Having just watched the start of the programme again I noted that Sugar's exact words were: "The team that comes back with the highest amount of sales will win".

There is no possible way that that can be interpretted as "the highest overall profit".

So he actually misdirected them and the task was scored on a different basis to that which the teams were told when AS briefed them.

They were given a brief. You can hear them mention it either on the show or on You're Fired - somebody said that they didn't read the brief properly and thought they had to sell absolutely everything, rather than selling to make a profit.

What Alan says is unimportant, they go off and read the brief for the task.

An extremely interesting take on the programme.

Quite irrelevant, though. I made no comment about whether or not they had correctly read the brief.

The fact remains that he misdirected them.

What an earth do you think "Highest Amount of Sales Mean"?

Any idiot could sell the items at a loss.

The rules of the task were unclear, to be fair.

I assumed the same as the candidates as I was watching the task. The purpose of having various hidden 'gems' was that they could potentially be sold for more value, not that selling them without knowing might incur a loss.

It means one of two things:

1) The most items sold.
2) The most money brought back.

The one thing it cannot mean is the highest profit.

That is why we have a special word for profit. So that we do not confuse it with the amount of sales.

Sorry, without seeing the actual written briefing, can't say with any certainty that he misdirected them.

And, point of fact, these people (gawd 'elp us) are supposed to be the cream of high-flyers. They spend enough time telling us how marvellous they all are. AS shouldn't be expected to hand hold them and is entitled to expect them to work out simple mathematics. Sell at value or for a profit.

I am saying that he misdirected them based on the evidence that was present in the programme. He told them that the winner would be the team that came back with "the highest amount of sales".

In fact, the scoring was done on the basis of the higest profit - i.e. the amount of sales minus the putative costs for each item sold.

His direction was wrong.


Not if that is not what they have been told to do. If they are told that the team that comes back with the highest amount of sales wins (and if that was how the task had been scored as previous selling tasks have been), then profit is irrelevant.

Obviously valuing the itmes is still important because the want to bring back the highest amount of sales.

Even if the other team had one, Ben would still be in it... grrrr.

Whether or not he misdirected the teams, the fact that we're discussing it at all must mean that he (or the editing) misdirected the viewers. It certainly wasn't very clear from watching it exactly what their brief was.

I thought the rules were as follows...

Both teams had to sell the same ten items.

The team with the most profit would win the task.

Sugar, however, placed importance on selling the items at or above their market value. This was to dissuade the candidates from underselling the items. Both teams ignored Sugar's comments about not taking the items at face value.

They undersold too many items and failed to break even or make a small profit. For example, say the total price of the items was £500 pounds, they would have sold them all for less. Ben's team made a bigger loss.

I think that was how it panned out. I don't think there was any confusion. If one team sold most items at or above their market value, they would have won. Seems simple enough to understand.

Sugar said sell the items but consider their market value. The likes of Philip and Ben ignored the market value because they're were too concerned about selling. They had a finite time span to sell the stuff so they ignored the market value and let the buyers dictate the terms of the sale. This was a fundamental mistake. The skeleton was valued around 150 or so pounds but Ben's team sold it for around 50 quid. It was, arguably speaking, the worst performed task in the history of The Apprentice. Both teams ignored the point of the task.

Perhaps the task was too hard. Given six or so hours to sell items at their market price? That's hard to do. If you've got an expensive rug to sell, you need to travel to the more classy rug stores (not markets lol) and that takes time. However, no-one on any team ever said "let's find a posh carpet store and try to sell it to them." They did make some big mistakes.

I guess things can only get better. Can't get much worse!

That is how the task was scored in the boardroom.

However, at the start of the programme Sugar says: "The team that comes back with the highest amount of sales will win".

The 'amount of sales' is 'revenue', not 'profit'.

So the basis of the task, as he set it out it to them, was incorrect. Hence the title of the thread.

It was a stupid task. If I were team leader, I would have ordered every one to sit around drinking tea and eating scones and we would have won by default.

It's a shame they didn't read the brief properly or the task could have been so easy.

Ignoring for a moment the fact that they could have just gone to the pub for the day and still won the task (net loss 5 rounds of beer, actually maybe not quite won!) if they just realised that the should only sell if at a profit and researched the values they could have sold a couple of the items and romped it. No need for the running around the market trying to flog shoes for a quid! (although it was funny to watch!)

We don't even know if the candidate's brief was correct.

If AS can say one thing and Nick and Margaret score the task another way and the production company are such a bunch of muppets that they actually transmit an edit that shows that who is to say which version was in the brief given to the candidates?

Then again, there seem to be quite a few people on this forum who do not have a clue about the difference between 'revenue' and 'profit'.

Are you not taking all this just a tad too seriously? You're beginning to sound a little bit fixated. Arguing semantics isn't going to change the fact that both teams were beyond rubbish. And there's nothing to suggest that they would have performed better had they had a more strategic approach since none of them really seemed to have their hearts in the task anyway.

If the task is repeated next year, it will be interesting to see how it is tackled when the brief is properly understood.

There would be more emphasis of ascertaining correct value, and not gooing below it.

Such a task si actually closer to real life selling. Boss says "make some money out of this".

I understand the quibble over sales and profit, but making a sale is a clear direction to make a profit. If they believed that the items were given to them and they were starting at nought, they were foolish. He made it clear that they were to assess the value of the items and look beyond the initial appearance - a clear direction not to undervalue items.

One thing that isn't clear though, is what would happen in the event of unsold items - profit was clearly the aim of the task, but would they have incurred a penalty for items unsold, would they have retained their value in the totals, or would they be excluded from the net total?

ROFLMAO.

Don't you think coming onto a forum to talk about a TV programme is maybe taking it a bit too seriously.

With all due respect, if you have lost interest in this particular subject a more sensible course of action would be to stop reading the thread rather than carry on and criticise those who haven't.

Why would they be foolish to believe that AS did not mean what he very clearly said?

Why would they be foolish to believe that the task did not work in the same way as other selling tasks have in the past?


Isn't it obvious?

Not in the least, that the point of the forum, and I find the show highly entertaining and like reading other people's take on it.

And I wasn't criticising, merely pointing out that you seem to be fixated upon something that really doesn't matter in the larger scheme of things, particularly when you have no way of knowing what the actual briefing said. Just my opinion.

Fair enough.


Just take a look at the list of threads and ask yourself which of those matter in the greater scheme of things.

I don't understand why you keep opening a thread if you don't think the subject matters. It seems rather perverse behaviour.

One of the reasons I continue to find it of interest is that I was genuinely unaware how many people seem to be completely unable to grasp that revenue and profit are two different things.

And how many simply assume that people should ignore what AS says and use their own ideas of what he meant.

Leaving aside whether SAS misdirected the teams or not, surely if you are given a written brief about a required task it should be a given that it might be a good idea to read it.

Noorul stated that his team did not read the brief properly on Your Fired". Quite frankly, I wouldn't blame SAS for misdirecting the teams on purpose just to check that his so-called top business brains in the country had the common sense to double check with the written instructions. In fact, I think he should do this more often...

Indeed.


Actually, that's rather a good point and idea. But they ought to let the audience in on what they're doing so we're not getting mixed messages. After all, we didn't even get the chance to read the brief.

he did that in the car after he sent the teams away, he said he did not expect the teams to sell everything, just to sell the right things at the right price