In episode two of this year's run of the show Laura was criticized for not doing an exclusive deal with Boots regarding the book product. Many of her team had a go at her and Sugar also thought she did wrong in not going for the deal. However, in this week's episode the girls in team Apollo did an exclusivity deal with a Soho shop but Sugar deemed this was a breach of the rules:


I don't recall Sugar saying at the beginning of the task that no exclusivity deals are allowed. And seeing as the exclusivity was not allowed this week it's going to make future exclusivity deals open to question. Seems rather inconsistent. I think all tasks should allow exclusivity deals if the buyer asks for it.

Perhaps it was explained by Sugar off screen.

Well I remember an Ice Cream episode from either last series or the series before in which exclusivity was discussed. So they seem very inconsitent with how they deal with this.

I dont know why they dont just do a blanket 'no exclusive deals' rule.

In the beach task they were representing themselves, and so were free to reach whatever deal they saw fit.
Tonight they were representing someone else. If they had made an agreement with the supplier when agreeing to represent them that exclusivity was ok with them, then they could do an exclusive deal. But they hadn't got agreement with the supplier so they couldn't give exclusivity.

The product in the previous episode was their own so they could do an exclusive deal.

This week the product was someone elses and they would have had to agree with them before offering an exclusivity deal

The difference is that in the first task the team was the manufacturer (well, fictional manufacturer) and could make the decision - in this task they are representing the manufacturer under terms agreed with them.

I think that the viewers should always be made aware of how the exclusivity should be dealt with (via voice over or meeting with the seller) in an episode.

Too often it happens that Lord Sugar knows more then the viewers by suddenly bringing it up in the boardroom.

The difference is whose products are they selling.

Both cases where the exclusivity deals were a problem (i.e., tonights episode and the ice cream episode) where tasks where they were selling other people's products.

In the book holder pitch, they were selling their own product so were free to offer exclusivity.

No because
1) It's only something the owner of the product can grant, NOT a salesperson desperate to close a deal.
2) Business instinct should tell you if it's worth pursuing at any rate ie is the deal good for you.
3) You negotiate with buyers, listen, but not do whatever they tell you

But we weren't told about it and the girls either forgot about it or weren't told!

Seems a bit silly. If someone wants to buy your product and you can't offer exclusivity - it was in a small part of Soho (hardly the entire London area!) - it tends to make a mockery of the show. Someone wants to buy the product but you can't sell it to them. If the inventor wants to make money from his/her product surely they should encourage the apprentices to do all they can to sell the product. If they're so bothered about exclusivity deals then why permit the apprentices to sell it in the first place.

To be honest - if you are a business person the difference betwen the two situations is clear and doesn't need to be explained. The girls should have known what they agreed with the manufacturer - in the same way the other team should have known what prices they were allowed to offer.

The candidates have no right to make deals with a shop which forbid the manufacturers from any further sales, whether it's just in the one area or not. They're agents on behalf of the company - with the Bookeeze it was different, because they were the company.

No not inconsistent, the situations were entirely different. LS makes it clear they had no right to offer exclusiveness without the manufacturers say so.

Well it's only clear if Sugar said to the teams

"Under no circumstances can you agree to an any exclusivity."

If he said that then fair enough, the girls were silly to go for the deal but if he never said that - and we don't know for sure because it wasn't shown in the episode - then the girls were not wrong for going with exclusivity. Anyway, the team won without the need for the Soho deal so it didn't make any difference. But there does seem confusion regarding this matter.

No - because it isn't actually a rule set by Sugar -- it's the agreement they reach with the manufacturer. If they agree with the manufacturer that they can negotiate exclusivity then they can go for it -- but no manufacturer is likely to agree to that without knowing in advance what the terms might be (ie size of market, size of order, price).

When the PM was talking to the girls in the car he made the point that the deal was probably going to be a problem because they'd have to go back to the manufacturer to get agreement - and they wouldn't be able to do that.

