Apprentice winner says she's done 'something huge'

Beauty business owner Karishma Vijay has told how proud she is at having done "something huge" after being named winner of The Apprentice.

The 28-year-old from Ashford, Surrey, has become Lord Alan Sugar's next business partner, with the billionaire investing £250,000 into her skincare brand Kishkin.

"My heart is just so happy and proud. I've done it. I've done something huge in this life," she said.

Vijay had not watched the reality show before she applied to go on it and said she kept going, taking it "one task at a time", until Lord Sugar pointed at her and said "you're hired".

She said she went on the show to save her business after a £25,000 shipment of products sank in a typhoon that hit Hong Kong.

A former social media and marketing consultant, she had saved up £100,000 to start her business and put everything into it.

On the day she launched, her card was declined and she opened her banking app to see she had just £7.42, with her rent due in five days.

She started to make money and later placed the order for the £25,000 shipment, only to see it "sink to the bottom of the ocean", uninsured.

Now she said things were "looking up" and she has plans to buy her own property and expand her business "very quickly".

She told Newsbeat she also got engaged two days before the final of the TV programme was broadcast.

Vijay said she was on a beach with her fiancé when he put a ring on her finger, as he took her "off the market".

"Life gave me the bottom of the barrel for way too long. And now it's my time to come up. And I hope I don't see the bottom of the barrel again."

The social media influencer told how she built up a massive following – with 500,000 followers on TikTok – and then worked to turn it into a customer base.

On TikTok and Instagram, she shared everything from makeup to dating and the ups and downs of life, and has said that is why people believe in her brand.

"I've always kept it real, always kept it honest with my followers," she said.

"They know that, they've been through the ups and downs of life with me, so they see right through the crazy stuff.

"When I announced I was on The Apprentice, they went crazy. The public support and love has been out of this world."

Lord Sugar had recognised the value of her social media presence, she added.

"Not a lot of people respect the trade I'm in," she said, "but also the trade I'm in sells millions of bottles of oil, so therefore it's a good trade."

She said her followers were "not just followers, they are potential customers", and that made social media "so important in business".

The man who has inspired her most, though, is her father.

Vijay said Lord Sugar was going to teach her the ropes, but her father, who runs shops, "invented the ropes".

"My pops is the best," she said.

On every task she considered how her father would handle it.

"That was my ideology. That was my thinking," she said. "I feel like there's just no man that comes close to my dad."

Even in today's beauty industry, Vijay said being a "curvy girl", and a "brown girl" meant she sometimes missed out on opportunities.

But she said: "I'm here to rewrite the script. That's why I'm so proud that the daughter of an immigrant has now gone and done amazing things on The Apprentice."

She said she felt like the whole South Asian community was right behind her, and the whole country was now standing there telling her she deserved her success.

"I'm just so happy at how it played out," she said. "I could never have dreamt this for me."

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