Speak Like a Native Shopper: English Vocabulary for Shopping, Sales...and SCAMS!

Hi, everybody.

Welcome to www.engvid.com.

I'm Adam.

Today, I want to talk to you about shopping.

But more specifically, I want to talk about sales, because everybody loves a sale.

Everybody wants to get the cheapest product they can and find something really special

and tell all their friends how much money they saved.

So, I'm going to tell you about some of the

biggest sales, again, mostly in North America,

but some of them are actually international,

and then I'm going to give you a whole bunch

of good words and expressions that will help

you become a better shopper when it comes

to sales.

Okay?

So, we're going to start with some of the

biggest shopping days in, again, North America,

but not only.

As you're going to see, it's becoming much more international.

So, we're going to start with Black Friday.

Now, Black Friday is very much an American

shopping day, although in the last few years,

I've seen stores all over the world advertising Black Friday sales.

In the States, this happens on the Friday after

Thanksgiving, so it's between Thanksgiving

and Christmas.

Right?

This is when people start buying gifts, like Christmas gifts and end-of-year gifts.

So, this is the biggest shopping day in the US.

Now, it is so popular that it's a little bit crazy.

There's actually a good word to describe this shopping experience.

It's mayhem.

Mayhem means complete chaos, complete uncontrolled

craziness going on in the stores all over

the US.

In this mayhem, people are...

They line up, first of all, hours before stores

open because they want to get in there and

get the best deals before other people get them.

And once the store is open, everybody rushes inside and everybody goes...

Tries to grab all the products they want, and it's very common to hear about people

fighting each other over, like, a TV, for example.

It's complete craziness, complete chaos.

It's mayhem.

Okay?

But where does the name come from?

There's a few different theories, but some people, and the one that seems to make the

most sense, because this is the biggest shopping

day, this is when stores start moving from

the red, means losing money, into the black, making a profit.

That's one explanation.

There are a few other ones, but that sounds like a good one to me.

Anyways, following this Friday, there is something called Cyber Monday.

This is the Monday right after the Black Friday sales.

This is the biggest online shopping day, when all the retail...

Online retailers - this is a good word, also

- retailers are the people selling in stores

or online.

All the online retailers put their products and services on sale as well.

So, also a very busy shopping day, but not in stores, on the computer.

Then there's Boxing Day.

This is one day after Christmas.

Now, in most...

In most of these countries, all the stores are closed the day after.

So, Christmas is really a two-day holiday.

The third day, the second day after Christmas,

all the stores are open and there are huge

sales with big discounts, and everybody goes

shopping, basically to try to save all the

money that they spent on Christmas gifts.

So, it doesn't actually really make sense, but lots of good deals on Boxing Day.

Boxing Day comes from a British tradition

that after Christmas, the wealthy people used

to make little boxed gifts for the servants and all that stuff.

That's where the name generally comes from.

Recently, in the last few years, there's the biggest sale of them all.

It's an online sale.

It's called Singles Day because it happens

on November 11th, so 1-1-1-1, a lot of single

people out there.

This is by AliExpress, this is a Chinese company, and they're...

It's basically the Chinese version of Amazon.

They sell basically everything online on this

platform, and they make billions of dollars,

and everybody's on the computer all day, scrolling up and down and shopping.

And I have to admit, I've shopped on Singles Day as well.

Really, really good deals, but it takes a little while for the product to arrive.

So, those are the biggest sales.

Now, we're going to look at a whole bunch of vocabulary to help you navigate through

all this mayhem.

So, first of all, there are different types of sales.

There's clearance sale.

Now, clearance sale, you have to realize that

a store or a retailer is not trying to give

you a discount.

What the retailer is trying to do is get rid of all the excess stock.

So, they have all their stock that they weren't

able to sell in the time they were supposed

to.

New stock will soon be coming in with new products, so they need to make space.

So, how do they make space in the stores?

They have to get rid of old inventory.

What's the best way to get rid of it?

Make it really cheap.

People buy it and take it home, and they have space.

So, clearance sales.

During clearance sales, the markdowns are quite large.

To mark down, like if you have separate

words, to mark down means to reduce the price.

So, you know, on products, if you go shopping, there's either...

There's a little piece of paper with a string

attached to the product, or there's a sticker.

So, that's called the price tag.

"On the tag" is the price of the product.

So, to mark down means to go to each sticker

or tag and cross out the old price and put

the new, lower price.

That's to mark down.

"The markdown", as one word, means the same as "discount".

So, there's a 20% markdown, 100% mark...

Well, not 100%, that's free.

75% markdown.

"Going out of business sale", this is when a

store is ready to close, or a store closing

sale means the same thing.

A store is about to close, and they want to get rid of all their stock.

They don't want to throw it away and lose money.

Now, you have to be careful about these because

businesses often put up a "going out of business"

sale, and they leave that sign on there for five years, and it's just a scam.

Anyway, speaking of scams, we're going to get to that.

You have to be careful about sales.

Always make sure to find out if the product you're buying is a "final sale".

