The Apprentice (UK series three)

The Apprentice UK
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Series Three

Series Three of The Apprentice (UK), a British reality television, was broadcast in the UK during 2007, from 28 March to 13 June on BBC One. As the programme had generated favourable viewing figures in the last two series, the BBC decided on moving the show onto its mainstream channel and thus to a much wider audience, with The Apprentice: You're Fired! being reallocated to BBC Two as part of the move.[1] For this series Alan Sugar commented that production of the third series would include "tougher tasks and better people" as a means of making the programme stand out from other shows like Big Brother.[2] Alongside the usual twelve episodes, the series also featured two specials - the first, entitled "Beyond the Boardroom", was aired on 3 June prior to the eleventh episode; the second, entitled "Why I Fired Them", was aired on 10 June prior to the broadcast of the series finale.

This series saw in a change in the show's format, allowing for sixteen candidates to take part in the third series, with Simon Ambrose becoming the overall winner.[3] Excluding the specials, the series averaged around 5.62 million viewers during its broadcast.

Series Overview

With the success of the last two series bringing forth favourable viewing figures, the BBC decided that The Apprentice needed to moved towards being accessible to more "mainstream" audience. Discussion between the broadcaster and the production company led to a agreement that the show be relocated to BBC One. Along with maintaining the same timeslot, the move also required that its sister show, You're Fired, be moved over to BBC Two as a direct result so that it too could also be accessed by a wider audience.[1] Work on the new series included Alan Sugar arranging for a more tougher set of challenges from him, such as branding brainstorms, and a more varied collection of participants taking part than had been seen in previous series. Sugar believed that by doing this, it would keep the show fresh, and thus avoid it becoming just another version of existing reality shows at the time, such as Big Brother.[2] A demonstration of this was that the first task saw him create mixed gender teams to begin with, albeit with one man moved over to the women's team and vice versa, rather than arranging for this to happen later, roughly during its third episode, as is more common in other series.

One of the biggest changes made by the production staff, besides the change of channel for episode broadcast, focused on an issue that Sugar raised in the previous series over firing candidates. With the show attracting a far greater number of applications for participation, resulting in staff conducting interviews, auditions and assessments on over 10,000 applicants, the decision was made to increase the number of candidates that formed up the final line-up while still maintaining the use of twelve episodes for the series, thus allowing Sugar to fire more than one candidate at any time before the Interviews stage. When production began, 16 applicants found themselves taking part in the third series, in which the first task saw the men form under the team name of Stealth, while the women formed under the team name of Eclipse. It is the first series to feature a candidate leaving the process despite having won a place into the next stage - the decision by Katie Hopkins to depart towards the end of the Interviews stage, garnered considerable criticism over sexual discrimination in the aftermath of the episode's broadcast.

The move to BBC One led to a further improvement to viewing figures during its broadcast, with it reaching a peak of 6.8 million viewers by the end of the series.[4][5] Of those who took part, Simon Ambrose would become the eventual winner of the series,[4][6] and go on to work at Sugar's property company Amsprop, overseeing development projects, before leaving Sugar's employment in 2010 to focus on setting up in the restaurant business.[7]

Candidates

Candidate Background Age Result
Simon Ambrose Internet Entrepreneur 27 Winner
Kristina Grimes Pharmaceutical Sales Manager 36 Runner-up
Katie Hopkins Global Brand Consultant 31 Quit after Interviews stage
Tre Azam Marketing and Design Consultant 27 Fired after Interviews stage
Lohit Kalburgi Telecoms Manager 25 Fired after Interviews stage
Naomi Lay Advertising Sales Manager 26 Fired after tenth task
Jadine Johnson Financial adviser 27 Fired after ninth task
Ghazal Asif Business Development Manager 23 Fired after eighth task
Adam Hosker Car Sales Manager 27 Fired after seventh task
Paul Callaghan Ex-British Army Lieutenant 27 Fired after sixth task
Natalie Wood Housewife 29 Fired after fifth task
Sophie Kain Quantum Physicist 32 Fired after fourth task
Gerri Blackwood Transport Development Manager 33 Fired after third task
Rory Laing Bankrupt Entrepreneur 28 Fired after second task
Iftikhar "Ifti" Chaudhri Company Director 33 Fired after second task
Andy Jackson Car Sales Manager 36 Fired after first task

