I miss the Nutz! Have fun...Estee and I will try and keep this thing on track.

Sean's harem has fallen apart. Allie thinks Sean needs to apologize to her for not backing her two Boardrooms ago. Roxanne seems to think Sean needs to go. Sean thinks he needs some sleep. By amazing coincidence, Sean and I use the same brand of earplugs. G'night, Sean. Don't let Allie bite. (Much.)

Sean was cracking me up with the ear plugs. HEHEHEHE! And, he volunteers to switch teams...SURPRISE!

i'd like to see these guys actually do a task well for once...the competition between the two teams is usually so lame. i think they should go blast the local hotels, frat houses and college dorms with flyers asap to get the word out. lots of people plan their tailgates in advance.

Ironically, Gold Rush did pretty much just that. Synergy's advance promotion stunk: they just put their attack on point of sale -- at the last minute -- and moved 'point of sale' to 'everywhere'. To an extent, this was a dumb luck win: if Allie hadn't roamed into that first delivery sale, Synergy would have been shut down.

But then, this season, they've mostly been dumb luck wins...

LAST EDITED ON 05-09-06 AT 05:23 PM (EST)

It's another double-shill: Rutgers Football and Outback Steakhouse, with the briefing held at the Rutgers football field: Donald arrives via helicopter. The minicorps will run tailgate tents in different parking lots on the day of the Rutgers-Navy game. Whoever sells the most food wins.

With the teams unbalanced, Donald asks for Synergy to give someone up to Gold Rush. Sean, feeling unloved, volunteers. This turns it into men vs. women again, which fascinates Donald. Synergy is thrilled to be rid of their testosterone traitor and dances their way off the field. Donald checks out the cheerleaders several times.

And that's pretty much it. It wasn't a very long segment.

'Deliver the goods.'

Donald should have listened to himself before starting the season.

Lee is PM for Gold Rush because -- well, because he just graduated and this stuff is really fresh in his mind. Lee decides to go for the male audience by offering games, an eating contest, a money-grabbing pit, and -- cheerleaders. Lots and lots of cheerleaders. In fact, both teams think of cheerleaders, but while PM Roxanne and her crew are meeting with the Outback people and sampling the entire menu to see what they'll be selling, Lee is reaching an exclusivity agreement with the Rutgers cheerleading coach: he'll have the RU team all to himself. Imagine his reaction. Imagine his secret dreams. Okay, you can stop now. Lee probably hasn't. So Synergy's missed this boat -- but Gold Rush hasn't met with the Outback people. Hmmm...

And Sean spells 'while' as 'whilst' in the flyer. Too much testosterone, and it hasn't aged well...

Was Synergy thinking by not making fliers or not having some type of announcement made at the pep rally.

maybe they can make it up by contacting the announcer's booth at the game....do they have budget to do that type of advertising? anyone know? right after kickoff, i'd start having a firesale that lasts through the halftime.

Most tasks have a small, fixed budget in place to work with. We generally only learn what it is when there's materials involved that have to be purchased -- 'each team must get $5000 in Home Depot supplues' -- but there's been a couple of times when we've seen the minicorp's briefing sheet. The one-pager, usually carried by the PM, lists the locations, goals, and limitations of the task. From the few sheet that have been spotted, the free-floating cash available is typically a thousand or two. This can be spent on pretty much anything -- and thus, the money booth and grill to give away at Gold Rush.

The fire sale might have helped a little -- clearly profit margin wasn't even close to being involved here, not with the prices both teams started with.

Does anyone know what 'exclusivity' means? The cheerleading coach meets with Allie (a former cheerleader herself) and renegs on her deal with Gold Rush, offering to send half the squad. Of course, Gold Rush has to be told, so said coach meets with Michal and asks to send 'one or two' over. Michael calls Lee and Sean to confirm. The answer is not only no, but hell no, and by the way, a certain Michael from two seasons ago still had his exemption, so -- the coach calls Synergy. Sorry, no pompoms. Live with it.

