it all she cares greatly about people she works with. And at least she’s self-aware enough to admit it sounds like she’s just saying what Claudine wants to hear.
From Claudine to Claude who’s uncovered a wee porky pie or two in Harpreet’s claims to do EVERYTHING herself in her business. “That’s not true” says Claude because.
DUH DUH DUUUH!
Eastenders drum roll
Harpreet has a 50:50 partnership with her sister. I love how this minor Hire One Get the Sister Doing All The Work For Free detail plays out as Harpreet diminishes her sister’s contribution and bigs her own up (“Everything on there I have done”) as though her sister is some mad woman in an attic who cannot be revealed to the public. “I guess I should have written CO-owner” Harpreet admits as the penny drops.
And in the lift.
She pops in to Mike who mocks her job title on her CV – “Isn’t chief executive a bit grandiose for someone who basically runs a café? Is there a vice president of washing up?” (IF not I claim that role, if the president of washing up doesn’t mind), before trammelling her supposed lack of ambition (“You opened 1 store in 5 years why is your growth so pedestrian?” – erm that sounds perfectly reasonable!). Harpreet counters that there’s no reason she can’t accelerate growth with the investment, but unfortunately Mike’s picked up on her plan to open one new store a year (also sensible), forcing her to claim she’s changed her mind as she’s “grown in confidence” during the process so not is ready for the heady heights of erm 2 new stores a year.
Dream big gurl.
Linda wonders if Harpreet even has a USP. She’s selling cakes Linda – her USP is pleasure and diabetes. Harpreet claims she is the USP causing Linda to go all evil stepmother.
Yes you CAN be a USP Harpreet.
She also claims she wants to expand her product line and bring in savoury snacks. Which kind of fucks up any USP. Unless she puts savoury snacks in puddings. Why not? We’ve had salted caramel. Chocolate and miso work as does mango and chilli. Just pop a few pringles on top of your meringues and your USP is sorted.
Harpreet so far has done best on the interviews, and even learns something useful – that she needs to “lay off the whole sergeant major a little”.
Unless you’re Harpreet’s sister in which case she will continue to beat you if your pastry isn’t flaky enough.
Finally thrown to the wolves is Stephanie. Mike’s not convinced she offers anything different to eBay. Stephanie’s convinced that she can authenticate garments which gives her an edge.
Mike gets in on the trap items game and produces a bog standard looking kid’s “designer” T shirt – posing the existential question is it real?
Stephanie guesses “fake” but apparently it’s “real” at which she confesses that she outsources the “incredibly important” job of authentication. Mike’s researched the company she uses and they only authenticate handbags and shoes. What a chancer! Stephanie mumbles about it being “very early doors” and she could hire different companies but surely the jig’s up especially when Mike points out she’s only costed to use this one company in her business plan and her face falls.
Out in the lobby she plays it blasé, shrugs and says she had no idea what she was doing and just pretended to look at the T-shirt.
Heh. Steph is so bad ass.
Linda attacks on the principle that Stephanie has only sold 50 garments and the customer base would be too exclusive to upscale and she’s out.
Claudine pokes away at Stephanie’s tough coating by bringing her dad into it and (missing her use of present tense) everything about the exchange, from the fact Stephanie bigs up her dad’s influence on her CV to her tearing up about him has me convinced Steph’s Dad is Brown Bread.
Tell me about your father
But no he’s alive and kicking and supporting her from the audience of you’ve been fired later – oops SPOILER.
“I think I cry every 10 years” says Steph, delighting Claudine who hands her a tissue before piling on the emotion (there’s even soppy piano playing over this exchange FFS) “What would your dad think about you being in the final 4?”
“He’d be so incredibly proud” sniffs Steph.
HE’s NOT DEAD!
“You know what” says Claudine “You’re so much more personable when you let your guard down”. Yeah Stephanie – it’s so much nicer to see you in tears! Blimey!
Things aren’t going to get better with Claude who announces his intentions to destroy Steph like he’s some sort of psychotic Victorian spanker.
He tears apart her lack of experience and credibility and every time she asks if she can respond he blocks her.
He points out her costs before even one sale is made are £160k (isn’t that the point of investment though Claude?).
And worst of all she’s massively overestimated her numbers. “You’re jumping from 300k to 1.8million turnover” says Claude. “Yeah” says Steph. “No” says Claude. Yeah but no.
As the battered candidates make their escape, Lord Sugar’s snitches assemble and bitch about them.
Claude thinks Brittany should stick with hotels. Tim thinks Kathryn needs a mentor. Linda thinks Stephanie’s idea is too niche and EVERYONE wonders about Harpreet’s sister!
Karren just laughs like a dolphin on crack at every dad joke Sugar makes.
Claude was impressed with her
Back in the boardroom and Kathryn is still insisting it’s OK to use Chinese manufacturers because other companies do it. For someone who pretends to be a designer she’s remarkably uncreative. Stephanie’s authentication process is revealed as someone er looking at a photo of a piece of clothing. Foolproof.
Harpreet sells her sister down the Swanee.
Ultimately though Brittany is fired for her bad business plan and has to leave with nary a hug from the others.
So Sugar is left like King Lear with his three daughters asking the three remaining candidates why they are ace and skill and should win. Kathryn intends to sell pyjamas and make money which Sugar points out is kind of how business should work. She hopes to use more online sales, which Sugar suggests is like Stephanie’s plan, which Kathryn takes a big dump on.
Stephanie hits back that her platform would be more global and Kathryn buts in disdainfully.
Steph suggests her idea will be the biggest thing since veganism and if Sugar doesn’t invest he’ll see her company in 2 to 3 years’ time and say “Oh that’s Stephanie’s idea that she had”.
Finally Harpreet’s sister’s ears get to burn again.
But she rather brilliantly bigs up the other’s ideas “I’d love to buy dog pyjamas and when I had kids I’d be scouring for a discount on designer gear for them”, before presenting her business as a proven, safe and reliable concept. In comparison.
And thus Stephanie is fired for her wobbly ideas.
Next week Kathryn and Harpreet have to launch their brands. Here’s hoping Akeem comes back on Harpreet’s team for some of that sweet sweet Stockholm Syndrome.
Before I start I’d like to appreciate Team Infinity’s prescient solidarity with Ukraine.
So with the sad loss of loveable bullshitter Akshay, we’re down to the last 6 candidates, so it’s time for a brief rundown of who the hell they really are.
We’ll start with Harpreet. Nobody could ever accuse Harpreet of not wanting to succeed. Her constant mode is Ferocious Ambition. The only problem is she can’t live up to this strategically and comes apart at the seams a little under pressure, taking it out vocally on anyone she perceives as weaker in her vicinity (usually Akeem). She genuinely cares about what she is doing, and she is probably brilliant in real life, but every week I want to love her and watch the brain fog of panic descend and make her talk to people in a way you – well you just shouldn’t without apologising profusely.
Kathryn is what I imagine happens to youth TV presenters when they reach their 30s. There’s still the fading past glories of beauty and relentless surreal chirpiness. There’s still the longing for the Biz as demonstrated by the avant garde acting masterclass that was Amelia Stone. But there’s also an emptiness in Kathryn’s soul that makes her think the word “Boujie” is a good thing, an aspiration for something better but no idea of what real good things are. Give this woman a helicopter and a mission to find “treasure” and she would give it her all though.
Aaron is everymanchild. He can sulk for England when thwarted. He has a resting Idris Elba as Luther after a bad day face. He hates being bested by “girls” at fishing. In fact Aaron has an old-fashioned unreconstructed notion of what masculinity should be, and it gets under his skin when he feels he is not living up to it. Hence his joy at his ultra-fast pit-stop change being faster than all the womens. However when he lets go and enjoys being himself and SMILES he is quite adorable. Joining in with Veronica Green at the Drag Night or telling Dad jokes on his tour. I want him to be happy, because he seems fun then.