Performance chart

Candidate Task Number
123456789101112
Simon ININININININWINININLOSEINWINNER
Kristina ININININWINBRINININWININRUNNER-UP
Katie INWINININININBRBRWININLEFT
Tre INBRWININININININLOSEBRFIRED
Lohit ININININBRWINININBRINFIRED
Naomi ININLOSEININININBRINFIRED
Jadine WININBRININININWINFIRED
Ghazal INININWINININBRFIRED
Adam INININLOSEBRBRFIRED
Paul INININININFIRED
Natalie INININBRFIRED
Sophie BRININFIRED
Gerri BRINFIRED
Rory INFIRED
Ifti INFIRED
Andy FIRED

Key:

     The candidate won this series of The Apprentice.
     The candidate was the runner-up.
     The candidate won as project manager on his/her team, for this task.
     The candidate lost as project manager on his/her team, for this task.
     The candidate was on the winning team for this task / they passed the Interviews stage.
     The candidate was on the losing team for this task.
     The candidate was brought to the final boardroom for this task.
     The candidate was fired in this task.
     The candidate lost as project manager for this task and was fired.
     The candidate left the competition on this task.

Episodes

No.
overall		No. in
series		Title Original air dateUK viewers
(millions) [8]
271"Coffee to Go"[9]28 March 2007 (2007-03-28)4.50
Sir Alan is offering another chance for someone to be his apprentice in 2007, and landing a job in one of his companies. This year, sixteen candidates take on his array of business challenges, beginning with the task of selling coffee to passing trade within Islington. As the black java flows, one team face a string of mistakes that soon land them in hot water, and leaves one of them facing the firing line as the first to go.
282"Doggy Designs"[10]4 April 2007 (2007-04-04)4.98
Man's best friend attracts considerable business for canine-designed accessories, so Sir Alan decides to see if the candidates can come up with something new that dog owners might want to buy for their pooch. As both teams seek to get in the most orders for their designs, one team struggle with a choice forced onto them by their leader, and soon find themselves ending up in the boardroom kennels.
293"Start-up Service"[11]11 April 2007 (2007-04-11)5.31
To start a business is never an easy process, but the candidates find themselves doing just that. Given £200 each, both teams must come up with a new form of service both during the day and the evening, making as much profit as possible. While one team deals with an aggressive project manager, the other struggle with a controversial concept for a business, but it will be the final tally that determines who has got some business sense to survive in the boardroom.
304"Sugar Rush"[12]18 April 2007 (2007-04-18)5.68
In their next task, the teams tackle making their very own sweets and selling them to visitors at London Zoo. Problems abound as one team struggles with manufacturing issues, and the other with misleading labelling, in which for one member, losing will be leaving a very sour taste in their mouth.
315"Fish, Lips and Horses"[13]25 April 2007 (2007-04-25)5.46
The candidates find themselves out of their comfort zone, as each team represents two artists and seek to garner sales for their photographs in East London. For one team, finding that winning sale strategy proves too elusive to avoid them being brought back to the boardroom.
326"The Sausage Saga"[14]2 May 2007 (2007-05-02)5.68
The teams find themselves heading abroad with the task of promoting the sale of British produce at a French farmers market. Being skillful at selling will be only be as good as speaking the language, and for one team, a lack of skilled French speakers soon proves to be their weakpoint. For one member, its will be au-revoir when Sir Alan judges their performance.
337"The 97 pence Victory"[15]9 May 2007 (2007-05-09)5.92
Sir Alan has a new shopping list for both teams to tackle, as they put their negotiating skills to the test to get the best bargains and bring back everything they can before the appointed deadline. There is confusion abound on one item, and erratic behaviour in seeking out some of the list, but in the end, the final tally shows how close victory was for one team.
348"Brand-a Trainer"[16]16 May 2007 (2007-05-16)6.05
Shoes do make the person, and the candidates find themselves tasked to provide a brand for a new style of trainers and promote them to retailers. As one team face issues over involving their brand with a local youth charity, the other faces problems with their campaign. For the losing team, it will be a walk of shame for one in the boardroom.
359"Feeling The Strain"[17]23 May 2007 (2007-05-23)4.99
Sir Alan is intent on establishing international trade links, and so tasks the teams to sell groundbreaking products from one nation to the British public. Setbacks, low sale figures, and delays are among the issues faced by the candidates as they strive to make sales, and hopefully avoid the boardroom.
3610"Selling on TV"[18]30 May 2007 (2007-05-30)5.23
The teams face the challenge of selling on air, as they take part on a shopping channel, in the hopes of making sales on a variety of products. Mistake, both humorous and serious, plague both sides as they try to demonstrate what they're hoping people will buy from them. Only good directions and impressive pitching will ensure one team avoids the boardroom and prospect of being fired by Sir Alan.
37SP 1"Beyond the Boardroom"[19]3 June 2007 (2007-06-03)1.62
In this special episode, the fired candidates from this series of The Apprentice look back at their experiences on the programme. Along with them, their friends, family and colleagues discuss about the backgrounds and personalities of each respective candidate, including Sir Alan's aides, Nick Hewer and Margaret Mountford.
3811"Interviews"[20]6 June 2007 (2007-06-06)6.06
For the remaining five candidates left, its now time to work on their own and prove themselves worthy of being Sir Alan's next apprentice, as they prepare to tackle a gruelling interview process with three of Sir Alan's closest business associates. There is praise, criticism and doubts, as each candidate's background, work experience and performance comes under review, with Sir Alan making the final decision on which two candidates proceed to the final.
39SP 2"Why I Fired Them"[21]10 June 2007 (2007-06-10)2.46
As the final looms, Sir Alan takes a look back to the tasks he set for this year's series of The Apprentice. From the fiasco in France, to the most tightly fought win in the show's history, he relieves all of the mistakes and doomed decisions that were made, and ives out his reasons for what made him fire a candidate in that respective task.
4012"The Final"[22]13 June 2007 (2007-06-13)7.09
For the two finalists, its time to prove themselves to Sir Alan with one final task - putting together a proposal for what redevelopment should be made on a plot that their future boss has recently purchased. With help from old friends, the pair give out good expectations as they pitch their designs, leaving it a hard choice to decide who will become the apprentice of 2007.

