📘 Part 3: Shopping

This episode's vocabulary

Сonvenient (adj.) - suitable for your purposes and needs and causing the least difficulty.

To draw the line (idiom) - to never do something because you think it is wrong.

To have ready access - you can use it whenever you need to express that someone or something has the ability to easily access or obtain something.

Personalization (noun) - the act of making something suitable for the needs of a particular person.

Tailored (adj.) - used to describe a piece of clothing that is shaped to fit a person's body closely.

To spoil (verb) - when food spoils or is spoiled, it is no longer good enough to eat.

Stagnant (adj.) - not growing or developing.

To level off (phrasal verb) - if a changing number or amount levels off or levels out, it stops increasing or decreasing at such a fast speed.

To stall (verb) - to stop making progress.

To intervene (verb) - to intentionally become involved in a difficult situation in order to improve it or prevent it from getting worse.

To tackle (verb) - to try to deal with something or someone.

Inadvertently (adverb) - in a way that is not intentional.

To enact (verb) - to put something into action, especially to make something law.

To accrue (verb) - to increase in number or amount over a period of time.

Questions and Answers

M: Why do many people like shopping online?

R: Well, that's easy. It's so convenient these days you can get everything in one click. I even think they have services called one-click shopping, so you can just order things as you go, and it all gets delivered in a broadly acceptable time frame. It also opens up a load of options for people, as opposed to the limited selection you might get just shopping at local stores.

M: Should advertisements be strictly regulated?

R: Well, I suppose that depends on what for and by who. Clearly, some products are inappropriate for certain audiences. For example, cigarettes shouldn't be advertised to children, but I don't know if we can apply that to all products. Where would you draw the line?

M: What makes large shopping malls popular?

R: Well, you have everything under one roof, don't you? And that's got to be convenient for people, since they can just drive or walk to one place and get everything they want in one go.

M: What are the benefits and drawbacks of consumerism for a country's economy?

R: Oh, God... I think whole books have been written about that. It's great that people have ready access to the things that they want and need, and it seems to drive at least some personalization of products and services, which is nice, because you can get something that's tailored to you, but by contrast, you, well, because you have all these competing companies, lots of waste gets generated, since you can't buy everything, and some items will spoil before they find an owner.

M: Can consumption drive economic growth?

R: Well, I'm not sure what else can, to be honest with you. Well, even if there's some sort of centrally planned economy, there will be some kind of demand that requires the use of resources. Maybe in a stagnant economy, or one where consumption has leveled off, growth will stall, but that's the exception.

M: How will people's shopping habits change in the future?

R: Well, that depends on lots of things. If there are more people, there might be fewer resources. So you might expect to see people buying fewer things. Similarly, if governments intervene to tackle the climate crisis, then they might inadvertently reduce consumer spending through the laws they enact because they've restricted access to products or different resources that are used to make these things. What are the differences between how young people shop and how older people shop?

M: Well, generally speaking, older people tend to have access to more money, so they would probably buy more, or at least more expensive things, whereas younger people, again, very broadly, well, again, very broadly speaking, have less money accrued because they've been alive for shorter periods of time. So I suppose they would be buying less or they would be buying cheaper products.

M: Thank you, Rory, for your answers!

R: No worries.

Discussion

M: Yay, shopping! Dear listener, do you like shopping?

R: I don't like shopping.

M: Yeah, but these days, people are just crazy, like buying things on Amazon, eBay. What? Like what's popular in Scotland? Where do people buy things? Amazon?

R: Unless we are being sponsored by any company, I will not say, but definitely, Amazon is one of them.

M: So most things are online these days. You get everything in one click.

R: At the touch of a button.

M: Yeah. At the touch of a button, or buy everything in one click. And that's it. You know, money is gone. And the delivery, we have no idea when it arrives. It's so convenient these days, not comfortable. Convenient. Shopping online is convenient. Alright? You order things as you go, and it gets delivered to your door.

R: Unless it's 200 kilograms of tiles, in which case you have to carry those up the stairs yourself.