I find Stephanie the hardest to read. I am sure she is lovely in real life but her surface gives off that she would be the meanest member of the Pink Ladies and top dog in Prisoner Cell Block H rolled into one. She’s tough, she’s driven and she gives no fucks (unless they’re in front of clients or on air). If she could just be a bit more interesting she could be quite the gay icon. She personifies the term “Resting Bitch Face” and in the last few tasks has shown herself wanting when it comes to client relationships and negotiations (after being quite the dark horse early on). But after swearing twice in front of clients and screwing up selling and haggling – she has to have the secret of alchemy as her business plan, no?
I started off thinking Brittany was a bit neurotic but she’s grown steadily into quite the player, mainly through her collaborations with Aaron, who she works really well with. I admired her politely sticking to her plans as PM. Even her likeable concern about the climate emergency, which seemed crowbarred into some tasks, worked out well in the driverless vehicle task (if not the woeful video game). She’s not always polished, but she’s definitely the one to beat now.
I don’t even want to mention Akeem, as it’s always the ones that I love who get fired. But Akeem is a nerd. He seems lovely, polite (to a fault – the fault being caving in too quickly to pushback) and genuine – he listens to his team which of course Karren and Tim find abhorrent but (call me old fashioned) I think can work – and he came into his own in the video game task. I recall having a similar nerd-crush on Tom the guy who made weird bendy nail files yonks ago and actually won. Dare I dream. Probably not. I think Brittany’s got this, and I wouldn’t begrudge her.
Anyhow here we go with Week 10.
Akeem, looking like third victim in a slasher movie takes the call to go to KidZania in West London.
I spend three minutes thinking they’re saying Kids Saviours and expecting to go to some very creepy church. Steph helpfully explains to Kat who’s trying to work out if it’s worth emerging from the duvet.
So as the only one of them with as yet fruitful loins Aaron is hailed as a potential winner despite looking like he’s struggling to dress himself.
Somehow Akeem ends up in the car with Harpreet who’s in power mode. “At this stage you have to go big or go home” she declares.
I think he fancies her!
Definitely lurve. Akeem and Harpreet K.I.S.S…
To KidZania where, talking of Star-Crossed Lovers, Lord Sugar goes a bit Shakespearean to let us know that even Tim has given up on this show.
He’s replaced for this episode by Mike Souter, a Scot so dour he makes Gordon Brown look like Timmy Mallett. He’s already getting his eye in for the interviews.
The task is to design a unique baby food brand and dish and pitch to high street and online retailers. Most sales wins. To even things up, Steph’s moved to Infinity, managed by dessert mogul Harpreet who’s having one of her visions – so watch out! In what you hope will be a respite for Akeem he’s paired with Stephanie – who leads their branding subteam. Then you remember what Stephanie’s like. Brainstorming commences and Harpreet’s taking no prisoners… or suggestions from anyone else. It’s that tried and tested method of simply talking over Akeem or Steph when they open their mouths to say something, making it sound like a non-stop stream of consciousness or an angry poem.
Over on Diverse, Brittany uses the age-old tumbleweed summoning spell.
They both look pointedly at Aaron, whilst Kathryn asks if anyone has any experience in food manufacturing.. or baby manufacturing.
At which point it’s check mate for poor Aaron despite his kids now being teenagers. He plumps for a veggie middle eastern theme, which actually sounds quite good, but his second major mistake after accepting the role of PM arises when he asks Brittany to take on the kitchen side of the task due to her creativity and knowledge of nutrition. To be fair to Aaron they are good reasons, it’s not just “stick the woman in the kitchen”, but Brittany pushes back, demanding to be on the branding team.
And by acquiescing, and asking Brittany and Kathryn to brand Aaron’s already lost the 3D chess game. He compounds it by telling them to basically do what they want, with no guidance or instruction. If Akeem did this everyone would be slagging him off – at least he had ideas which everyone rubbished rather than saying “Oh I don’t know – just go where your heart leads you!”, but I digress.
This is fucking batshit insanity.
Back on infinity and there’s no chance Harpreet’s subteam are walking away without a brief as she specifies colours and little bowls for the label of her proposed fish curry (shudder). Steph asks if fish should be on the packaging to which Harpreet responds “Let’s not lead with the fish”
Good motto to have in life.
Karren points out that by micromanaging every aspect of the task, Harpreet is putting herself in the firing line if something goes wrong. I might come back to that later…
Anyhow the teams split and poor doomed Aaron goes off to the kitchen where he and Harpreet are taught separately how to puree veggies. I mean how hard can that be?
Although I’m a bit worried that Harpreet only seems to be learning the last word of every sentence.
So we want baby to choke? Hmmm.
Harpreet pitches for celebrity chef status.
Yes I think we need something to calm it down Harpreet. How about a cheeky Sertraline?
OK some Garam Masala then…
It is basically me in the kitchen but without the externalised monologue and Karren sat there pulling faces. And it does sound quite balanced and nice.
Aaron adds every carb known to mankind to his cous cous based baby food, the only veggies being sweet potato and butternut squash. I think he’s been asked to use up Akeem’s surplus rice from Silverstone. Could maybe do with some of Harpreet’s greenage. And a few litres of water.
Playdoh meet concrete, concrete meet playdoh. Aaron calls this a “Moroccan Medley”.
At the House of Fuji Steph and Akeem choose names. Stephanie suggests “Bubba’s Little Dishes” which is quite cutesy – I’ve never had baby brain but if I did I might go for it. Akeem has never heard of the word “Bubba” for baby. To be fair it’s not really a standard word, but surely it’s a recognisable infantilised version. Stephanie starts riffing on the word Foody and Akeem goes for “First Time Foody” (see – he has INPUT) which Steph amends to “First Time Foodies”.
Watch out for that plural later Steph!
Harpreet phones in the ingredients and warns them to mention the nutritional benefits (which she doesn’t explain) and warns them not to deviate. In the nick of time she remembers there’s “no salt or sugar”. Phew! In the Apprentice there is no second phone call.
Brittany and Kathryn go for Little Taste Adventure. Aaron phones in ingredients and there’s NO discussion of names whatsoever. The girls move on to torment their captive designer as they want him to create a magnifying glass logo that also looks like a saucepan.
Kathryn Katsplains.
It ends up looking like someone cooked half a globe.
They spend so long twatting about with this that they rush the rest of the branding whilst Brittany keeps adding random suggestions.
Ending up with a design that looks like the personification of ANGER.
However on Infinity, Steph’s making the second step towards Apprentice legendary fuck-up status by suggesting the Os to FOODIES be shaped out of bowls.
And it’s not like the graphic designer doesn’t subtly warn them.
Also those bowls look like a bra.
Akeem suggest the name of the meal should be on the front of the label (INPUT), but subteam leader Stephanie overrules this saying the brand should be the big thing.
You can do both Steph. Not that it matters at this stage as nobody but their designer (presumably stifling tears of laughter) has noticed.
Karren finally says it out loud that all she sees is “First Time Dies”.
Good point.
The chefs prepare sample batches for the pitches and Aaron HAS discovered green stuff.
It may be a bit of coriander to you but it’s life or scurvy to some poor baby.
More rice Akeem!
“It must be alright cos I keep eating it” reasons Aaron through his mouthful of wallpaper paste.
Akeem directs the First Time FooDIES poster, coaxing cute baby Finn to express all the deadly sins, a sense of adventure, “Reaching towards the East” (?? Like people would know?) and existential angst within one picture.
Bit early for this though?
Stephanie clearly doesn’t like kids.
She also comes up with the most corporate way ever to tell someone to shut up. Yeah just Stop Vocalising!
She basically just takes over so she can claim credit for the direction, accusing Akeem of being “Too faffy”. So of course they now have to sing to baby Finn whose mistrustful response I love.
You’ve got a few years of this crap at infant school Finn. Enjoy.
It’s telling that after Steph takes over Finn gets so moody they have to leave. Kids recognise evil.
Their poster ends up looking like a horror film. PLEASE don’t feed it to me daddy.
And they still haven’t noticed.
Brittany and Kathryn are blessed with an even more adorable (and definitely more compliant) baby.