Criticism

Unfair behaviour to candidates

Following their appearances on The Apprentice, both Gerri Blackwood and Tre Azam criticized the programme for how it treated the candidates. Blackwood mostly made allegations against the filming of the programme, stating that candidates were given misleading information by Hewer and Mountford, and that female contestants were forced to shower together in the same bathroom in the candidate's house, after two of its five bathrooms were closed by the production team, who allocated a third to the film crew.[23][24] Azam's allegation mainly focused on the programme's editing and the portrayal of candidates, mostly himself, stating that his portrayal had been "dumbed down" in comparison to the other candidates.[25]

Negative remarks over a product

After the sixth episode of the series was broadcast, the programme received criticism over Sugar's negative comments about a brand of cheese sold by wholesale chain Makro and manufacturer Wyke Farms. Both parties refuted his belief that viewers would not likely find the brand being sold in France, and pointed out that Sugar lacked any knowledge of the cheese market to have had reason to verbally blast Paul Callaghan for choosing to take the product to sell there.[26]

Sexual discrimination accusations

Following the broadcast of the eleventh episode, several organisation, including the Trades Union Congress, the Liberal Democrats, The Equal Opportunities Commission and the Recruitment and Employment Confederation, accused Alan Sugar of sexism and breaching the 1976 Sex Discrimination act. The accusations were made in regards to him only questioning contestants Katie Hopkins and Kristina Grimes about their child-care arrangements, and not Tre Azam who was himself a parent. While the incident was well documented within the media,[27][28][29] none of those who made accusations took into account that both women were single parents at the time of the interviews, in comparison to Azam who was married,[30][31] and that Hopkins resigned from the programme after declining Sugar's initial offer of being one of the finalists during this episode.[32][33]

Despite this, Sugar responded in his defence to his actions, when appearing on GMTV, that he was aware of all rules regarding sexual discrimination within the workplace.[34][35] Simon Ambrose later denied claims from internet conspiracists that Katie's exit from the show was fixed, and that the segments were re-filmed and edited in later, insisting that nothing had been changed with the final edit of the episode.[36]