Anything that is called or considered a "final sale" means that...

Well, basically it means "final", but more

importantly, there are no refunds and no exchanges.

Once you take it out of the store, it's yours.

If you get home...

Like, let's say you bought a shirt.

You get home, it doesn't fit properly - too bad, it's yours.

If you bought a gift for someone and they don't like it - too bad, it's yours.

You cannot take it back to the store.

So, be careful if something is marked "final sale".

There's no...

You can't change your mind later.

Now, another thing you have to be careful

about sales, there's something called a "bait

and switch".

A "bait and switch" basically...

Okay, let's start with "bait".

When you go fishing, you put a little worm on the hook and you throw the hook in the

water to try to catch the fish.

The worm is "bait".

It is something that attracts the fish.

So, in a store, they will set out a bait.

They will say our...

Let's say our top product is 75% off.

So, you think, wow, great deal.

You walk into the store and then a very...

A very good salesperson will come up to you

and they'll say, oh yeah, yeah, that's a very

good deal, but a better deal is really over here, and then they start talking to you,

so then they switch.

They attracted you into the store and then

they try to switch, change your mind to buying

something else that will help them make more money.

So, you have to be careful about that.

Especially during sales, because they're...

They're putting something out there to attract

you, and then they're going to try to sell

you something else.

And you also have to be careful about gimmicks.

Gimmicks are similar to "bait".

A gimmick is basically something that seems

attractive, but really is not anything special.

So, a lot of...

A lot of stores will say if you spend, let's say, $100, we'll give you a gift...

A gift box.

So, okay, you say, well, that sounds nice.

You go, you spend $100.

You take the gift box home, and inside, there's, like, $2 worth of gifts.

Right?

So, you didn't really get anything.

But you got into the store and you spent $100.

So, they make money, you spent money, basically.

You didn't get much for the... for the gift.

"Bogo".

Buy one, get one.

Buy one, get one.

So, usually "bogo", buy one, get one free.

Or buy one, get one half price.

The whole idea is to get you to buy at least two of whatever product.

That's a type of gimmick, because sometimes

what they'll do is they'll raise all the prices,

so even if you're buying one and buying one for half price, you're more or less paying

the regular price.

So, be careful about that.

And also be...

Make sure it's not always buy one, get one free.

Buy one, get one half off, so essentially you're paying, like, you get a quarter off

each one.

It's not that great of a deal.

Now, when you're going shopping, when people

go shopping during sales, they're bargain

hunting.

They are looking for the biggest bargain, the best deal they can find.

But you also have to be careful when you're going bargain hunting.

If something seems too good to be true, it means it's a little bit unbelievable.

It's such a good price that you think you're a little bit suspicious.

My personal motto, if it's too good to be true, it isn't.

Right?

If something seems like too good of a deal, be suspicious.

There might be something wrong with it.

Sometimes you will find a find, or you will find a steal.

"A find", notice that "a", I'm using "find" as a noun, and I'm using "steal" as a noun.

A find or a steal means you got a really, really good deal.

You were a little bit...

Like, your bargain hunting led you to a very successful purchase.

Most people might have missed it or they came too late.

You got the best possible deal.

It's a find or a steal.

Now, another thing that you might often see

during sales is there may be clearance items,

things that are...

That have been marked down a lot, and then on

the sale day, they will say take an additional

10% off the lowest...

I forgot.

The lowest ticketed price.

So, you will see a product, it will have a

price tag, as I mentioned before, like a sticker

or a little piece of paper.

It will have the original price, $50.

Then it was marked down to $40.

So now the sale price is $40, you can have it for $40 plus an additional 10% off, so

another $4 off, so $36.

Always look for the lowest price on the sticker

and take whatever percentage off that price.

And then you also have to be careful about door crashers.

A door crasher is a type of gimmick.

The store will say...

Okay, so the first 100 customers in the store get 25% off everything in the store.

So of course, everybody wants that 25% off, so before the store opens, there's like a

lineup of 100 people.

Everybody wants to be the first.

So, the door crasher means they're lining up and they want to get in so quickly that

they break the doors to get into the store.

That's fine, except if you're not one of the

first 100 and you come in there like two minutes

too late, you don't get the discount, but they get you in the store and sell you the

products they want.

So, for them, it's a good deal to give 100 people a discount because that will attract

another 100 people who will not get the discount, so they make more money anyway.

And also, when you're negotiating, if somebody

says "final offer", take it or leave it, that

means they're not negotiating anymore.

That's the lowest price that you can pay.

Then, you have to decide, do you want to buy

it at that price or not, and then walk away.

So, in negotiations, last price, take it or leave it, final offer.

Okay?

So, there you go, just some vocabulary to

help you go shopping, help you find a steal,

get that find.

Do you...

Do you have a very successful bargain-hunting shopping trip?

Okay.

Anyways, if you have any questions about any

of this, please go to www.engvid.com, you

can ask me in the comments section.

There's also a quiz to test your knowledge of these expressions and these vocabulary

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