Brittany messes with more designers minds.
At least the poor designer has the ghost of George Michael with him offering moral support.
Harpreet lambasts the FooDIES labels for being too basic and not featuring the product on the front.
She hasn’t noticed yet.
Aaron’s chuffed with the fact their label features “adventure and discovery”, fantastic. The girls are less delighted to discover the flavour of his baby food. You can see Kat wondering if it’s acceptable to spit it out on camera.
The nicest thing Kathryn can say about it is that it’s stodgy and beige. I hope for their sake that babies don’t care that much if it’s food. They can’t – all baby food looks pretty vile.
Poor Aaron’s depressed by the feedback.
Steph and Akeem declare Harpreet’s artisan salmon curry to be “alright”. True genius is never appreciated in its time Harpreet. Akeem waffles on about how they carefully “structured” their poster including the highchair as an erm feature? Because that’s where babies normally eat.
(WRONG! The correct answer is “off the floor”).
He describes the logo as “fun and endearing”.
They still haven’t noticed.
It’s Pitch Time – 1st time foodies meet Ocado. Stephanie talks about how important having the information on the label is, so they ask why the flavour profile isn’t on the front, which Steph bats away as a “reconfiguration” they can do in post.
And finally.
This woman has been ITCHING to say this!
Finally they notice.
Steph tries to flannel them with the standard “It’s just a prototype” line and they can fix it “IF it is in issue”. IF?!!
The damage is done. Ocado lady lands her killer blow whilst Harpreet just stands there frozenly smiling in disbelief.
Well that went well.
Harpreet’s all for fessing up in the next pitch and stating off the bat they will change the logo. Steph wants to keep schtum and hope they won’t notice it. Oh they’ll notice.
Aaron fares no better with Ocado as even Ocado power lady can’t get the Moroccan medley out of the pouch (although later they suggest a 10-month-old baby couldn’t squeeze the product out – do these monsters make their babies serve themselves?).
SOUKS? More like SUCKS. Ahahahah!
Brittany claims the market research feedback was that people preferred chunkier food. This is a lie. Here’s the feedback.
And Ocado aren’t happy with the taste or texture either.
Brittany claims they are on a mission to “revolutionise bland baby food”. Well they’ve certainly done that.
Ocado power lady asks that age old question about the logo.
Brittany clears it up by saying very slowly “It is supposed to be a frying pan and a magnifying glass”, but then they get stick because Ocado point out a frying pan doesn’t scream health. Or Morocco for that matter. Maybe they should have had a tagine shaped like a boat?
All the kids at Akeem’s First Time FooDIES feedback session love their fishy curry. Because they can’t read.
Unfortunately the parents aren’t quite so enamoured of the logo.
And the penny finally drops for Akeem too bless him. “Slight concern that it actually says dies” he worries.
Next pitch is to Iceland – and why Harpreet just doesn’t go over those dodgy Os with a marker and tippex I don’t know. Stephanie leads the pitch and sure enough tries to gaslight Iceland into ignoring the elephant – but they’re not having it.
Steph claims they didn’t notice but are happy to change the logo “if you think that reads like that”. Which isn’t at all going to make them look like fuckwits.
If there was ever a word you don’t want associated with babies, Iceland man warns.
Which one is it out of First Time Fuck Dies then mate? Oh JUST the last one?
Harpreet pushes Akeem at them to say how much the babies loved the products because babies can’t read. Iceland agree that the product tastes really good, but can’t get over the name.
Aaron’s strategy for the Iceland is to give the girls a look of “Help” if he’s struggling.
Brittany jaunts in. “Michael, Richard, Sanj good evening” she breezes.
Awkward, because there’s no Michael there. Just Matthew.
Whilst Richard from Iceland appreciates Brittany’s pashun – the product is just too damn stodgy and dull for him to buy into. Kathryn again lies that at feedback the babies loved it. What this baby?
Iceland also don’t feel the poster or logo is clear enough. Aaron tries some quality sucking up.
He suggests that if anything needs tweaking he’s happy to work with them, but perhaps Kathryn knocking the poster off its easel on the way out isn’t going to help them change their minds.
Aaron sweetly tells the girls that he’s really chuffed with how they’ve done, whatever happens. So first chance they get they’re blaming him for the task failure.
In the slightly mammoth boardroom session, Stephanie blames Harpreet for not putting the meal type on the front. There’s a slight difference from “Don’t lead with fish” there, which actually meant not having fish in the logo. Sugar points out Stephanie’s “Asian bowls” look like a bikini top. I love that Aaron has a little chuckle at this. Boys will be boys.
Sugar drags the evisceration of the poster out, getting increasingly exasperated as he berates them for ten minutes for not even having the words describing the food on there in bold before moving onto the “elephant”. Aaron thinks he’s smashed it at this point.
Not the best choice of words in response there from Harpreet.
Stephanie fibs that she didn’t tell Iceland up front because she didn’t want to look “unprofessional” because she takes everything anyone says literally so she can use it to defend herself from blame. Karren sorts her out.
Anyhow NOBODY GOT ANY ORDERS – to which Sugz gives a justified “BLADDY HELL!” so they all troop off to the SAD CAFÉ which has to put extra chairs out. Stephanie’s still trying to take credit for the name. I’d give up on that if I was you. Brittany and Kathryn blame Aaron for a lack of direction and he basically holds his hands up and says if it’s because of the food he’ll take it. Last time I looked this programme was not called Masterchef.
Back in the boardroom however Aaron is fired for creating the worst product.
Harpreet blames her branding team for their failure and Akeem holds his hands up.
Nooooo!
Asked why he should stay he points out he was the second person to be PM twice, but doesn’t point out he won twice as PM. But it’s too no avail as yet again a candidate I like is regretfully fired. In the taxi of tears we find out he runs a sportswear business, which is surprisingly off brand (I’d assumed as a maths nerd he would have a magic calculator company), but good luck to him. I would like him to join Harpreet as sous chef on her cook show – before they get married obvs.
Next week the bullshit hits the fan as it’s the interview round. And the return of Claude. Get em Claude! Not sure if I’ll have the energy to blog it mind.
Will probably win: Brittany
Wouldn’t mind winning because she wants it so darn much: Harpreet
Meh: Kathryn
Deserves a grilling: Stephanie
Bye Bye: Harry, Conor, Shama, Navid, Alex, Francesca, Amy, Sophie, Nick, Akshay, Aaron, Akeem (having a name beginning with A was not a good move this series)
It’s Week 9 and Akshay takes the 5am call from the Satanic Shrine to Hungry Hungry Hippos.
The candidates gather in the glamour of an empty Greenwich market to be tasked with selecting and flogging tat during a pretend “selling hour” to the drunk and vulnerable on a “leading shopping channel” (TJC for short). Brittany gasps in ludicrous excitement.
It’s Brittany’s childhood dream of one day selling things on a channel where Z-List Celebrities go to die.
I have a dream. That one day I will sell vibrating slippers to mad people
Aaron tries to crush that dream as he’s decided a selling task is right up his street so puts himself forward to lead Infinity. However Brittany’s pashun gets her duly elected as PM.
The passion of the Brittany
Aaron says he’s not bothered – but you can never tell with Aaron. He usually does this Idris Elba as Luther having a shit day face.
Could be happy. Could be the main suspect got away. Who knows!
Brittany’s first edict is to create a subteam to go and choose random shit extra products to sell – so she puts Harpreet in charge of Akeem.
Yes that well known dream combo back together again. Blink if you need support Akeem.
Akeem’s confident he can go for products with good USPs as this is part of his day job. Harpreet does a Robert De Niro face of Unconvincedness.
Wise guy huh?
Brittany takes Aaron to check out the high-end products. In the car she makes an admission.
I love Brittany’s self-reflection.
In the TJC warehouse, which presumably also houses the lost ark of the covenants they encounter Raghu. of who guards the precious things and demands due respect for them.
Looking for the Sue Gray report
Brittany goes on a charm offensive deciding that some serious sucking up is called for.
