The Apprentice: Fishy business for Stephen

The Apprentice: Fishy business for Stephen
The Apprentice: Fishy business for Stephen (Image credit: PA)

Apprentice contestant Stephen Brady gets himself into deep water this week when he signs up a fish spa to offer deals on a luxury website. The 33-year-old saleman's head is already on the block after he narrowly escaped the axe last week by telling Lord Sugar that if he stayed he would definitely win the next task. The candidates are given one day to sign up luxury services, such as restaurants and health spas, to offer discount deals on a high-end website aimed at wealthy City workers. As project manager of Team Stirling, Stephen is taken by teammate Gabrielle Omar to a popular fish spa in Fulham, west London, where he tries out the nibbling foot treatment and declares it "feels horrible". But even though the spa's owner is doubtful his service is suitable for the website's high-end customers, Gabrielle insists on signing him up to offer several deals. Meanwhile, teammate Ricky Martin allows himself to be taken on a full tour of London's exclusive Galvin at Windows restaurant and tucks into a dish of sauteed scallops, before finally getting down to business and discovering the manager has no interest in offering deals on the website. The amateur bodybuilder moaned: "I'm very frustrated by that meeting. In honesty, it was a bit of a waste of time. But I've learnt a lot of lessons and I'm going to use this to motivate me for the rest of the day." Meanwhile, project manager of Team Phoenix Jade Nash is made to look a fool when she and Nick Holzherr meet Michelin-starred chef Marcus Wareing with no prepared plan of what deal they could offer. As the pair struggle to work their calculator, an unimpressed Marcus tells them they "can't run a business like this".

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 


An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.