Also, Gold Rush has their flyers working by the time of the pep rally and is passing them out there, with Allie running around trying to work word of mouth at the same rally with nothing to pass out -- Tammy and Roxanne are on their way back from the copy shop. And that night, when Synergy is going home, they pass Gold Rush -- who's working the Greek housing streets, passing out more flyers and word of mouth while training people to bash Synergy's parking lot.

At this point, the only question remaining on the task is Gold Rush's exact margin of victory.

*waves* just to let you know I'm reading the thread.

©Syren Creations, 2005

Guess what? The editing lies! Y'see, Gold Rush has thrown a tremendous event. They give away a grill. They give away money. Michael's a great MC and he promotes RU football like you wouldn't believe. What none of this does is sell anything, and while people are over there taking advantage of the events, and some of them are enjoying Gold Rush's lower prices, they're not having food shoved down their throats -- except at the eating contest. Synergy, for their part, has accidentally discovered the joys of delivery. Allie stumbled onto this one with a $200 order from the baseball team, and now Synergy (dressed in cheerleader outfits) is running all over the lots, selling and delivering to anyone they can find. As a result, the final totals are:

Gold Rush: $1750
Synergy: $2750

Synergy gets to fly out to Long Island, visit the Raphael Winery, and create their own signature drink from the grape-stomping on up. Gold Rush will be enjoying the taste of their own feet in their mouths later that night.

Do you want wine that tastes like Synergy's feet? Really? Check eBay. Personally, I've seldom been so glad for my non-drinker status. This segment does give us the image of three women crowding into the same small tub for a mutual stomp, so at least we've finally identified one of Donald's mild interests.

Back in Suite #1, Lee and Sean think Michael should be fired because he was basically married to the microphone. (Sean gets off the 'umbilical cord' confessional just in time.) Michael realizes where they're going to attack him and tells Sean he plans to defend himself by going after Lee's initial plan as having been flawed. Of course, he doesn't know what Sean and Lee were just talking about. And Sean is now officially our narrator. This should hold true for at least one more segment. Or at most...

Lee notes that he's been in the Boardroom seven out of ten times, and as a cat, he's on his eighth life. Guess what? Lee can count to eight. Now we know what a college education does for you.

Okay... so as an impatient left-coaster (and the curious) want to know...
Who gets fired?

Short and sweet: Lee uses his strategy. Michael uses his. And Donald almost has a complete flip-out when he hears about Michael nearly giving up exclusivity. Michael argues that he was playing along to provide the appearance of cooperation without the actual result, and go ahead and read that however you want to, but Donald's always looking for an excuse and despite Lee's attempt to shoot himself in the foot with a visible desperation 'I always step up' move, guess what? This is Michael's mistake week and Donald's excuse. Michael's fired. Sean and Lee are on thin ice. And Carolyn is looking snottier with every passing week.

Next week: It's Soulless Corporations That Destroy America, Two For The Price Of One: Wal-Mart and Microsoft. Can someone else start the spoiler thread and do the segment recaps for that one? I'll be too busy throwing up.

Thanks for the update...
As for next week... I share your opinion on Wal-Mart (Target runs a very close second)... if Sam Walton knew what was going on now, he'd be spinning in his grave.
As for Microsoft, why does everyone feel the need to beat up Bill? The man saw an opportunity and a need and he filled it.. you really can't blame him for that! It's really IBM's fault if you really want to look at it logically (and no, I do not work for Microsoft). Let's face it, unless you're using a MAC, you're using technology that Micrsoft started and is giving you the ability to post.
JMTC

It's not that he filled the need, it's that he goes to such extreme measures to keep anyone else from filling it better. Honestly, you'd think the man was an oil company.

Thanks so much for this thread. We were having severe weather last night, and they broke in a couple of times, so I missed half of the episode, and didn't get to see who got fired.