No, more sucking up than that!
To be fair Brittany and Aaron strike an easy rapport with Raghu by showing interest in him and his products.
Diverse talk strategy in the poshest pie and mash caff ever.
Altogether “Knees up Mater Sienna! Oi!”
Akshay is a man to his word taking on the PM role and cursing himself by declaring at several points throughout the task that they’re going to “Smash It”. Steph is happy to lead his subteam of er Kat, who he sends to chase the “Star Product”. Kathryn suggests they need to go for the high-end risk of the £4K ring given it is on a jewellery channel.
Unfortunately Stephanie’s curse of the RBF and the girls inability to engage with Raghu beyond an SS style interrogation on price and sales numbers. What was it Oscar Wilde said about cynics?
So needless to say Brittany and Aaron scoop the precious ring, whereas Steph and Kathryn are left with the £400 air fryer. It’s all about the PASHUN for Raghu in his lonely dragons lair of flotsam!
Harpreet and Akeem arrive at the Dragons Den room now repurposed as an Aladdin’s Cave of the sort of thing my other half’s mum buys me for Christmas. I swear I mentioned I liked owls once – I now have six owl ornaments including a fluffy Christmas owl and a healing crystal owl.
So this is my next Christmas present. Behold the hand crafted solar powered owl.
I’ve seen SIX of the feckers!
This is how Athena would light up her back garden. Akeem is very impressed by the “ooh handmade!” element.
Having been tasked by Brittany with gathering as much info as possible about the products so, you know, they can sell them, Harpreet and Akeem play around randomly with all the energy of me going round the Gadget Shop. At least they’re quite friendly. But not THAT friendly.
Like smothering her?
Akeem demonstrates a discerning knowledge of fabrics.
Akeem would NOT have selected this product. Just saying…
Sticking with ornithology Harpreet falls in love with a pink inflateable flamingo – and when Akeem drags her round in it does look like the happiest moment all series.
Harpreet is smitten “You could say OOH have fun with your grandchildren.. you could take it on your Staycation” (ignoring the fact that even if your staycation is to a British Coastal Resort where this may be useful, you can buy this for a couple of quid in the seafront tut-marts). “Durable, lightweight.. you can take the air out of it” she babbles desperately.
Eager to please Akeem joins in.
Ironically Brittany and Aaron are feeling pretty buoyant as they drive away from securing their ring (fnar), so it’s great to watch them descend into a surreal nightmare as Harpreet chirpily details the sub-team purchases.
I think Aaron is still thinking about the owl. He doesn’t even know the bedding set is polyester yet.
I love how he physically flinches out of his own body when Harpreet mentions “An inflatable flamingo”.
I’ve seen bad things.
Brittany tries to put a brave face on things.
Akshay goes solo to the room of dreams, although I love how, just because Karren is holding a pen and notepad he tries to rope her in as his personal assistant and sounding board.
Take this down for me Ms BradyOh feck off
Karren’s not playing.
Akshay proceeds to show off doing press-ups and goes a bit Alan Partridge/Fast Show Jazz over the press-up machine thing.
Hey girlies! Look how many press-ups I can do!
Eventually he plumps for some snail-mucus cream, a clothes steamer and a robot rampant rabbit I mean “personal massager”.
Actually they are very Shopping Channel products and he does focus on things that address a problem or have a story behind them – and they all have a physical, visual method of demonstration.
He still thinks Karren is his PA.
Karren’s actual notepad
Akshay’s chosen to let the girls present whilst he plays with the cool tech stuff. This looks like a major own goal (Akshay and Kathryn would have had the right energy) as Steph demonstrates when they video her demoing the Air Fryer with Kathryn directing – Steph has only one face and little interest in products apart from how much they can be sold for.
Still Kathryn tries her best and god loves a trier.
But even when Stephanie tries to smile, it’s like when Gordon Brown used to try to smile.
With humanity
Frankly unnerving. Some people just aren’t made for it.
Over on Infinity Aaron directs his video Masterpiece. He’s taking it seriously. He even storyboards it!
It definitely has a French New wave quality to it – didn’t have Aaron down as a “Last Year at Marionbad” fan, but the evidence speaks for itself.
At first sight, it seemed impossible to lose your way. At first sight..amidst these statues, where you were already losing your way forever in the still nightI must have you alive
Flawless.
I still like running non-Baywatchy (actual direction) Brittany the best.
You’re raving! I’m tired, leave me alone!
However it speaks nothing of rings to me.
Next day Akshay regales the girls with the stories behind his products – forgetting from the last task that they prefer to shun actual research and learning in favour of winging it.
I do love his tale of the snail frotting farmers in Chile with sun wisened faces and arms but freakishly youthful hands.
“No snails are harmed” Akshay insists. “It’s just using the best part of snails”. I think snails might disagree on those statements.
Meanwhile Aaron meets the owl light. It’s handmade don’t you know.
Have you been posessed by a wooden bird fetish?I’ve seen things no man should see
It does not go well. Also how the hell is it handmade to give a wooden effect. It’s wood surely. You’re not carving it out of plastic. “Do you know where it’s handmade from?” Aaron asks. No they do not.
Harpreet suggests a novel selling technique.
Well it starts with Twit
Next comes the regal Flamingo.
Aaron asks about the USP and I love how proud Akeem is of the heavy-duty handles!
I also love how unimpressed Harpreet appears to be about the ring.
She thinks it’s too luxury and it would have been better to go for something “more practical” – like some form of fake bird?
Still it’s all worth it for this.
The presenters and producers get their instructions – I think Brittany’s a natural with her vibrating exercise board warm-up demo whilst the TJC guy yells instructions at her and Aaron collapses into hysterics.
Akshay asks thoughtful questions of the tech guy in the control room but sadly I’m just childishly amused by the Strap On button.
Tee hee
He allocates Stephanie to advertise the fryer, Kathryn the snail juice and Kathryn to lead them both in flogging the vibrator massager.
Meanwhile Brittany welcomes us to Hell.
L
All very Twin Peaks with the owl in the log.
Unfortunately it was a false start so there’s an awkward gap. Not like they’ve lost out on owl flogging time. Despite Akeem gently urging them to stress “Handmade with hands” they have to half the price – and amazingly ten people call. At this point those callers need an intervention – that’s a cry for help.
Next up there’s no callers for the £25 plastic Flamingo. “Fuck let’s do a shock price” Harpreet panics and drops it to an equally ridiculous £15 before losing it – barking orders “Stand up! Swing her around!” at Akeem and the presenters.
Oh well – the harmony was nice when it lasted.
Brittany I’m not even there and I need a jug of cocktail.
Harpreet takes over on giving instructions (it’s hard to notice the difference) and to be fair she’s right to urge Brittany to more visually display the ring and clean the fluff off it. They could market the ring as having touched Brittany’s tit now.
“I’ll just make it all shiny with my boob” – we have 2000 callers online
“Step out in front of the desk!” bellows Harpreet.
That went well.
Next Aaron whilst failing to physically engage with the bedding does at least manage to find one USP.
Diverse go next and Akshay does a decent job at the instructions, although when the sales don’t fly in he has a tendency to price drop pretty quickly. Also Steph and Kathryn both struggle at listening whilst talking – which fair enough is a tough skill to master even for people with empathy.
Also they have a tendency to just hold or stand around their products rather than demonstrating them.
Akshay tries to liven things up.
The injuries it can cause?
But TJC tell him off. To be fair if your life previously was steamer free wouldn’t it technically be correct?
It doesn’t help that Steph and Kathryn as we saw last week are sweary marys and unlike Harpreet earlier Steph unleashes a four-letter fuck-up when the mics are actually live.
The massager demo starts off as it should with Kathryn presenting and demoing and Stephanie pretending to feel better.
The problem is she runs out of ideas and sits there looking bored. Akshay asks her to say something, which leads to awkward moments where they talk over each other, whilst not saying anything more of interest about the product.
