节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2012-01-09
难易度:Medium
关键字:scrape, sole, resemble, a slap in the face, entrepreneur
Hello, friends. Welcome back.
Today we are talking about TOMS Shoes.
Now TOMS Shoes is a "one for one" company.
And that means he's working to help people with a one-to-one basis.
We're going to talk about what that means.
Well, we already know is that the traveled to Argentina and saw the children
needed shoes and wanted to help them in a sustainable way.
We're going to find out that he did accomplish that.
And today he is running a wonderful company.
You can participate with TOMS Shoes in many different ways.
You should check out TOMS website and learn about a way to... style your own
soles.
Well, we're going to keep talking about this "one to one" company, so join us on
line 12.
(Music).
TOMS: One for One.
He had already started several successful businesses, but none of them resembled
his newest plan - TOMS.
For every pair of shoes he sold, he would give a new pair to a needy child.
One for one.
It was a slap in the face to traditional business practices.
How could he make a profit by giving so much away?
Nevertheless, he started selling shoes out of his apartment.
When he had sold 10,000 pairs of shoes, he returned to Argentina with 10,000
pairs to give away.
TOMS Shoes is doing amazing work.
And the entrepreneur Blake Mycoskie who started it started an interesting
business idea.
Exactly. Now earlier we were talking about how this company actually started
when he traveled to Argentina for vacation and saw that many of the children
were without shoes.
He had already started several successful businesses, but none of them resembled
his newest plan - TOMS.
Exactly. Now we saw he already had several businesses.
We know he's an entrepreneur, he has plenty of money.
And he's... he's someone who has a lot of ideas, but they certainly did not
resemble this plan.
That's right. This was something new.
It did not resemble.
When you "resemble" something, that means it looks like or is like something
else.
So his new business idea was not like his old ones.
Often when we think of resembling, maybe you think of a mother and her daughter.
A daughter that looks like her mom resembles her mother.
Exactly. So none of Blake's ideas in the past have looked like his newest plan
for TOMS,
which is, for every pair of shoes he sold, he would give a new pair to a needy
child.
One for one.
Exactly.
You buy one pair of shoes, and he donates one pair of shoes to a child in need.
Exactly. So that is what "one for one" means with TOMS.
And I think this is a great idea, Kaylah.
For every pair that someone buys, another child gets a pair.
It's absolutely an incredible idea.
And the fact that he was so passionate about it that he made it work was
impressive because this really was a slap in the face to traditional business
practices.
All right. And that would be very true.
"A slap in the face" is an action that is insulting to someone or makes someone
else look bad.
So his business, instead of just making money like most other businesses,
he actually would then give away, well, basically half of what he's earning.
How could he make a profit by giving away so much?
This is a really good question.
As a business person, your goal in business is to make money so your business
can continue.
How is he going to make money if his business is selling a pair of shoes and
then just giving one away?
Right. Well, actually that's a great question because most of the time if you
want a nicer pair of shoes,
you know they're probably going to be pretty expensive.
So if you want to buy a pair of shoes from TOMS, and you know it costs a lot of
money to send shoes and give shoes away, how can they make money?
That's a good question.
What do you do when you want to be selling something... how do you make money,
Ryan?
What do you think brought this about, like, how can he do this?
Well, yeah, he obviously saw those children in need, wanted to help them, and so
he decided to find a way to make it work.
And of course, that was a difficult question for even him to answer at the time.
That's right.
Business practices all over the world, the goal is to make money so you can
continue.
How in the world would he able to do this if he was giving away just as much as
he was selling?
Nevertheless, he started selling shoes out of his apartment.
So no matter the problem, he went with this.
Exactly. Nevertheless - that means no matter what - he decided to start the
business.
And it was small - he just started selling shoes from his own apartment.
Now the shoes he wanted to sell were based off of the shoes that he saw the
farmers wearing in Argentina; we talked about that earlier.
So he gets his inspiration from there, and then sells them from his apartment.
Exactly. You can see some shoes that we have here on our set and also in
pictures on your Studio Classroom magazine.
And he wanted to design those shoes remind people that when they buy a pair,
someone, a child in Argentina gets a pair too.
When he had sold 10,000 pairs of shoes, he returned to Argentina with 10,000
pairs to give away.
Exactly what he promised to do.
Exactly. So here 10,000 pairs were bought, 10,000 pairs were given away.
So he is starting this business, he's making money, but he's also doing
something wonderful for these kids.
That's right. He's holding to his word about helping these kids.
And you too can help if you participate in TOMS.
So check out their website and see, well, maybe you could do to help with this
"one to one" company.
Well, we're out of time for today.
Join us tomorrow.
Before we go, let's watch this video.
We're so excited that we sold the 10,000 pairs of shoes.
Now is the time to go back to Argentina and make good on our promise that every
pair we sell, we're going to give them away.
Now a lot of people think that when you say a shoe drop, that means you're just
dropping off the shoes.
That's not the case.
We actually handplaced every single shoe on the children's feet.
And that's so important.
It's the huge part of our brand because that connection you have with that
child,
it not only gives them a shoe and gives them a great feeling of love and warmth
and experience, but it also gives back to us.
And that is really what has caused the employees of TOMS and our volunteers and
our interns that want to work so hard is they have that experience where they
give away the shoes.
And that changed your life.
And it changed my life.
I mean, when I came back from the shoe drop, I basically said:
This is it! I am investing all my money, all my time, all my energy in TOMS.
And I'm going to build this into one of the successful, profitable and
charitable shoe companies in the world.
So literally, in less than a year, we've gone from four interns and myself, you
know,
working out of my apartment to 8,000 square feet of office space, you know,
professional warehousing systems,
some of the best, you know, shoe designers, shoe salespeople in the industry.
And we're going to give away 200,000 pairs of shoes this year.
Hi, everyoen. I'm Michelle.
(Chinese).
And I guess that's it for today's Language Tips.
I'll see you next time.
Bye-bye.
(Music).
Thank you, Michelle.
We always appreciate those tips.
Remember, friends, TOMS Shoes' founder's first name is Blake, not Tom.
In fact, there is no "Tom." TOMS, T-O-M-S is an abbreviation for the phrase,
Shoes for a better tomorrow.
Now speaking of tomorrow, do you remember what today is?
The second Monday of the month, which means Call Your Teacher night,
an opportunity for you to practice your English with a Studio Classroom teacher.
Check page 8 in your Studio Classroom magazine for the special Call Your Teacher
phone number.
And then join us tomorrow when we learn why giving shoes away for free is good
business.
Bye-bye, everybody.