Business Lessons from Celebrity Apprentice (Ep 11)

In Last Thursday’s episode the teams had to build and sell a Quiznos sandwich. I think this episode really showed where the celebrity candidates are weakest, and that is in genuine business and marketing. They could not rely on their celebrity so everything came down to how to market a new sandwich to the average person on the street. But on with the lessons…

Business Lesson One: Savor victory, but don’t gloat.

Last week I enjoyed Piers reaction to Omarosa and his gloating in the boardroom to Trump. But come on now, enough is enough. While nobody likes a bad loser, a bad winner is often worse.

There is nothing wrong with enjoying a good victory. In fact, celebrate victories whenever and wherever you can. But a victory celebration doesn’t mean you have to continue to gloat over and over. Enjoy the win but use that as a catalyst for the next victory, not unnecessary reveling.

Business Lesson Two: You can’t always bank on your bank.

The great thing about this episode is that the celebrities could not rely on their rich friends to come and buy a $2 sandwich for $5,000. They had to sell it like anybody else would have.

It’s got to be nice having deep pockets and many friends with equally deep, or deeper, pockets. But you can’t always rely on such a free ride. We all have resources that we can and should leverage ourselves into more successful positions, but at some point or another we’re going to have to stand or fall on our own.

It’s a smart business person who networks with others and uses that to his fullest potential. It’s an even smarter business person is one who also learns how to succeed on their own merits.

Business Lesson Three: Fliers don’t sell sandwiches, coupons do.

This is a lesson that both teams could have capitalized from but I’m certain it could have easily made the difference between failure and success for Trace and Stevie B. First of all, I have to say how much of a disappointment Lennox’s sandwich was. They took a popular selling sandwich, changed the cheese and then gave it a new name. But the name in no way reflected the sandwhich. But hey, they won, so how valuable is my complaint?

I was very impressed with Trace’s decision making on this. He knew exactly what kind of sandwich he wanted, named it and made sure the toppings lived up to the name. It may have been a bit on the exotic side and maybe simple was better for the other team, but at least they put forth the effort.

But here is my main issue with this task. Both teams printed up a flier to pass out that just had information about the sandwich. Hello! Talk about missing a golden opportunity. Fliers don’t sell sandwiches, but coupons do.

First, if I was on Lennox’s team they could have printed up “tickets” to the sandwhich knockout event of a lifetime. The tickets would have allowed the holders to buy the sandwich for $2 each. That would have sold.

Being on Trace’s team, the fliers would have worked better had they printed a coupon on it. A Each flier should have offered 2 Cowboy Club sammies for $4! Now they are selling two sandwiches at a time instead of just one. This could have easily added another 100 sandwiches sold which would have placed allowed them to beat the other team. While Trace thought far more creatively than Lennox, it wasn’t enough to win, which was unfortunate.