I love this song
Still Stephanie’s slip of the tongue does make her sound like a high-end masseuse.
And that’s not even with a happy ending
Akshay’s lost so much faith that within seconds of the air fryer going live he’s dropped the price twice. Stephanie looks full of enthusiasm at this.
It ends up dropping to £117 just to attract 6 bids.
Finally Kathryn tries to sell the snail slime without completing the Chilean farmer story. At least, she reassures us, the product is “Vegan Friendly”
Oh dear. TJCs legal department has woken up again.
Well at least the snails are er friendly.
I’m more surprised she got away with promising it as the secret to eternal youth to be honest.
Back in the boardroom Lord Sugar continues the façade that he watched the candidates selling hours on real telly.
Stephanie pretends that she showed passion in the quest for the ring (which Sugar gets to do the obvious Tolkienesque dad joke about):
Stephanie claims Raghu gave the ring to Aaron and Brittany because of their jewellery selling experience. Karren as always puts the boot in.
She’s also quick to condemn Stephanie for swearing on air.
Akshay lightens the mood by going all “Enough about that what about ME?!” to the girls.
Cracking Sugar, Karren and Tim up.
Bless Akshay.
I do like Sugar’s critique of Brittany and Aaron’s early presenting style:
Akeem insists they provided plenty of information to sell the solar powered owl light and when challenged lists just 3, one being that it’s solar powered. At which point Harpreet helpfully nudges him under the bus.
Anyhow it’s numbers that matter and the “real confirmed sales figures” (after buyers sober up) are in.
3 person Diverse sold 84 products (but only 4 of the star product) and made £2089
4-person Infinity made 56 sales – but thanks to 1 person going through with buying the ring made £2500
That’s close and I’m a little sad as Akshay was immediately doomed should this task be loss, yet he did his research, picked good products and engaged well (you could argue Brittany, Aaron and Akshay did best personally in this task) – however he should have been schmoozing and selling with Kathryn so perhaps the failure does rest in his ego.
But never mind because the winners get the Ru Paul’s Drag Race tie in we’ve always wanted! An Audience With Veronica Green at the Pheonix – and bless her she still needs to up her wig game!
One candidate is VERY excited!
It’s like this is all for Brittany at first.
Harpreet (who is still insisting that barking out orders is a valid leadership style) looks sweetly confused during it all. Aaron (who SMILES!) and Akeem seem to really get into it.
I have NO idea what is going on – but I quite like it
In the Sad Café the girls of course blame Aaron – and this seems to stick going back in. Despite the loss of the best star buy, the rubbish presenting, lack of attention to details provided and saying SHIT to potentially (if it had really been live on air) lots of old ladies with heart conditions, Stephanie remains and Akshay is fired because, as Sugar says, on the losing team 8 times “No Smoke Without Fire”.
He’s still positive and smiley in the taxi of despair and I swear when he doesn’t return to the help a few heads are still turned expectantly towards the door waiting for him to saunter in.
Next week the candidates make baby food. What could possibly etc etc?
Sorry this is late again. Bit under the weather and this season feels hard to write about. So far this (possibly Covid restricted) series we’ve had as task themes BOATS (episode 1 & 4), Toothbrushes (ep 2), RECIPES (ep 3 (drinks) & 4 (fish), Tech (Ep 3 (Toothbrush app) & 5 (Games), Tours (ep 6), Cars (ep 7) – so let’s do something crazy and go for cars, tours and a little bit of recipes. Just to mix it up like.
Anyhow Week 8 dawns at 4am with Brittany, evocatively lit like a carnival fortune teller, in her fetching Gemini bed blindfold taking the call summoning the candidates to Aston Martin HQ.
“I see a short beardy man who looks a bit like Nookie Bear”
“Sounds like it could be a driving task” guesses Harpreet. Brittany takes a “stab in the dark” guessing it might be car related.
No shit Sherlock.
On the drive to Warwickshire Aaron regales Harpreet with his Aston Martin story.
I do love Harpreet’s response. “Everything but” being in an Aston Martin. The possibilities are endlessly boggling.
Aaron continues with a wistful look in his eye.
That journey must have flown by!
At Aston Martin HQ in another not terribly tenuous link Sugar reminds us that cars are sometimes used in Formula 1 so the task is to lay on a racing themed corporate away day (complete with a tour, a racing “experience” and food and drink) at Silverstone, using two “global partners” of Aston Martin as guinea pigs clients. Most pretend profit after any “refunds” wins
On Diverse, Stephanie confidently puts herself forward with her background in “luxury corporate hospitality” and nobody challenges this, not even Akshay a man we were told last week “constantly talks about cars”.
Over on Infinity Brittany throws her “first class degree in hospitality” into the ring, but is immediately steam-rollered by Harpreet who points out the task is about profit not just events.
Harpreet comes out with some claptrap about wanting to work closely with Brittany and discussing their “vision” but then states she knows in detail every last minutia of the task.
And the guys vote for her out of pure terror.
The teams choose their “experiences” with Stephanie plumping for a museum tour followed by a “track experience” whereas Harpreet is keen on a “pit stop” experience and some motion simulator “pretend you’re driving an F1 car” thing. Brittany seems to be more aware of profit margins, pointing out that the team could save money by putting on their own experience but Harpreet’s not having any of it and insists on paying for an activity in order to lay on a “premium experience”.
She gets more and more “customer services call holding message” in her interactions when challenged that I almost expect her to say “Your input is important to me – but please fuck off” to Brittany.
Next the teams pick food options with Stephanie putting the ex-car-enthusiast Akshay with Nick on catering and demanding they provide luxury food at mid-range prices (and also – in response to Nick yes she still does want this to be the best experience of their clients’ lives – no pressure). Just send the lads down to Home Bargains for a case of pot noodles and stick a load of chopped coriander on top Steph – nobody will be any the wiser.
Over on Infinity it’s pricing time (without fail before they’ve actually worked out costs). Harpreet sees that the basic package costs £300 so decides to go in big and ask for £500 and sends Aaron and Brittany to negotiate with the client. Aaron is confident of “going in big” and at the unnamed tech client suggests £600 per person and argues them up from £250 to £310 per person (they could have dropped the motion simulator for this, which Brittany is now bigging up as “Virtual Reality” to a bunch of techies – but Aaron for some reason thinks this element of the experience is “Vital”. We shall see.
Stephanie meanwhile decides to try for £750 per person. There’s going in “big” and there’s mugging. She still undercuts herself starting at £700, but their client (Peroni) aren’t budging much and it gets a bit fractious with Stephanie just hammering out prices without discussing the clients need and thus only managing to argue them up from £200 to £245 (perhaps panicking when Peroni man feigns impatience).
Brutal.
Steph could have saved some cash by suggesting downgrading one of the elements, but it doesn’t occur to her. Outside Kathryn comforts her like they’re down the Slug and Lettuce discussing relationship troubles.
He didn’t deserve you love
Nick and Akshay decide to sample ALL of the grub – starting at the lower end and working their way up. They’re particularly smitten by the mid-end Kung Po chicken – with brownies apparently garnished by fruity merkin sculptures for dessert.
The King Po option costs £16 which even with those brownies seems fucking astronomically overpriced (I’m getting some Kung po King prawns from my local takeaway tonight and it costs £5.90 – bung in some Singapore noodles and a few viennettas – job done) and the food lady is particularly resistant to lowering this. Akshay puts on the charm.
I can’t stop laughing at this picture of Nick guiltily snaffling another brownie in the background.
Brownie? What brownie?
Akshay for all his smarming is negotiated into paying £13 but only through Nick’s promise of them doing the washing up afterwards.
Stephanie now apparently on her way back from the Slug and Lettuce with her bestie calls and admits they’re only getting £245 per customer.
“Why not round up?” moans Akshay.
Even Nick isn’t optimistic.
On the Harpreet and Akeem dream catering subteam there is NOT a chance in hell Harpreet is allowing Akeem ANY agency. And he just meekly takes it.
