Monday night marked the launch of The Apprentice Australia, which I watched and enjoyed thoroughly. Though according to Mumbrella, disappointingly for Nine, only 691,999 other people joined me.

One Tim’s post there was a lot of discussion about why this failed. Some people thought the show was on too late, others that The Apprentice concept was tired and more than a few who thought that Mark Bouris was simply not up to the task. None of this was an issue for me. The late-ish slot works for me, I like The Apprentice series (having been a big fan in the UK) and I thought Mark was fine. Though what I thought was lacking was the PR!

I am a fairly big consumer of media, being a PR guy, but the show hardly touched me. This was completely the opposite in the UK at series launch. The Apprentice was absolutely everywhere! Profiles of the contestants appeared in the papers, the radio stations talked about it, the morning current affairs programs cut to scenes of it, celebs were asked their opinion, last year’s contestants gave their insights. There appeared to be little of that here, which is disappointing.

Of course in the UK the show was on BBC, so benefited from the power of its news and influence network. However, Nine, its affiliated online partner ninemsn and magazine stable ACP for all the poor decisions they have made over the last decade are still a media powerhouse.

Maybe I am getting this wrong, I was moving last weekend so didn’t consume the same amount of weekend media that I normally do, but a quick straw poll of some of my friends suggests the same. The PR simply didn’t register.

As momentum around the show heats up perhaps it will all change? I hope so, I really enjoy The Apprentice series and want others to talk with about it.