New Ladder To Success

The remaining ten candidates convened at the fountain at Cherry Hill in Central Park to meet Trump. Trump arrived alone in a DeLorean. He stated that Gold Rush was a disaster for their third straight loss, and then asked for a volunteer from Synergy to join Gold Rush. Michael volunteered to switch teams.

TEAM SYNERGY:  Allie, Sean, Tammy, Pepi, Andrea (project manager), Roxanne, Brent, and Stacy
TEAM GOLD RUSH:  Michael (previous from Synergy), Tarek, Dan, Bryce, Charmaine, Leslie (project manager), Theresa, Lee, Summer and Lenny

 THE ASSIGNMENT:  This task was to help the convenience store, 7-11, launch a new sandwich called, the P'EatZZa.  The goal was to develop a promotional giveaway centered around 7-Eleven’s Andretti Green race car. P'EatZZa is a new sandwich that is made with two slices of pizza. The winner of the task would be whichever team generatged the largest increase in sales at the store they were assigned on the day of the event.

THE WINNING TEAM:   Synergy

FIRED CANDIDATE:   Leslie

LESSON LEARNED:

1) The facade of a control freak

When the team, Synergy, gathered to brainstorm ideas for promoting P'EatZZa, various people suggested cups, drink holders, hats, keychains, etc. as a promotional gift. Andrea adamantly decided on hats even though the rest of the team felt cups were the better giveaway. She told them, “I’m letting you know right now, it’s hats.”  Later, Carolyn commented, "If someone approached me on the street and said, 'Go inside and try this pizza sandwich, and I'm going to give you a hat.' Trust me, I'd keep walking."

In an interview, Andrea confessed she’d like to be PM every week and she’s happiest when she is in control of everything. Andrea claimed that people have accused her of being a total control freak. But the reason she has a nice life is because she’s a control freak.

Don’t confuse being in control as being controlling.

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2) Know your target market

At Gold Rush, Leslie, a 28-year-old Houma, LA realtor who was the only remaining contestant who had not yet served as a project manager, took up the responsibility of project leader. Without a familiar knowledge of the store location, a lower Manhattan location near New York University, she made a fatal error of marking the sandwich price higher than the market can bear.

Like Carolyn said, "This was a 7-11." Despite the quality of the sandwich, 7-Eleven stores are known for less pricey items.

Which leads to the next lesson…

3)  Listen to people 

In the fifth episode of The Apprentice, Trump described “Listen to people” as an important leadership quality.  Surprisingly, Leslie failed to listen to Lee when he suggested $6.99 for the price of P'EatZZa instead of $7.99.  Lee told Leslie a 7-Eleven store manager suggested a lower price, Leslie ignored his pitch.

For a second time, Lee informed his team that he overheard two of the store managers saying the price is too high for the sandwich.  Leslie refused to take action to lower the price.

George noted that it doesn’t take a great deal of expertise to sell a sandwich. By talking to the store employees, It would be very easy to find out the average price of a sandwich at 7-Eleven is $2.99 to $4.99.

In the end, Gold Rush lost the task by nearly 400% (Gold Rush increased the store sales by 608% verses Synergy increasing sales by 997%).

Trump's Lesson of the Week: "Know Your Customer"

Trump’s father, was also a builder.  He studied buildings and those who worked in them, then would design buildings based on what people needed and wanted. Trump says know your customer, and it will lead to a the “road” to success.

Related links:   The Apprentice on NBC, The Apprentice on SirLinksalot.net,The Apprentice Rules, and The Next Apprentice