Unfortunately Harpreet has chosen to lead negotiations with an even more stubborn food lady. With her heart set on this “Indian butter chicken” – finding it hard to find the chicken here. In fact most of this plate seems to be rice. Which may explain what happens later.
It looks a bit like grilled Halloumi with fancy rice pudding. Annoyingly the dessert is tiramisu or they could have gone the full ambrosia style option.
Harpreet starts by asking what price they want – which is normally a wise option but here the answer is just too upsetting. £34 – is there a starter made of cocaine, saffron and hand sanitiser?!!!
Unless this was £34 for an actual cooked person…
Harpreet ends up getting it down to £26 per person. Maybe she should have given Akeem more to do than holding an open notepad and looking discombobulated?
Bring the price down or I’ll read this ancient Sumerian demon poetry at you!
I would have rather cooked and eaten Silverstone roadkill than pay even that price. Look at the food lady openly laughing at them.
I bet she gobs in the tiramisu too.
Still at least it gives Brittany a chance to look momentarily smug.
(Aaron always looks like the wife’s taken the kids and he doesn’t know how he’ll cope).
At Silverstone our two besties are living their best life doing a practice lap in their fast cars!
I’ll get you Penelope Pitstop if it’s the last thing I do!
Well one of them is.
Considering Aaron and Brittany are doing the track tour and pit stop shouldn’t Kathryn and Steph er be reading about the museum tour. Just saying.
Brittany and Aaron actually do lots of homework and because Aaron discovers he’s much faster at doing pitstops and the blokes there compliment him he finally smiles. Masculine pride restored.
“Said the actress to the Bishop” etc
Time to negotiate the Team Building experience – looks like Nick and Akshay have just borrowed their mates Scalextrics – oh no they do have to pay £495 to a mild-mannered beardy bloke.
Time for Harpreet to unleash her killer negotiating again. That’s right Akeem you get out of the way and play on the pointless simulator which looks like something out of a Clacton arcade.
She even bosses the man when he’s playing. To be fair she just wants to understand what happens when the guests crash into a wall.
Fair enough. Carry on.
Somehow this man wants £1000 for the use of this toy.
Maybe that’s why he looks slightly haunted – because of all the theft.
This time they both get the notepads out just in case Akeem’s holding it wrong.
Akeem’s big moment
Every word on those pages is actually just “SHIIIT!!!”
It looks for a moment that Harpreet’s about to tell the bloke to take his toy and go crash into a wall when she’s offered £800.
Sadly she accepts.
Albeit as passive aggressively as she can. He can cry on the way to the bank.
On Infinity Brittany’s keen on having more stop points on the track tour, but over on Diverse Stephanie wants less on the museum tour.
She’s convinced the museum will do all the work and they have nothing to learn.
Oh oh
Kathryn agrees that by chucking guests at the immersive aspects of the museum and willing them to interact it will be easier for her subteam.
Next day whilst Stephanie and Kathyn boast about what a great day out they’ve had, Harpreet again has to confess the cost of the Simulator, and tries to blame the subteam for promising it to the client. Brittany gets to look smug again.
In an attempt to generate some revenue Harpreet suggests Aaron and Brittany deter their tour guests from taking pictures with their phones so she can sell pictures Kathryn takes. What “deter” like this?
Or this?
Or even this?
This is how Aaron vogues
To be fair Aaron and Brittany do a pretty good job. Aaron breaking the ice with an “I know what you’re thinking” dad joke:
before kicking off with a tour of Silverstone’s iconic “corners” (so iconic they’re actually bends) even giving a little history on the “unfortunate”murder of Thomas a Becket.
It’s not all fun stuff like murders though.
Aaron throws down the gauntlet on the pitstop challenge.
How delighted is he that this woman was much slower than he was?
LOSER!
Aaron is living the dream this task.
Meanwhile on the less well prepared Diverse subteam it’s like a modern-day Aesop’s fable of the little bunnies who couldn’t be arsed reading as Stephanie and Kathryn manage to get their group hopelessly lost in the Silverstone museum.
This rapidly becomes a hostage situation.
LOOK AT THE THINGS AND ENJOY YOURSELF OR ELSE
“Let them have a little look around” mutters Steph within earwigging distance of her group “Gives you time to figure out where the fuck we are”.
At one point Stephanie asks if the guests want to know what makes a racing car tick and they gather round expectantly only for her to send them to waft aimlessly round the room in search of knowledge.
“This is great cos they get to do it themselves” Kathryn preens. Unfortunately Stockholm syndrome wears off and some of the guests start asking awkward questions and Steph and Kat have no idea what the interactive displays do or where the relevant ones are.
Peroni Man is angered
Stephanie decides to call quits on the interactive museum experience and drag the guests to lunch.
The other teams have been on “kitchen duty” which is where I get really angry at those food prices. You’d expect the meals to come in at least little reheatable containers for what they’ve paid but no the teams apparently have to prepare, cook, portion and plate it all themselves.
Nick and Akshay develop a beautiful bond over their shared love of cooking.
Nick insists it’s all in the preparation so of course they’ve forgotten to put the oven on.
Unfortunately they’re still faffing when the tour turns up hungry and the table hasn’t even been set.
Stephanie not at all awkwardly sets the table around the seated guests and the waiting game begins until 40 minutes in Nick and Akshay saunter right past the guests in their pinnies and hairnets like Mrs Overall tribute acts – much to Kathryn’s mortification.
Pretty sure they’ve started eating the balloons at this point
It gets even better when they realise they haven’t got plates.
Eventually they plate up.
Table cloth by Damien Hirst
Some of the sauce even gets onto the plate.
Unhappy punters fed, Nick and Akshay scrape the plates and start washing up.
Meanwhile for Akeem the beasting begins.
Pretty much every Akeem reaction shot this episode
Harpreet puts him on rice duty telling him to whack in more rice as it’s better to have too much than too little.
“This looks like a lot” Akeem worries, but Harpreet insists he just “Make Rice” and aggressively micromanages every aspect of this for him.
It’s uncomfortable viewing as Akeem just passively soaks it in, much like the vast padi field worths of rice in the oven. “A kitchen is a military operation” Harpreet insists. It looks like Akeem is a prisoner of war. He suggests making a backup portion of rice (dear lord!) and Harpreet explodes, Ramsey style.
Fortunately Brittany turns up to help with service and comment on the amount of rice. “Don’t worry we’ve got plenty” gabbles Harpreet who’s completely lost it at this point. For god sake nobody mention the naan bread.. oh shit!
Kathryn is determined to give the clients a great afternoon driving the Aston martin round the track and the clients on the whole seem happy, when they’re not on the verge of puking. Which at least Stephanie can identify with.
Harpreet unveils the motion simulator and the clients aren’t impressed.
Harpreet tries to dress it up as the closest you can get to Virtual Reality – but her saying that is even closer to a form of virtual reality.
Everyone has way more fun on the scalextrics.
In the boardroom, Stephanie admits abject failure on negotiating a price. Sugar seems tickled with Akshay’s haggling technique. And Nick gets compared to Manuel because Lord Sugar lives in the 1970s.
I love how Nick soaks up all the mockery so sweetly.
On Infinity Brittany gives Aaron credit for negotiating the price, but she gets stick from Karren for insisting on still calling the motion simulator VR. I’m with Karren on this.
Ricegate of course raises its ugly head with Harpreet now expecting Akeem to change the laws of physics and prepare a couple of kilos of rice in less than 15 minutes.
I’m pretty impressed given the cooking instructions for rice in the oven.
Akeem finally pushes back and it descends into bickering.
You tell her Akeem!
Aaron’s face is all of us.
Karren picks up on the “tension” between Akeem and Harpreet. Not sure it’s that sort of tension Karren..
Anyhow results are in.
Diverse spent £895 and took £145 on photos but after refunds to disgruntled customers only made £1209
Infinity spent way more (£1283) took less on photos (£109) but had no refunds so made £1926 (with Brittany and Aaron getting praised by the clients) and are sent to the new Spurs Stadium. What a treat eh?
