The CV

home. ‘Another waste of money,’ he’d say, while my mother would shrug her shoulders and ask, ‘How much was that?’ All this despite the fact that I was paying for it myself!
    It was difficult for me to justify laying out £12 for a camera when the old man got £8 for doing a week’s work, so I tried to save his pride with answers such as, ‘I’m paying off for it to Mr Allen,’ which, to be fair, I did do when it came to my next camera – the Yashica, a poor man’s Rolleifiex.
    Not only did I buy the camera, but I also invested in an enlarger, a lens and developing equipment. Mum and Dad couldn’t understand how I’d managed to buy them and the situation wasn’t helped by my brother-in-law, Harold Regal, who said, ‘This is very expensive stuff, Alan. How have you managed to afford all this?’ I didn’t need him winding the old man up.
    My father was such a worrier. I swear he thought that one day there’d be a policeman knocking at our door – I don’t know why. He just couldn’t accept what this young lad was up to. My only criticism of him would be that he didn’t support me in any of these activities and always seemed to think there was something wrong. I wouldn’t say the same about my mother though; she was quite supportive.
    Once I’d got the equipment and converted my dad’s workshop (the spare bedroom) into a darkroom by putting a blanket across the window and shutting the door, I set about finding customers. It struck me that many of our neighbours had kids and grandchildren, so I decided to knock on people’s doors and ask them if they’d like me to photograph the children on a ‘no obligation’ basis – a no-brainer, as you can imagine. ‘Sure,’ they invariably replied. I took the precaution of writing ‘PROOF’ on the corner of the photosin biro and presented them to the parents and grandparents who, of course, loved them.
    ‘What’s this word “proof”?’ they would say. ‘Can’t I have one without that on it?’
    ‘Well, that’s a rough example. If you want a final, good-quality one, I’ll print you off a large one for half a crown.’
    That was it! I was at the races. It was pictures of children and grandchildren for the next few months.
    While on the subject of photography, one of the young lads I’d seen around was soon to be Bar Mitzvah’d and, as his mum and dad couldn’t afford much, I offered to take the Bar Mitzvah photographs.
    Bloody hell, what a risk that was! When I got to the venue, I found myself taking pictures of adults and doing group photos. Only then did it dawn on me: these people are expecting memorable photographs, pictures they’ll frame and treasure for the rest of their lives. I thought to myself, ‘What have I done? What am I doing here?’ Thankfully, it came off quite well in the end. I can’t remember what I charged but I certainly undercut the professional photographer.
    Based on that event, I decided to professionalise myself. I went to a local printer’s, Austin Press, who made me a rubber stamp: ‘ Photographed by ALAN SUGAR – Phone: UPP 7875’. Even as I tell this story, I can see my mum smiling and shrugging her shoulders and my dad still shaking his head.
    The stamp I used when I set up as a ‘professional’ photographer.
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1959 – 1963: Enterprise activities
    At school, photography was becoming a fashionable hobby and we had a photographic society whose members included one of the more financially fortunate pupils, a posh kid who used to hold court. His dad owned a shop and everybody looked up to him as if his shit didn’t stink.
    When I showed my photographs, he’d sneer at them and look down on me as a second-class photographer. On one occasion, I showed him some negatives I’d developed myself. He observed some smear marks on them and announced haughtily, in front of the society, ‘Oh, Sugar, it seems that you dry your negatives by farting on them.’ You can imagine the laughter.
    My next scheme wiped the smile off his face, in more ways than one. At that time, he used to be the supplier of photographic materials to the kids and the teachers. Now, at the rear of Mr Allen’s shop there was a small film-processing factory. I’d occasionally go and see how the developing process worked and noticed that they discarded the empty 35mm cartridge cases. I wondered what could be done with these seemingly useless items, but at the time nothing came to mind. Until one day I went into the