Ratings

Official episode viewing figures are from BARB.[8]

Episode
no.		AirdateViewers
(millions)		BBC One
weekly ranking
128 March 20074.5019
24 April 20074.9816
311 April 20075.3117
418 April 20075.6810
525 April 20075.4614
62 May 20075.6811
79 May 20075.929
816 May 20076.0511
923 May 20074.9918
1030 May 20075.2312
116 June 20076.608
1213 June 20077.095

Specials

SpecialAirdateViewers
(millions)		BBC Two
weekly ranking
Beyond the Boardroom3 June 20071.6222
Why I Fired Them10 June 20072.468

References

  1. 1 2 Day, Julia (25 August 2006). "Apprentice promoted to BBC1". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 14 May 2008.
  2. 1 2 Robb, Stephen (3 April 2007). "Back in Apprentice's firing line". BBC News. Retrieved 12 May 2007.
  3. ↑ "Simon named as Apprentice winner". BBC News. 13 June 2007. Retrieved 13 June 2007.
  4. 1 2 Schmidt, Veronica (14 June 2007). "Simon 'shocked' at Apprentice win". London: Times Online. Retrieved 5 August 2007.
  5. ↑ "'Apprentice' final brings in 6.8m". Digital Spy. 14 June 2007. Retrieved 25 July 2007.
  6. ↑ "You can reach goals with tough-talking". Evening Times. 9 July 2007. Archived from the original on 16 July 2009. Retrieved 25 July 2007.
  7. ↑ "Apprentice winners through the years – and where they are now". Daily Star. 1 October 2018. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  8. 1 2 "Weekly Top 30 Programmes". Broadcasters' Audience Research Board. Retrieved 16 September 2015.
  9. ↑ "Episode 1, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  10. ↑ "Episode 2, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  11. ↑ "Episode 3, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  12. ↑ "Episode 4, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  13. ↑ "Episode 5, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  14. ↑ "Episode 6, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  15. ↑ "Episode 7, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  16. ↑ "Episode 8, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  17. ↑ "Episode 9, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  18. ↑ "Episode 10, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  19. ↑ "Beyond the Boardroom, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  20. ↑ "Episode 11, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  21. ↑ "Why I Fired Them, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  22. ↑ "The Final, Series 3, The Apprentice - BBC One".
  23. ↑ "Sugar Show's sex shock". Daily Star. 13 April 2007. Retrieved 11 May 2007.
  24. ↑ "'The Apprentice' reject Gerri speaks out". Life Style Extra. 13 April 2007. Retrieved 10 August 2007.
  25. ↑ Kilkelly, Daniel (22 April 2007). "'Apprentice' star complains about editing". Digital Spy. Retrieved 10 August 2007.
  26. ↑ Caulfield, Pam (8 May 2007). "'Apprentice' backlash as farm proves success of British cheese". 24dash.com. Archived from the original on 26 September 2007. Retrieved 11 May 2007.
  27. ↑ Duffy, Marisa (8 June 2007). "Katie gone at last, but was the firing squad fair?". The Herald. Archived from the original on 25 June 2007. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  28. ↑ Russell, Ben (8 June 2007). "Sugar accused of sexism after apprentice quits". The Belfast Telegraph. Archived from the original on 11 July 2007. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  29. ↑ "All fired up". The Guardian. London. 8 June 2007. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  30. ↑ Levine, Nick (8 June 2007). "Sir Alan Sugar accused of sexism". Digital Spy. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  31. ↑ Sherwin, Adam (8 June 2007). "Sugar faces sexism row as ex-Apprentice sells story". The Times. London. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  32. ↑ "Sugar picks Apprentice finalists". BBC. 7 June 2007. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  33. ↑ "Apprentice contender Katie fired". BBC. 12 June 2007. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  34. ↑ "Sugar defends interview technique". BBC. 13 June 2007. Retrieved 9 August 2007.
  35. ↑ Phillips, Fiona; Sugar, Alan (2007-06-13). "GMTV Today, June 13, 2007". GMTV Today. Season 14. ITV. ITV1.
  36. ↑ Hilton, Boyd (13 June 2007). "Exclusive! heatworld interviews Apprentice finalists". Heat. Retrieved 6 August 2007.
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