Akeem is too pure for this world and gives Harpreet credit for the win – I like to think it’s the cameraman saying “WOW??!” there.
Akeem mate blink if you need rescuing
In the Sad Café whilst the girls connive to blame the kitchen team, Akshay rightly identifies the main issue as being the low ticket cost. Back in the boardroom, Sugar even calls Stephanie’s negotiations “pathetic” as it transpires her client actually had £3k to spend, and it seems he’s rumbled her plan as he brings all four back in.
Akshay is the boardroom loser heavyweight here having been there 5 times now, whilst Stephanie and Nick have both (disgraced) this scenario 3 times.
We get an obligatory 1970s Grand Pricks gag.
Altogether now. “But it SAYS PRICKS!”
And Lord Sugar draws out the none tension before “regretfully” firing Nick for being a bit well Nick bless him.
Continuing with the smut, Sugar accuses Kathryn of not showing him much and she begs to let her show him.
Oh please let us handle him easily!
Akshay PROMISES to be Project Manager and they’re all shooed out by Karren before LordSugz releases hell.
In the taxi of despair Nick has cosplayed as an Edwardian thespian with a dreadful tragic secret.
So farewell Nick you strange sweet otherworldly poo logo creating frustrated artist accountant type chap and back to your elfin grot with you.
Back at the house, Akshay swaggers in to cheers like he’s a recurring character in a US sitcom.
“I AIN’T GOING ANYWHERE” [WHOOPS]
Next week the usually joyous shopping channel task. Please don’t screw this one up.
(Again sorry for my lateness due to being laid up with an appallingly painful back – am currently dosed up on painkillers & smothered in some odd Polish ointment containing CBD oil and chilli that my lovely neighbour and constant source of odd ailment cures gave me. My back is having fever hallucinations).
Week 7 dawns with Aaron enthusiastically answering the 4am summons and bounding up the stairs with all the grace of a toddler elephant on Christmas day bellowing “GUYS!!! GET YOURSELVES UP!”
Despite nobody having suggesting he should Project Manage Akeem somehow believes it is his duty to do so and insists he’s going to have to rule with an iron fist. No more Mr Nice Akeem.
At the Here East hub for innovation and technology in the Queen Elizabeth Park Lord Sugar arrives in a driverless pod that resembles a throat lozenge, as, in another non-tenuous link, the candidates are tasked with designing and branding a driverless pod aimed at the leisure and sport industries and pitch to a corporate customer. Most orders wins.
The teams are mixed up for maximum annoyance with Kathryn joining Diverse (Sophie, Akshay, Nick & Steph) and Britanny sent to Infinity (Akeem, Harpreet, Aaron) which she seems genuinely insanely pleased about.
As ever Stephanie asks Diverse the killer question “So does anyone have exp with autonomous vehicles?” but straight off there’s a volunteer as Akshay, whilst not au fait with the electric kind absolutely loves cars so would seem a perfect fit for the PM role.
Well unless you’re Sophie, who gasps like a woman determined to keep Akshay away from anything that might make him happy.
Sophie volunteers because she knows sod all about cars but once designed her own BAR which sounds a bit like car right?
Bizarrely Steph votes for Sophie to PM with her “extensive” interior design experience, although given their previous interactions this could be a cunning set-up for a fall.
Akshay looks forlorn.
Over on Infinity, (who straightaway I love for eschewing a meeting room for sitting amongst the flowers in the sunshine) Akeem is duly elected PM for his Tech Skillz and Nerd cred and lays down his iron gauntlet suggesting the pod should be a sort of taxi
(erm isn’t it going to be that anyway?) but also sustainable
(erm isn’t it that already?) but also futuristic
(erm.. OK I’ll stop).
Aaron, already clearly befuddled by the word futuristic, worries that the idea is too complex.
Go on Akeem put him in his place!
Oh. OK.
The observing Tim is unimpressed.
I mean heaven forfend that a manager works collaboratively with their team, listening and taking on board input!
Sophie meanwhile wants a “party pod” in red and (accursed) green. At least there’s no brown. It has to be “the vibe” whatever that means.
Kathryn asks Sophie to share her vision clearly so everyone is on the same page. Sophie insists she is 100% for the party pod.
Akshay volunteers to bring his technical knowledge to the corporate subteam. Sophie of course immediately slaps him down.
No fun allowed for Akshay. Sophie chooses Nick and Stephanie to meet the corporate client with her and, just to remove any shadow of doubt that she utterly despises Akshay with every fibre of her being she makes Kathryn sub team leader.
Turns out they’re both worried Sophie’s idea is tacky.
Akeem asks Brittany to lead branding and asks Harpreet to join her, but immediately Harpreet pushes back he acquiesces and lets her join him on corporate with Aaron put on branding. To be fair it is a wise choice, but I do love him insisting to camera that he’s become more assertive. He doesn’t get off to a good start with the client in Wembley by confusing the number of arenas in Wembley, focusing on events and not listening to the client talking about the shopping centre and restaurants.
Fortunately Harpreet jumps in and brings it back with the novel approach of asking the client what they want.
They prompt Akeem and Harpreet to think about the diversity of users, which to be fair they should have done before this meeting, so they’re back at square one. Harpreet’s straight out the room leaving Akeem to pick up the paperwork so she can complain to camera about having to “step up” to find out what the client wanted.
Hell hath no fury like Harpreet having had to contribute.
Brittany and Aaron work with Tina the digital designer to create “BeePure” (Aaron’s suggestion) with Brittany again going the full Greta. She likes the concept of the bees.
However the yellow colour of bees on the logo isn’t “pure” enough for her.
Who knew yellow was the colour of SEX? That explains why this feels rude.
Akeem calls and Brittany grills him about units and cost, none of which he has got the info on – but this shouldn’t matter to the branding team. She totally fails to tell him what their design is, apart from that it’s focused on sustainable, although he stresses it should be modern. And at that Brittany cuts him off so she and Aaron can bitch about him not getting figures. It’s like they’ve forgotten they’re there to brand and are already looking at pitching. Surely they need to know WHAT they will be pitching first?
At the NEC the client tells Sophie they want to create “unforgettable experiences” which Sophie insists bizarrely is “word for word” exactly what she said earlier.
I mean they’ve all been sat there and she’s straight up gaslighting them. I love how Steph’s face gives it away.
Despite false memory syndrome when it comes to what she said, Sophie promises an “everlasting memory” and tones down her idea to an “experience pod”.
Anything branded as an “Experience” is shit.
NEC lady warns that their customers have different needs so “don’t be too niche”.
Blissfully unaware on branding Kathryn and Akshay brainstorm names whilst their designer worries it’s going to be a long day.
It’s a party, a celebration. Celepod is my absolute favourite suggestion.
Mainly because if you google it you get pictures of giant squids. They end up plumping for “Star Pod” even though Kathryn worries it sounds like a karaoke booth. The quest for a suitable logo begins.
Kathryn worries it’s “not a good message” if the star on the pod looks like an explosion, but eventually goes for it.
Karren thinks it looks like an exploding toaster.
Sophie calls and explains that the NEC don’t want anything “too niche” and they should forget the party element. So much for that clear vision! She insists she hasn’t changed the idea since the morning. I do love Akshay taking the piss asking “just to confirm do you want it sharable or instagrammable?”
Steph doesn’t like the logo or the name. I love Nick’s optimism.
Sophie leads this subteam to design the interior of the pods, in a fun twist. So Sophie goes for a red carpet and starlight ceiling prompting Steph to point out that this obviously sounds like a PARTY of some sort. Sophie will be adding prosecco and cake ambush next!
Sophie denies that this has anything to do with a party – she just wants the “experience” to be “exciting”, at which point Nick’s emboldened and chucks in some glitter.
I just love how he asks to “revisit the glitter”. A portable fridge and glass holders are added, before irony strikes and a karaoke machine is stuck on board.
Definitely not a party.
Meanwhile Kathryn and Akshay tone down and simplify their design to make it less obviously like a party. Heh.
