The Amyprentice

I was on The Apprentice today. Kinda. At work Gav said he had a special job for me to do- his motives are somewhat questionable sometimes so I was a bit apprehensive as to what this ‘special’ job could’ve been, but thought “Meh. Beat’s facing up”. The job was that he gave me a trolley stacked with stock and i had to sell as much of it as i could before my shift finished at 5- i started selling at 1. To start with i was absolutely mortified, which wasn’t helped by Ben, Georgia and Gav all hanging around trying to see how i was gonna go about doing it. I found it cringe-worthy to be standing there going “Hello, can i interest you in our special offers?” but Gav said he wanted to see how capable i was, so i persevered; First things first i felt the need to come up with a motto that would keep me going when even the old people looked at me judgementally- ‘WWSASD’ What Would Sir Alan Sugar Do?. Once this had been established, every time i felt a slight twinge of embarrassment i would shout at myself in my head “WWASD” and then all embarrassment would be replaced with an overwhelming sense of sales capability and pure London grit. I imagined Paula and Tilly behind the till to be Nick and Margaret- (it was hard, seeing as neither of them warranted the honour of being such a necessity in my now overtly Sugar-Laden world) and started trying to sell. At first i wasn’t very good, and was a bit mumbly, but after a while i started being more confident and had no problem at- apart from the fact no one wanted to buy anything. Well, i say that- i did sell some stuff to start with but mostly i just got looks of confusion and annoyance, and was repeatedly asked questions such as “Where’s a good place to buy postcards in Beccles?” and “Where are the nearest toilets?”. i felt like saying “I’m not bloody ‘Tourist Information’” but i figured just because i had now embraced the spirit of Sir Alan Sugar this didn’t permit me to become blatantly rude to people i didn’t know and so instead pointed them in the direction of both the Old lady who sells postcards in her little shop and also to the public toilets whilst praying to god that the old man who smelled like stale bread and spoke to my breasts wouldn’t confuse the two.

After an hour i really felt like my attempts to sell were falling flat on their Sugary arses. There’s a wonderful mental image. Anyway, i went to go find gav and tell him things were going a bit not good., but he told me to keep on it and move if i felt like i needed to- so i did. And i sold TONS. I WAS ON FIRE!!!! By the time my shift had finished i had 5 items of stock left, and had done myself proud. However, i was also absolutely shattered- so tired in fact that towards the end instead of saying “Can i interest you in any of our offers today?” i kept saying “Can i offer you any of our interests today?” and after my shift ended, as i was leaving, Ben gave me some baskets to put at the front of the shop and as he handed them to me i said “Would you like a bag?”. He simply smiled and said “I think someone needs to go home now” and i stumbled out of the shop, where i waited for 10 minutes for my dad to pick me up before remembering he was doing an SA and in fact wouldn’t actually get home until gone 6.

And that was first task on ‘The Apprentice’ complete- i’m hoping next week i’ll get to invent my own toy or choose merchandise to sell to buyers. Or maybe, just maybe, i’ll be put behind the tills for 4 hours straight, with no seating and an endless line of grumpy, smelly customers waiting to tell me i’ve packed too much into one bag and demand a bag for almost every item. If i’m lucky ^^

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