Episode Report Card Miss Alli: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Water, water, everywhere, and yet it costs a lot
By Miss Alli | Season 1 | Episode 8 | Aired on 02.25.2004
"Beggars Can't Be Choosers," announces the title card at the opening of the next piece. Trump says with a chuckle that "you'll never sell through the begging route," so you might as well do your best and take your lumps as necessary. There are some very cute New York shots here, and...why are all those people waving yellow baseball hats? Is that a thing? I am so out of it. Troy, Heidi, and Kwame start making sales calls. Heidi sprains her shoulder patting herself on the back in her interview about how they had a positive attitude and high energy and all that. Troy tells the first guy that if he buys by the pallet, he's getting it for just about eight bucks a case. The guy's problem is that he has no room for seventy-two cases of water. Heidi interviews that this was a big problem for a lot of places that they visited. Another guy tells them the same thing, and Troy offers to help him move the cases in and make room if he'll go for half a pallet. "You've got it outside, don't you?" the guy asks with a laugh, and right there is the friendly vibe that others who shall remain nameless (like Nick) will fail to create later.
Funny Honking Music of Hijinks plays as Amy and Assorama stroll along together. Heidi voices over that she put Assorama and Amy together because Amy is the closest to being someone who can tolerate Assorama's presence without spontaneously combusting. We now see Assorama and Amy making a sales pitch at a restaurant of some sort, where a woman is swirling Trump Ice in a glass. You can't judge water unless you swish it around, you know. "We're talking about a very unique [sic] American premium water," Assorama intones seriously. "And it is really one of the better-tasting really sweet waters that is offered." In an interview, Amy says that she and Assorama had a strategic agreement that Amy could kick Assorama if Assorama needed to shut up. "She got kicked quite a bit," Amy says. Oh, not enough, Amy. Not enough. "I'm a big, big connoisseur of waters," Assorama says self-importantly -- not like there's really any other way to call yourself a "connoisseur of waters." Assorama goes on about how good the water is, and again, she's really missing the point that Boyfriend Bill was making before -- these people don't care how sweet the water is. They only care whether people will order it, and the flowery talk is largely unnecessary.
Amy explains that she and Assorama agreed in advance that Assorama would do the sales pitch (a/k/a bullshit), and then Amy would move in to talk numbers. As the restaurant lady brings up again the problem of storing a pallet of water somewhere, Assorama immediately offers her the option of "just a couple of cases," and the lady says she'll take five cases. Five cases! College dorm rooms have five cases of drinks in the corner, for God's sake. "Five would be perfect," Assorama says with a self-satisfied grin. Amy explains that Assorama had this way of offering the people a tiny number of cases that they would then just accept to end the discussion, and you just don't do that. I think I would even know not to do that, and the last thing I sold was candles to support my sixth-grade softball team. On the way out, she tells Assorama not to talk numbers, and Assorama promises she won't anymore.