On Infinity Harpreet designs the interior (complete with ipads and headphones) mainly because Akeem simply accepts everything she says whilst Tim seethes and shakes his head in the background.
Even Tom the designer looks a bit disgusted.
Meanwhile Brittany has added sunflowers and more bees to the exterior. It looks like Fat Freddie’s Mystery Machine. I like it.
Tim’s not impressed. He likes everything to be literal.
And has never heard of Autumn.
What’s he got against bees.
Akeem manages to hide his disappointment at the lack of modernism and focus on the positives on the big reveal, “[PAUSE] yeah …it looks very eco-friendly”.
He adds that a corporate client might be confused by the outside, which Brittany still argues is due to her not knowing how many units the client wanted and therefore she went for something desirable to mass numbers. Again how does that impact design – surely you would want that appear anyhow?
In private Akeem admits he wanted something simpler and more versatile. This is the closest he gets to moaning.
Across town and the Star Pod is revealed
and I’m here for Akshay’s expression of disgusted betrayal when he sees the interior.
Kathryn explains that it looks a lot like a party, but Sophie waffles on about maybe in “normal life” but they can pitch this differently to different client types. Sophie sends Stephanie and Kathryn to prepare for the launch whilst she Nick and Akshay go to pitch to corporate.
Stephanie explains their dilemma with the “definitely not a party pod” – using the word “party” at least 8 times in the process of trying to “untangle” the concept for clients.
“Steph came out with all this STUFF” laughs Kathryn – acknowledging that neither of them understands Sophie’s “vision”. Stephanie thinks if they manage to sell it won’t be down to Sophie’s “leadership skills”.
Akeem picks Aaron to pitch until the team disagree and he sends Aaron and Harpreet to the corporate client and takes Brittany with him to work on the launch event, where there’s more dithery nonsense over who’s going to close the speaking before they dress up as the traffic version of a Safe Sex instruction video.
Sophie, Akshay and Nick show the NEC round Star Pod, with Nick very keen to draw their attention to the pink bench and karaoke machine whilst Akshay noticeably broods in the background. Nick claims they’re catering to the “VERY SERIOUS adult demographic” as well as to families. NEC lady is unimpressed.
She points out it feels more like a hen party and her colleague suggests the pod is too niche and they’d only order one or two. Nick tries to play nasty cop again
and somehow manages to argue them up to 5 rentals at £6k per month for 6 months. Karren points out the client had a million quid to spend on up to thirty – come on woman let Nick enjoy his (sort of) deal.
Over at the BeePure corporate client meet and already they’re asking awkward questions.
Aaron steps in and says there will be branding to say it’s a taxi added. Because you can always fix it in post.
The other issue is the confusion between the exterior and more formal interior, so they offer to take only 4 at £6k each, but Harpreet haggles it up ever so slightly to £6.5k and then complains they could have done far more.
So neither team managed to satisfy the client they were supposedly designing for.
At the launch venue the latest hot light entertainment double act is storming it.
You know what would be better than riding like a star. It all being sustainable. Wowzers just imagine that eh? The glamour!
“That would be INCREDIBLE!” shrieks Nick and I love the long deathly silence from the audience as the Star Pod is revealed.
Broken only by the flinches as a confetti cannon pops sending coloured paper flying past their bored faces.
Akeem dons a special hat for the BeePure launch.
Sadly his audience largely can’t see it as he talks from INSIDE the pod waxing lyrical about how easy the seats are to clean – because obviously they’ll need to know they can get vomit, jizz and blood off them on a regular basis.
Eventually he pops out and continues speaking with his back to the audience like a pro.
Luckily Brittany’s there to get over-excited and wake them up at the end (whilst Akeem plays with one of the ipads STILL with his back to the audience).
It’s time to sell, and surprisingly Harpreet is struggling with Manchester Central (I would have thought the bee logo would work). It’s sad she feels the need to prostitute herself though.
She does manage to get an order for 12 pods at £5k each from the rather tight Manchester Central bloke and his witch companion which she guestimates at being £320k.
Unfortunately she realises she’s got her sums wrong leading to this somewhat undignified attempt at grovelling whereupon she’s forced to split the difference and take £340k.
Bad maths is expensive kids!
Kathryn and Stephanie try to negotiate with the impressively formidable Network Rail representative who hates everything about the Starpod. Kathryn asks if she’d be interested in taking it as a trial, but it’s a no.
Meanwhile Akeem tries to pitch to the boss of Urban Airways who is clearly so rich his kids don’t have lunchboxes but Food Trucks!
Brittany gives it her best go, but gets no orders and is gutted.
Nick asks the HS2 rep if they have any questions only to be told the product “Screams a little Las Vegas strip”. Actually they could be talking about Nick’s outfit.
He’s reduced to tragic, unsuccessful begging. No sales for Nick.
Back in the boardroom and Sugar quizzes Akeem as to whether he asked Wembley how many pods they would be looking to purchase.
It’s almost like Akeem doesn’t realise this is an error – but he’s let off the hook as Diverse didn’t ask that either.
“What’s with the bees?” Sugar asks Brittany who eulogises how bees are imperative to the planet and eco systems only for Lord Sugar to compare them to some wax that smells of fanny.
I think bees deserve better.
Sugar eyes up the design dismissing it as “the Teletubbies tour bus”.
Akeem gets some stick for changing his mind when challenged, but Akeem points out he knows how to listen.
Over to Diverse and Sugar asks Sophie what we all want to know.
She waffles on about her pashun for interior design. But we all know why. Akshay does.
She then accuses Akshay’s branding as “basic” and eyerolls her way through Kathryn’s explanation for the reasoning behind making the design more neutral. “Then it would have been tacky” she snaps when Akshay says it was originally louder. Which kind of lands her in it. She also claims her hands were tied by the branding team’s colours and is horrified when Kathryn points out the truth that the colours were literally Sophie’s Choice. “It was your vision” laughs Akshay as Sophie’s world begins to crumble.
Sugar’s assessment is it looks like a “pimpmobile”. He looks like he’d know. He later compares the interior to a “Giant Mouth”. It might be niche but take out the karaoke and I bet you’d find some clients who would pay good money to ride in it.
Anyhow the results are in and Infinity took £156k from the corporate client but made just over a million in other sales.
Diverse took £180k from their client but only made £355k in other sales.
Total investment in Infinity was £1m 260k – every single last bit Brittany and Harpreet will now attempt to take credit for. Infinity get sent to Lea Valley for some White-Water Rafting. Diverse huddle in the Sad café.
“I wanted something classy!” wails Sophie.
Love you put a karaoke machine in it!
Kathryn’s got to the point with Sophie’s fibbing about what was said that she’s checking her receipts by going through her notepad.
Back in the boardroom and Sophie gripes about the exterior letting her down, but Sugar reveals the NEC didn’t like the interior either. “You wanted to be told everything” Sophie whines at her branding team, missing the point of being Project Manager.
Stephanie puts the long-awaited boot in.
As Sophie chooses to bring back the branding team,
but switches at the last minute to bring Akshay and Nick. Sophie claims nobody supported her.
Nobody supports this. She claims Akshay wanted to drive her down the party rabbit hole.
Sugar sums up that the branding may have been bad but only because the vision kept changing and Sophie is fired, leaving without so much as a thank you.
There’s a brief moment when it looks like Nick might get fired too, but he and Akshay get sent back to the house.
In the taxi of despair Sophie humourlessly vows to concentrate on her cocktail bar and expanding. I’d be marking levels on the bottles just in case bartenders. So farewell Sophie – queen of the eyeroll and source of conflict.
Next time continuing with the over-lapping task themes, we are still on bloody cars with the teams having to put together a motor racing themed corporate away day.
Liking: Akeem, Harpreet
Most In it to Win It: Stephanie
Entertained by: Nick
Warming to: Akshay, Kathryn
Meh: Brittany, Aaron
Bye Bye: Harry, Conor, Shama, Navid, Alex, Francesca, Amy, Sophie
View From The Funny Farm 