I agree - and what the hell were the boys doing? who was in charge of budget? Laura could have allocated the creative team budget to jenna.

Not very often I feel sorry for the losers , But I did this time.

As soon as Jane was chosen for the boardroom she was dead. Lord Sugar obviously wanted her back as he mentioned that she had only sold £10 worth of items.

Jane has also been less than average in every other task.

Jenna doesn't do numbers (well)

It seems every year early on in the series a team decides the budget is the minumum to spend, almost as if they will be penalised for not spending it all.
The blame last night was on Laura for not controlling the budget closely - or more realistically, not specifically appointing someone to watch the budget. But also Gabrielle should've asked the question 'how much am I spending here and can it be justified?'

I think too often in apprentice the PM gets the blame for things that any competant buisness person should be doing off their own bat.

Sometimes AS does criticise a team for spending too little of the start-up cash

True, but Lord Sid does say a lot of things with 20-20 hindsight - I was expecting Tom's team to fail last night and him get reamed out for underspending at the start...

Thought Laura should have gone last night. Gabrielle wasn't well managed but did she was asked and contributed the most. Jane looked like she didn't want to be there (missing her son perhaps?) but didn't really do much wrong - as she said her expertise is B to B selling and if this is what her business plan is based on does it matter if she isn't great at selling direct to consumers?

Series is a little disappointing so far.....

But then she showed remarkable clarity when asking what the others had done, and Lord Sugar picked up on that. I think he likes that she admitted she overspent, because he likes people who are willing to admit their mistakes. The fact she sold the most meant that she could not be blamed for the failure of the task, if she'd only sold a bit then she'd have been a goner.

Yes think Gabrielle got a little overenthusiastic with the Union Jacks and the amount she spent, but I think she was kept because she has more to offer to the process

Laura's a complete bitch, I didn't see any leadership skills whatsoever and I didn't see her jumping in to stop Gabrielle from doing what she was, so she has herself to blame for that one.

"You stuck some tape on a wall, well done" - That was just plain sarcy, and a nasty attempt to belittle Gabrielle

Yes that was nasty and pathetic (she was referring to the shop sign i assume, which was written across the windows using masking tape). In other tasks laura seemed fine, but in this one she was useless and a complete bitch (I don't mind scraps in the boardroom but she was a complete irritant).

I think Gabrielle deserved this one chance to stay. She did go mad with the buying, but at no point was she checked by Laura, who clearly didn't have her finger on the pulse at all. I would have fired Laura this time, but Gabrielle would be on my watch list

Standing up for Jane here, but I think that was all in the edit. I'm sure I remember one of the guys saying that Jane did actually send a lot of people in.

Her team bought too much stock, and had too much focus on upgrading what they'd bought. So her understanding of the task was a bit off, but I think that's forgivable: it must be hard if you're not experienced in the area. It looked like she was responsible for the fliers getting done and bringing in more people towards the end. I like that; it shows she spotted a problem and did something about it.

Its not at all clear if Gabrielle got anything much wrong apart from the union jacks, and not clear if the upgrading strategy wouldn't have won with better sales and more selective purchasing. As you say, she won on effort and she won brownie points heavily on sales.

With the new format, there may be more though? She and Jade come with an artistic flair claim which they have had tested in tasks. If he likes what she has on offer as a business plan, the hard work and sales ability reinforce her case.The specifics of union jacks don't matter as she won't be making those. Its possible they may be offering a prospect that fits his interests, or the scale of money he has on offer/wants to deploy. I imagine he isn't that interested in things like restaurants or large scale food production which may explain why some people went.

I think the other thing going on is that you could explain everyone who has gone regardless of their performance on tasks. He's been getting rid of the people he can't see himself working with - and I think he can see himself working with Gabrielle, or even Katie, but not a Michael or a loud female.

And the good females have now learnt to pick up on his tips who to bring in. More often in the past he could signal madly and then send the PM home for missing his hints.

Even if they had spent nothing on the fabric and painting products, they would still have lost. Added to that, Gabrielle was the best seller. As lord Sugar said at the end, she should not have been in the boardroom.

i don't think she should have been fired, I actually agreed with Jane (which I wouldn't normally admit) but some of their products to sell were just not that desireable looking, whether vintage or not.

Ricky made a mistake last week in production but because he sold well in the last part of the task, was deemed to have not cocked up entirely. So Gabriellle made a mistake with the buying of materials (maybe argubly the Union jacks too but tbh there are some people that actually go for that, so, maybe she wasn't completely wrong in trying to cash in on that trend.. though the amount of furniture that it was applied to prob too much).. but, on that basis that she sold well (the most wasn't it) like Ricky did, then would be consistent to keep her over Jane and Laura who sold less and no doubt made some task mistakes of their own like Gabrielle did.Maybe she was able to make up the cost for what she used on the materials plus whatever profit came from the left over selling amount and Sugar kept her for that reason??... who knows. Doubt it wasn't just becasue it's thought Sugar likes her (in another thread).

I think the whole team went overboard with the "upcycling". Gabrielle might have initiated it by saying how she enjoys doing it, presumably as a hobby, but IMO it's the PM's job to reign in their team's over-enthusiasm. Laura should have allowed them to have their way and tart up a few pieces, but not everything in the shop.

I think Jane went because she seems a bit unlikeable, but I don't see Laura going much further.

Definitely not Gabrielle. Should've been either Laura or Jane but I'm really glad it was Jane as she was pretty bitchy and 2-faced towards the end of last week when she was ready to dig the knife into Duane had they lost...which they didn't of course.

She's nothing special either - good riddance.

Jane was weak, but only one person was responsible for their loss, and that was Laura.

She was desperate to buy complete tat and sell it, so causing the need for so much materials.

So, if Jane had to go for her weak sales (and I am not convinced the blokes in the team sold that much) then Laura should have gone because of her lack of vision and poor cost control.

She made over half of the total money that the team made though

400 / 1400 = 30%

I think some people may be taking her sales as a proportion of the profit rather than of the overall sales.