Who is Alan Sugar - He Started With Nothing And Created A Money Making Empire!

• Alan Sugar Started Out With Nothing!
  Alan Sugar came from a very poor family and grew up on a council estate in East London. He started out in business at the age of 12, making ginger beer and selling it to his neighbors. At school, he was making more money, selling bits and pieces, than his father was earning and when he left school at 16 he set up selling car aerials out of a van.



• Alan Sugar Was Only 21 When He Set up His Own Company!
  Amstrad (a derivation of Alan Michael Sugar Trading) started out as a small enterprise which soon became an international company concerned with consumer electronics, telecommunications and computers. It now owns many subsidiary companies across Europe and with its network of distributors has a World wide presence.



• He is a great role model for any budding entrepreneurs today.
  Alan Sugar's experience and expertise is now highly valued and he is one of the UK government's team of figureheads traveling around schools and universities encouraging entrepreneurial spirit amongst young people.

Alan Sugar took the job on The Apprentice because he wanted to be a role model. He wasn't interested in being paid for the job but when the BBC insisted he gave away his fee to the Great Ormond Street Hospital.

His success is definitely not based on popularity in fact Sugar readily describes his personal style as up-front, sometimes belligerent with high expectations of everyone. Since becoming the star of BBC 1 reality show, The Apprentice, viewers in the UK are glued to his show every week watching him as he eliminates one contestant after another

Each week, the straight talking Sugar "fires" a candidate, until one candidate is left, who is then employed in his company. The elimination of each contestant is announced by the utterance, "You're fired!" which has become a popular catchphrase. The candidates are split into teams and Sugar uses his contacts in the business world to get them assignments in such establishments as Harrods department store.

The show has also produced some of TV's vintage moments, including the winner of the 2007 series, Simon Ambrose's trampolining episode, which will guarantee the show is repeated for years.

There's little doubt that interest in Sir Alan Sugar will continue as long as The Apprentice keeps being commissioned. The BBC is also broadcasting loads of offshoot series, which will make the programme even more popular.