You miss the point. Apart from the question of ownership and rights of the product as mentioned above, which puts the kabosh on offering exclusivity without the manufacturers/patent owner's consent, there's the big issue of what exclusivity entails.

Boots a nationwide brand with hundreds of stores across the UK and in airports around the world is a no brainer for exclusivity.

However this was one shop in Soho, the owner specified that no other shop in the whole of Soho, which contains hundreds of outlets and fashion stores could sell the product. Moreover, he was only willing to buy 200, (whereas Boots would have pushed hundreds of units across hundreds of stores.)

To offer exclusivity to only one outlet in the main shopping area of London (and be aware, technically Soho includes whole tranches of Oxford Street) is stupid, potentially financial suicide. Had they gotten six more small orders of the amount bought by the first shop, American Retro, in the hundreds of shops across Soho, they would have easily outsold that one deal.

Had the manufacturer of the shirt been offered an exclusivity deal with a major retailer with outlets across London and the UK he would indeed have been out of his mind not to take it - but this was the antithesis of that scenario.

Paloma was an idiot, she was so up her arse and intent on coming back the hero for her own personal glory that she didn't stop to think or care that only allowing 200 units to be sold was a bad deal for herself the company and the manufacturer.

Maybe all products should be non-exclusivity or full exclusivity? One or the other. That would help to avoid mistakes as seen in this week's episode. I doubt a few shirts sold in Soho would have been such a big deal to the future success of the product however I take your points, Uroboros1.

Truth be told, Sr'Alan can justify whatever decision he wants to make

and 9 out of 10, he loses the PM, so by the end he doesnt have the right guys left. Which partly explains why he has picked such dross as his apprentice every year.

Perfectly put. There is a tendency for some candidates to only see this as a competition and focus on sales for one day. However, normal business methods apply and will be applied in judging the outcome. The best candidates will remember this thanks to their experience. It should not be necessary to spell everything out each and every time for the benefit of say Laura.

Quite a lot of info is given to the candidates that the viewers don't see. They should also know to read the fine print and have the sense to anticipate scenarios and ask questions while they have the chance ie with the manafacturers/clients.
The fact that some on a team do know, tells us that it wasn't something sprung on the teams in the boardroom.

The point is that to be a good business person he expects them to be able to discern the difference when they are selling.

That's the thing, the shop owner who demanded exclusivity was a canny business man and right on the money. Also, given the overwhelming gay clientele of Soho and knowing that what this was was essentially a vanity product he instantly saw that the product was only a moneyspinner if he could prevent the diffusion across the whole of Soho.

He was also careful to stipulate the whole of Soho, not Old Compton Street, and that could include Selfridges, any private outlet of which there are hundreds, sports stores indeed anywhere where men who want to look better than they actually are without having to put any work in might go.

Indeed by the terms he demanded he could pretty much set the parameters of what constituted Soho. Paloma who fancies herself an arch business woman fell for it hook line and sinker. He was a better business person that she'd ever be.

What should have tipped the girls off that they were on to a winner was the fact that (it would appear by the VT) the first two stores they went in to both bit. Had Paloma not been such an arse and stopped to think then they could probably have cleaned up in terms of sales by spending the whole day moving around the whole of Soho.

Anyone claiming to be the next Apprentice should understand the difference between the two situations - it is pretty basic. That they made the mistakes highlights their weaknesses - which is surely the point of the tasks.

Tercet,

I think it's not so much "knowing" the rules in this case but more that Chris, Liz & Alex instantly realised that exclusivity on a number such as 200 was piss poor business and plain common sense.

But then Paloma is a piss poor business woman and has no common sense.

As long as the candidates know the rules before the task begins then it's their fault if they mess it up. I was just thinking we, the viewers, weren't told about no exclusivity deals (I can't recall Sugar mentioning it) so you get the impression the candidates weren't told too. But I guess a lot of footage is cut out to fit the hour long episode.

You can't offer exclusivity without prior consent of the maufacturer.

But whether they had it or not, no one with an ounce of business acument offers exclusivity to anyone for an amount as small as 200 units.