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Raef is fired from the Apprentice |
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Written by Telly Addict
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Thursday, 22 May 2008 |
Raef has become the latest candidate to be fired by Sir Alan Sugar from the current series of The Apprentice
Sir Alan Sugar calls the candidates to an early morning briefing at the National Theatre on London's South Bank and reveals that this week's task is "all about telling a story". This week both teams must build a new brand of tissues and create a TV and print advert in support of their promotional campaign. The experts at Ogilvy, one of Britain's biggest advertising agencies, will decide which team comes out on top. Of course, as always in The Apprentice, one person in the team that loses will be fired.
Sir Alan again muddled up the teams and appointed Alex in charge of Alpha which is made up of Lucinda and Lee and Raef (despite Michael's protests last week) as project manager of Renaissance, made up of Claire, Helene and Michael.
This week's task is designed to give both teams the chance to bring their creativity to the fore as they innovate an exciting new brand of tissues. The teams must brand their product, design the packaging, produce a print ad, and film a TV promo for a blank box of tissues.
The Alpha team sit down to brainstorm and Lee is on full stream. This all leads to good results however when they choose the name 'Atishu', while Claire's suggestion of 'I Love My Tissues' is carried forward by the Renaissance team.
Renaissance are very quick to assign roles, with Raef and Michael working as creative directors on the TV ad, leaving Helene and Claire responsible for the packaging, design and the print ad. Claire's experience as a retail beauty buyer helps as they create an upmarket, understated, female-friendly package.
The Renaissance boys, meanwhile, immerse themselves in their long-held arty ambitions. Both men have a background in amateur dramatics and they relish the role. As they scout locations for the film shoot and engage the services of TV weathergirl Sian Lloyd to act as a wholesome mum, they get carried away, with Raef saying, "I need to get my cravat ready. All directors need to wear a cravat".
Back at base, Claire is less impressed.
Over on the Alpha team, Lucinda feels Alex and Lee are too gauche to understand the subtleties of selling to women, and given the end result, she could well have been right.
The next day, relations improve on the set of Alpha's video shoot but are strained once more by the time they get into the video edit suite.
After working late into the night, both teams finish preparing their campaign materials and begin to work on the presentations they will give to the Ogilvy advertising teams. A public focus group, as well as Sir Alan Sugar himself, will be on hand to judge the results.
Claire delivers a seamless and professional pitch on behalf of Renaissance. Lee delivers the pitch for the Alpha team, but compared to Claire's it looks poorly prepared and messy.
After the presentations, Sir Alan meets with the advertising agents to get their expert view, then calls all of the contestants into the boardroom.
Alpha are declared the winners and are rewarded with a trip to the upmarket Harvey Nichols store to treat themselves with "a few quid' from Sir Alan.
Back in the boardroom, Renaissance are about to pay the price for losing the plot when they made their advert. Claire as always, fights her corner. Raef and Michael blame each other for removing the vulgar pack shot from their final edit, but Sir Alan is on a roll and takes no time in declaring "Raef, you're fired."
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