M: No, no. In some countries, you just pay. You order the tiles for the bathroom. You know, when you renovate your bathroom, you order tiles for the walls in the bathroom. And when you pay for the delivery, you can pay for the product to be carried upstairs if you don't have a lift. Rory doesn't have this option, unfortunately. So he is a young and healthy Scottish man who does wild swimming, and he can carry 200 kilogram products upstairs. Right, Rory? How are you feeling?

R: Well, I feel terrible. Don't do that, make sure you get someone to do it for you.

M: Yeah, get it done for you, dear listener. And you can say that in local shops, you get a limited selection of products. So kind of a limited number of products, as opposed to online shops, where you have, I don't know, everything. You can say, shops or stores, local shops, local stores. We talk about advertisements or adverts or ads. They should be strictly regulated, or they should not be. So, for example, the government should be strict about the rules. What should be advertised and what not. Some products are inappropriate for certain audiences. For example, for teenagers, certain products are inappropriate for teenagers, like medicines for old people, cigarettes.

R: Alcohol.

M: Well, but cigarettes are not advertised at all.

R: Um, well, I think that depends on where you live.

M: Seriously? So there are some countries where cigarettes are advertised on, like, TV, radio?

R: The other thing there is some surreptitious advertising that goes on because you see people smoking in movies as well. And I often wonder who influences that to a certain extent. Of course, some people argue that that's just a realistic depiction and they don't have any brand names, but I'm still unsure about how that works.

M: So that's also advertising?

R: Well, it could be. But of course, you don't see the brand names. So who's paying for that? Who is paying for the cigarettes?

M: Yeah, but sometimes you do see the brand names, you see like, packs of cigarettes, so you see the brand.

R: But I wonder if there is advertising for cigarettes in some countries. I think it's banned in a lot of countries. That's true. But I don't know if that's true for all countries.

M: Yeah, dear listener, if you know the answer to this question, or if you are in a country where cigarettes are legal to be advertised on national TV or on billboards, let us know in our telegram channel. Okay? It's IELTS Speaking for Success, right? Telegram. Go there and tell us. Alcohol shouldn't be advertised to children. Actually, again, alcohol is not advertised. Only like free alcohol beer, I think, could be advertised during football matches, for example, but it's like, alcohol free.

R: Oh, just look there, it's legal to advertise cigarettes in places like Germany and Bulgaria. They can use billboards to do this. In Indonesia, cigarette advertising is permitted, but as long as it includes warning messages, it's fine. So make of that what you will.

M: Interesting. And also like you want to advertise certain, I don't know, toys or video games to older people, right? But if older people have children... I mean, like grandchildren, and you advertise video games to older people, so they will buy them for their children. Yeah, but we don't advertise medicine to children, for example. We advertise medicine to older people.

R: Yes, because they can read and they understand what it is to be ill and take medicine.

M: We go shopping in large shopping malls or shopping centers, and you have everything under one roof. And here, Rory used a tag question, dear listener. A band nine grammar structure, which is also good for your pronunciation, because it's not actually a question, it's just a statement. So it's like, well, it's convenient, right? You have everything under one roof, right? So instead of this right, you use a tech question, and you say, you have everything under one roof, don't you? Rory, could you read it again with a nice intonation at the end?

R: Yeah, well, you have everything under one roof, don't you?

M: You see? Don't you goes down. It's not a question. A question would be, don't you? Don't you? Like, right?

R: You're asking the place.

M: You're asking, yes. I am asking you.

R: Do you have everything under one roof here?

M: Don't you, really? Huh? Yeah. But here, the intonation goes down because we are stating a fact, we are not asking a question, but it has a form of a question. Band nine, dear listener. Yay! And that's really convenient. Especially if the weather is horrible. If it's cold, you don't have to travel to different locations, and you can drive or walk to one place and get everything you want in one go. So if you get everything you want in one go, you just get it once and today.

R: At one time.

M: Consumerism, dear listener. What's consumerism?

R: Consuming.

M: Yeah, when we consume, when we eat, when we buy. So consumerism - the state of an advanced industrial society in which a lot of goods are bought and sold. So usually we use it in a negative context, disapproving, negative, consumerism. And we describe a situation in which too much attention is given to buying and owning things. So consumerism, like, I'm into buying, owning products, things. So it's about like material possessions. And a collocation is rampant consumerism. What's rampant consumerism, Rory?

