The Apprentice

Oh My God.....................

Not on the subject of shares, but I'm going to vent my spleen on this one! ( and I guess it loosely links into proper research.......LOL)

Last nights programme had me sitting with my jaw on the ground. I wouldn't employ any one of those twits. Their research was abysmal on their market. The research they did do, they ignored and worst of all their price point for the sweets considering it was kids they were for was an indication of the fact that they were all probably single people without kids who earned too much money.

£2.50 for a flippin sweetie for a kid on a day out - what planet are they from????

Now I don't have kids, so why do I care eh?

I care because it was the moral content of it all that had me shocked. Good for Sophie for having morals I'd say and I'd give her the job on that basis alone. Sales techniques can be taught later if you have the right candidate. It is called 'The Apprentice' after all.

I've been in sales in some shape or form since I left school. Telesales, counter sales, doorstep sales, selling is selling.............but..........and this is a big but...............if you don't believe in the product you are selling and that it has benefits, that it is priced correctly and that you can go home at night and sleep after a good days work, then forget it.

I refused a job offered to me at the end of a 3rd interview once because by the time I had entered the building for the 3rd time and walked through the sales team to the interview room, I had still not seen even 1 person smile. They all looked tired, sad, and stressed. So I told them that the interviews had been as much about them checking me out as me checking them out and on the basis of what I had seen in the building I could confidently say that it wasn't a place that I would want to work in and that they should offer the job to one of the other candidates. They were pretty shocked to say the least but I hope they thought about it after I left.

Back to the Apprentice though. The girl who handed a sweetie to the kid having said "would you like this?" then turned to the parents and asked for the money, well she'd have got a right shock if she'd done that to me and any kid of mine because camera or no camera she'd have got a piece of my mind and I'd have made her give the kid the sweetie for nothing based on the fact that she had made a verbal contract with the kid by asking if she wanted it and then handing it into her hand. Technically, she gave it away by handing it over.

Alan Sugar should have been pleased that Sophie had the morals to think that there is a point where something is overpriced. If he didn't believe that then he'd be selling everything at twice the price or three times the price he does now.

YES all businesses are set up to make money, but people aren't stupid and they do have an idea of what value for money is and that's why they shop around, but handing sweets into a kids hand is bang out of order!!!

What would I have done?

I'd have checked to see what it would cost a family of 4 (the average) to pay to get into the zoo, which was apparently about £16.00, thought about what percentage of the cost of their day out would be spent on additional treats (remembering that the kids would probably also want to go to McDonalds as part of their treat on the way home and then priced a sweetie accordingly to what the total expected cost of their day out would be.

If my team had then lost because they didn't make as much money, at least I'd know that they had done proper research and aimed a product at their target market at a reasonable price point and not because they were a bunch of idiots with desperation in their eyes!

And anyway, with the right price point they'd have got the money on volume sales instead of a few at too high a price.

Ok then.........rant over.