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Week One SummaryHere's a summary of Week One:
| Quote: | Task: The teams are each given a van filled with fish worth £600 wholesale. Boys take on girls in the quest to find the perfect market pitch and offload the seafood at the best possible price. There's gotta be a few squid in this...
Project Managers: Claire Young for Alpha and Alex Wotherspoon for Renaissance.
There's precious little time for the contestants to settle in at The Apprentice series 4. As soon as Sir Alan has made his introductory speech, the nervous hopefuls are split into two teams and whisked off to a shady kerbside, where each team takes ownership of a consignment of fish.
The boys take ages to name their group Renaissance "as in changing, rebirth…", and by the time their decision is made, the girls' team has not only chosen the moniker Alpha "because it's the first letter of the Greek alphabet, and looks a wee bit like a fish" - but hot-footed it to the premier market pitch in London's Islington Market. When the boys show up ninety minutes later, the girls' selling is well under way (although Sir Alan later suggested their early tactic of getting customers to name their own price was neither bright nor right)!
While all eight ladies surrounded their stall and squabbled periodically, much to Claire's consternation, the reluctant but capable man-manager Alex divvied up tasks amongst his crew. Simon and Lee used their patter to attract the punters with ease but unfortunately entrepreneur Raef, charged with identifying the fish, incorrectly labelled three boxes and barrister Nicholas, appointed chief price-fixer, charged only £4.90 per lobster instead of £4.90 per pound of lobster, resulting in up to a £10 loss per crustation unit. The boys' profits were soon feeling the pinch.
As the deadline drew near, both teams upped the ante, sending additional crack sales teams out into the streets. The girls' plan - to sell business to business - saw them offload the last of the stock by persuading upmarket restaurants to make their menus more fishy. The boys also sold business to business... but with just moments to spare, they somehow ended up in the local jewellers, and finally in a solicitors office, where Michael's 'executive' decision saw them flog £130 worth of fish for £50.
Back in the boardroom, Sir Alan was unimpressed. Although the Alpha team had made £153.98 of profit, he told project manager Claire, "I know if I was to speak to a professional fishmonger he would kill himself laughing. But a win is a win..."
But as the rapidly disintegrating boys team only managed to get £32.69 into the black the girls were declared the winners of the first task, allowing the delighted Alpha team to travel to their luxurious accommodation where a delicious treat was in store, prepared by chef Jean Christophe Novelli.
And after a serious dressing down from Sir Alan, three of the men - the indignant project manager Alex, plus the somewhat petulant Raef and Nicholas, returned to the boardroom the next morning; the first to fight for series 4 survival.
Raef and Nicholas insisted the team's poor showing was due to a serious rift in team relations. "The barrier that has been drawn is like educated against... gritty salesmen", Nicholas asserted.
Taking 'gritty salesmen' to mean uneducated, Alex was gob-smacked. "I am educated!" he countered.
"Well, I'm not suggesting you're not... I'm just guessing", floundered the public school barrister, before perhaps nailing his fate by telling former Spurs chairman Sir Alan, "I am very into culture and art. I find it very difficult to have conversations about... football."
And an incredulous Sir Alan quickly booted him out the competition. "You were devastated when you got a B in your GCSE French, you are going to be even more devastated now because you got a big F. You're fired…!"
Nicholas de Lacy-Brown was the first contender to leave the competition. "I've been made a scapegoat", the barrister said in his defence. |
From http://www.bbc.co.uk/apprentice/
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