Week five of The Apprentice 2026 and the contestants were treated to a home visit from Lord Sugar himself, and you guys are treated to another blog post. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to make an IP connection for the fifth task, but don’t worry I have (however tenuous).

It is unclear what day of the week the opening for week five’s episode took place. Lord Sugar came round to the contestant’s house at 9 am, which to me (unless it’s the weekend and you’re treating yourself) is a time when you should be up, dressed and ready to work / already working. However, when Lord Sugar came, most of the contestants were still scrabbling around in their PJs! Imagine! This was then followed up by Lord Sugar saying, “In business, you have to be ready at a moment’s notice”. To me, this implies it was during the week, and hence none of these people should have still been in their PJs at 9 am if they are competing for a massive investment into their business (at least act like you are doing something business-related in your downtime to suck up to Lord Sugar).

The Fifth Task

For the fifth task, the contestants were told that they would need to create bouquets to sell to the public. In addition, they would also be meeting with a corporate client to create a bespoke floral arrangement for said client. The team that made the most profit at the end of the task would be the winner.

On one team, the project manager was very focused on making sure they kept all their costs as low as possible to try to guarantee the win. With this in mind, she decided that their team would go with a ‘country garden’ themed bouquet, as you could purchase a number of cheaper filler leafy plants to bulk out the bouquet and keep the costs down. Of course, the downside with such a strategy is that people probably don’t want to pay upwards of £40 for a bouquet comprising mainly of green stems and leaves. They were set up with a corporate client who makes fragrances using “English country garden” floral scents (quite the coincidence that this was the team that wanted to do country garden bouquets also!). This corporate client wanted the team to create a flower arch for their corporate event. When it came to the day of selling the bouquets to the public, there was one member of the team who got quite confused when trying to say the names of some of the flowers (to be honest, this is something I would do too so no judgment from me). This resulted in her calling one of the flowers ‘hydrations’ (translation: hydrangeas), maybe her mind was still on the bottled water task from week four?

On the other team, the project manager decided she wanted to go more high-end and do fun and funky bouquets using tropical flowers. These flowers are more expensive to purchase, but you have the benefit of being able to sell the bouquets at a higher price (if you are a savvy salesperson). This team’s corporate client was the theatre (or the producers? I can’t quite remember) putting on the new musical adaptation of the movie The Devil Wears Prada. This corporate client requested a flower wall that the invited guests to the premier of the musical could pose in front of before heading in to watch the show, they requested something “high-end and opulent”, not a big ask for a team of people who do not have any expertise in floral arrangements. A member of the sub-team who was negotiating the price with the corporate client said, “we are not going to promise perfection”, and a good thing too because perfection the flower wall was not (pardon the Yoda speak). The flower wall this team produced was so bad that after the sub-team delivered it, the client threw it in the garbage!

At one point in the episode someone (I think one of the corporate clients) said, “too many fillers, not enough flowers” and I feel like in some ways this quote sums up the current series of The Apprentice.

Plant Variety Rights

What has flowers and bouquets got to do with IP rights? Well, there are in fact an IP right that can be afforded to people who breed new plant varieties.

The International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) was first established in 1961[1] and (as per their website[2]) their purpose it to “provide and promote an effective system of plant variety protection that encourages the development of new plant varieties for the benefit of society”.

Essentially, it was realised that to develop and breed new and successful plant varieties takes a lot of time and money as well as great skill and knowledge[3]. Therefore, breeders should be rewarded for the substantial investment they put into developing plant varieties.

UPOV grants breeders of new plant varieties an IP right known as the plant breeders’ rights. A ‘breeder’ is defined as either (a) the person who bred or discovered and developed a new variety, (b) the person who is the employer of (a) or has commissioned the work of (a), or (c) the successor in title of either (a) or (b). In the UK, this is fairly similar to determining who has the right to file and obtain a granted patent (inventor(s), or their employer, or the successor in title to the inventor or employer).

To obtain protection, an application must be filed, and the plant variety must satisfy the following conditions[4][5]:

  1. New – the variety is deemed new if, at the time of filing the application for breeders’ rights, propagating or harvested material has not been commercialised (sold) to others;
  2. Uniform – the variety is deemed uniform if the characteristics of the plant variety are consistent from plant to plant within the variety;
  3. Distinct – the variety is deemed distinct if it is clearly distinguishable from any other variety whose existence is common knowledge; and
  4. Stable – the variety is deemed stable if its plant characteristics remain unchanged after repeatable propagation

Again, this is similar to other forms of IP, such as patent applications or design applications, which are also examined on a number of features.

If the application is successful, the breeder is awarded exclusive rights[6] where nobody can do the following with their new plant variety: produce or reproduce, sell or offer to sell, alter the variety so it can be propagated, export or import, or keep stock of their plant variety. Of course, if a breeder gives their permission through a license, for example, then the licensee can do these acts. These rights last for 25 years for plants and 30 years for trees, vines and potato varieties.

It is also important to remember that, like patent rights, the plant breeders’ rights are also territorial!

Next Time

For the sixth task, it appears the contestants have to organise corporate away days in Egypt. Will I be able to draw out another IP connection there?! Stay tuned..

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Union_for_the_Protection_of_New_Varieties_of_Plants
[2] https://www.upov.int/en/
[3] https://www.wipo.int/en/web/wipo-magazine/articles/upov-the-impact-of-plant-variety-protection-35341
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant_breeders%27_rights
[5] https://www.upov.int/en/about-upov/introduction#conditions
[6] https://www.gov.uk/guidance/plant-breeders-rights

 

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