R: Well, that's when there's a whole load of it going on. It's uncontrolled.

M: Yeah, like rampant corruption, uncontrolled, increasing, getting worse, quickly and in an uncontrolled way, or rampant consumerism. On the one hand, it's good that people have access to products they want to products, services, products. But on the other hand, we have lots of competing companies. Companies who compete with each other for clients like Nike, Adidas. Yeah, Nike wants clients, Adidas wants clients. They compete with each other. Yeah, imagine, like, think about all the companies which sell clothes. They're constantly competing for clients. And this creates a lot of waste. So lots of waste gets generated. Waste, here, Rory, you mean that like they damage the environment?

R: Well, they could damage the environment. But here, if we think about food, there are different companies producing different forms of the same kind of food. For example, you get a sandwich from one company and a sandwich from the other. You cannot eat both sandwiches. So one of these sandwiches is not eaten and is thrown away. That's waste.

M: Ooh, okay, okay, got it. Oh, yeah, that's right.

R: But the same is also true for clothes. Lots of clothes that people don't buy are thrown away.

M: Right. So some items spoil before they find an owner. So that's spoil, like food gets spoiled. And that's also true for different products, right? So clothes, yeah. Wow.

R: Well, allegedly, because clothes, of course, will last for a very long time. But it's not the clothes themselves that are the problem, it's the fashion. So the fashion trend spoils or goes out of date, and you even have that expression like a dated look. Like clothes that are old fashioned or seem to be unpopular or not trendy anymore. And so what do they do with these clothes? They throw them away.

M: Consumption. The act of buying things, consuming products. So when we eat, buy, we consume products, and people are consumers. So consumption. That's buying products. And our consumption can drive economic growth. So it can, kind of it moves economic growth further, it drives it.

R: But I don't know what else can fuel or increase economic growth, because there must be some consumption going on in order for the economic growth to happen. What else could make economic growth possible? I don't really understand.

M: Oh, it's too difficult.

R: Well, this is what I'm saying. The question sounds it's a good question to think about, what else could drive economic growth, if not consumption? Because what else does? You have to use resources anyway, and you'd have to use a lot of them to grow the economy, unless the economy is stagnant. Oh, yes.

M: Yeah. So it's something negative. It's something that is not moving forward, stagnation. So stagnant. Like you know, if water is stagnant, it's not moving or flowing, and usually has an unpleasant smell, so not growing, developing. And usually, we say a stagnant economy that is not improving.

R: Or growing.

M: We talk about consumer spending. And careful, dear listener, people buy fewer things, fewer products. Or you can say people will buy less. That's all. Okay? So in the future, people are likely to buy less, or people are likely to buy fewer products, fewer services. Can I say people are likely to buy less products? No.

R: Well, you could, but I would not be very happy.

M: Yeah. Stick to traditional grammar rules. And now, Rory's vocabulary show.

R: For talking about the vocabulary and grammar. So starting at the top, I talked about why many people liked online shopping, and I said it was very easy to get things, especially online, because all you have to do is a certain action. But what was that action?

M: You get everything in one click.

R: One click, one touch of a button. Nice. Then we talked about regulating advertising. And I used an expression for a point where we must stop doing something. What was that expression?

M: Draw the line.

R: Nice. We draw the line at important preposition. Things we are not comfortable with or which are impossible for us or to be done. Then we talked about why large shopping malls are popular, and I said that everything was in a single place, but I did not say, in a single place. What did I say instead?

M: You have everything under one roof.

R: Very nice. And then we talked about the benefits and the drawbacks of consumerism. I talked about items not being usable after a certain point, but I didn't say they're unusable. I said something else.

M: Products can spoil.

R: Very nice. And for our last one, we talked about economic growth, and I described a special kind of economy where there is a pre determined idea of how things should be consumed. But what was that phrase?

M: Centrally planned economy.

R: Nice. So if something is centrally planned, then there is some kind of organization that decides how everything should be organized. Sometimes a good idea in certain cases. But in the modern age, we don't really have this, at least in my country. Five out of five, Maria, nicely done.

M: Yay! Thank you very much for listening, and we'll get back to you in our next episode! Bye!

R: Bye!

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