Deep Green Crystals

The task was a new and different one. Solicit personal experiential donations from NYC celebrities for a charity auction to benefit children's cancer research. The auction was in two days and the ten (five each) celebrities were already lined up. This task was a little wimpy because the celebrities already knew they were going to give something. The Donster had already signed them up. They do things like this all the time. The eager beavers just had to show up and ask. VersaCorp, led by Bill, would work with Regis Philbin (of "Live with Regis and Kelly"), Rocco DiSpirito (of NBC's "The Restaurant" fame), Carson Daly ("Last Call with Carson Daly"), Tiki Barber (NY Giants) and Ed Bernero (An Executive Producer of "Third Watch"). While Protégé, with Omarosa at the helm, would work with Russell Simmons (Hip Hop producer; co-founder of Baby Phat), Kate White (Editor of Cosmopolitan Magazine), Nicole Miller (Fashion Designer), The Fab Five (the entire cast of "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy") and Isaac Mizrahi (Fashion Designer).

Now this is a task that I know something about being on the board of the Pike Place Market Foundation and having to solicit donations for that organization. The hardest part is getting people to donate any time at all. So the Donster had already done the very hard part. I guess this is the only way it could have gone with such a short timeframe and having all these young'uns from out of town and all. Since the celebs do this kind of thing allot, they have a standard "package" that they usually give. No-one on the teams seemed to grasp this. In addition, no-one on the teams bothered to talk to any customers! Imagine that! What do people actually like to BUY at these celebrity auctions? Even talking to the auctioneer. Or the charity organization that was putting on the event. "What sells well?" seems to me like an obvious question. Say a celeb has two or three standard things they do for this kind of event, why not get the one that tends to sell for the most? The children could have even asked the celebs themselves. But narry a word about any of that. A critical flaw that as the Donster I would have berated both teams for. Simply going to these people and suggesting stuff is no way to maximize the package. These guys had ZERO market knowledge.

So Omarosa organizes the troupes and heads out to ask for stuff. She makes the mistake (in my mind) of taking everyone to every meeting. Better to divide and conquer like Bill's team did. Less imposing for the peeps. Omarosa had a reasonable strategy of having a lead and a follow for each ask. But she had no understand of what to ask for or how to pair her team up with a celeb, so there were horrible miss-matches. Omarosa didn't even figure out how to say Isaac Mizrahi's name until AFTER she met him. Most asks were uneventful with the exception of Isaac Mizrahi where Jessie totally botched it. She talked slow like he was a child. He commented on it and she kept doing it. She oversimplified it. He hated her ideas and asked for others. The other team members had to pitch in to get anything. Troy came through with another "good ole boy" trick which was surprising in it's ingenuity and cleverness. They were on the way to see the "Fab 5" from Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. So Troy is wearing a suit and takes off his belt. He knows this is going to set the gays off and he is right. They hone right in on it (so to speak). This breaks the ice as does his country drawl and they go googo. Put together a very cool event (probably a first for them).

The excitement during the asks was over at VersaCorp where Bill did a great job of leading the team, but Tammy from Seattle kept embarrassing everyone from here. She was on some other planet. Not only was she not on the same page as her team, she was on another planet. She kept asking for totally out of this world things. All her team could do was panic every time she opened her mouth. She asked Carson Daily for a round of golf with Tiger Woods. He was visibility insulted. What about ME? He asked for other ideas and Tammy came back to the golf three times! With Regis she suggested flying a group to the bahamas or something. Three days! These people were down for a day in the city at most! Easiest is a tag-along with what they are already doing. Next is maybe a dinner or something. Tammy was embarrassing. On the cab back and for awhile in the apartment, it seemed like there might be a love connection between Nick and Amy. That is bound to start up sometime.

At the auction, the prices which things went for were not really a reflexion of the team's ability to negotiate things from the celebs. It was more a reflection of how much the people had to drink. This dis-connect in performance was overlooked though. Both teams together raised $75K which is a respectable sum. But Bill's team got $40k while Omarosa was left behind with $35K.

So Omarosa was back in the board room. She did the indecent thing of telling Jessie that she would be there as well the night before. Telling her what a bad negotiator she was. I was convinced that Jessie would be fired. She has no back-bone. The Donster doesn't like people who don't defend themselves and I knew Omarosa would walk over her. And then she choose Heidi to go there as well. Two power bitches against the "why can't we all get along" mouse woman. It was no contest. Omarosa was very condescending and even RUDE to the others. Heidi put up some fight but kept saying "I like Omarosa". Jessie hardly raised her pulse above sleeping. Trump tried and tried to get her to defend herself. She wouldn't. He didn't like Omarosa's treatment of the others, but he disliked weakness more. Bye bye Jessie. It is getting down to the hard core bitches now. Going to be fun from here...