Practice Listening Business English Exercises for B1 – Entrepreneurs

1   (me) what I liked

2   her (that) I liked

3   (me) if/whether I had

4   (that) I took

5   thought I would be

6   I had never thought

Audioscript

1   What do you like doing in your free time?

2   I like hanging out with friends.

3   Do you have any previous work or voluntary experience?

4   I take the dog for a walk every day.

5   What do you think you’ll be doing in five years’ time?

6   I’ve never thought about that.

A

1 d   2 g   3 a   4 h   5 b   6 f   7 e   8 i   9 c

B

1   They make specialist and high-end cases for mobile phones, tablets and laptops.

2   18–25 years and 25–30 years are their two biggest age demographics.

3   The mobile sector is growing.

4   They don’t have enough stock.

5   Mobile cases – they see these as the big winner for the next two years at least.

C

Market growth: A

Customer age demographic: C

Stock needs: F

Audioscript

Part 1:   the overview

In this next part of my presentation, I’m going to tell you more about the target market for our new company as well as market growth and our forecast for the next quarter. As you know, we produce specialist and high-end cases for mobile phones, tablets and laptops in a range of sizes for each product line.

On this slide you can see three charts. This pie chart shows us the age demographic of our target customers. You can see which ages the colours refer to on the right. You’ll notice that the 18- to 25-year-old age group is our biggest target group. Next, you can see the growth of our market in terms of annual revenue on this line graph. The main point is that the mobile case sector is both our largest and fastest-growing sector.

Finally, on this bar chart, you can see the stock levels we have and our forecast for the next quarter year. At the end of Q4 we’ll have this much stock and you can see from our projected sales that we’re not going to have enough. We’ll need more stock to be able to fulfil l the orders that will come in. For that reason, we need a short-term loan so that we can buy more stock. I’d now like to hand over to my colleague, who will give you more details.

Part 2: the details

So coming back to the growth development graph. It is significant that the growth of the tablet product line has been slow and the laptop line has fallen slightly. On the other hand, you can see that the mobile sector has risen sharply and is projected to continue. These details confirm that mobile devices, in general, are outselling both tablets and laptops combined.

I’d also like to show you something on the customer age demographic pie chart. Although our cases are high-end and not exactly cheap, it’s interesting to see that almost half of our customers are in the 18-to-25 age group, and almost a quarter are in the 25-to-30 age group. This means that around 70 percent of our customers are in the 18-to-30 age group and are willing to pay high-end prices for our cases. This fact proves that our cases are highly desirable for this age group and they’re willing to spend, even though they might not have a lot of disposable income.

The last thing I want you to think about is our current stock levels. The stock is the quantity of product we have ready to sell in our warehouse. Looking more closely at the bar chart, you can see that we have greatly underestimated the growth of the mobile sector. For that reason, we don’t have enough stock to meet the demand. We need more, but we’ll need money, like a loan, to be able to buy more stock. If we can secure this loan, we will be investing in further stock, especially mobile cases. We see mobile cases as the big winner for the next two years at least.

A

b   to explain the background to his business

B

1 estate agent   2 wooden toys   3 craft fairs

4 target market   5 larger premises

6 family savings   7 placing an order

8 pitching   9 business angels

Audioscript

Good evening everyone, I’m George Johnson and I started my business, GJWoodToys, while I was still working at my full-time job at an estate agent’s, selling houses. Although I quite liked my job, ever since my kids were born I’d been making wooden toys for them as a hobby. But then other parents saw the toys and wanted to buy them and kept telling me that I should set up my own business. I started by selling the toys at craft fairs and they sold out every time. My target market was enormous: parents and their children, because kids are usually the ones to persuade the parents to part with their money. Parents like something that is well made, durable, reliable and above all safe, and the bright colours and versatility of each piece appeals to the children. It looked like we were onto a winner.

I continued making the toys in my garage for a while but then, when a couple of local stores approached me, I realised that I needed funding to expand my production and move into slightly larger premises. In order to do this and invest in more tools and employ more people, I had to use family savings and remortgage my house, which was a big risk because I could’ve lost all their money.

However it wasn’t long after this that a big department store became interested in the toys after one of their directors had bought some at a craft fair. They started talking about placing an order for 50,000 units. It was at this point that I realised I had a potentially very successful product on my hands. However, this next step would require a huge investment and I just didn’t have the money. With the promise of the order from the store I tried pitching to various potential backers to find the funding. The bank wasn’t interested, so I started looking at the possibility of crowdfunding, although I eventually decided against this. I also talked to business angels. I was very lucky to meet a business angel who’d been looking for a start-up to invest in and he brought not only the investment needed but a wealth of experience, too.

A

Speaker 1 wants money to replace costumes and equipment destroyed in a fire.

Speaker 2 wants money to develop a mobile app.

Speaker 3 wants money to the cover the production costs of its travel guides.

B

1   events and festivals

2   hit by disaster

3   costumes and equipment

4   insurance company

5   world tour

6   design your own

7   organic cotton

8   our mobile app

9   order

10   smartphones (anytime, anywhere)

11   an audio guide

12   free to download

13   (just) ten euros

14   70 percent

15   cover the cost

Audioscript

Ben Fischer

Hi guys! I’m Ben Fischer and my award-winning theatre company performs at events and festivals all over the world. We bring the works of famous German writers and dramatists, such as Bertolt Brecht, to audiences across the globe.

In true dramatic style, our latest production of Brecht’s The Good Person of Szechwan has just been hit by disaster. An electrical fire destroyed the arts centre where we were performing in London and took with it all our costumes and equipment. Fortunately, nobody was in the building at the time and nobody was injured in the fire.

We know one day the insurance company will eventually pay the compensation to rebuild and replace everything, but we need to complete our world tour now and can’t wait around for the money to arrive.

Can you help us? We need to raise €10,000 in the next few weeks to replace everything. I promise all donations to our cause will be repaid when we receive the insurance payout. Not only that, depending on the size of your donation you will receive discounts on tickets and even free tickets to see our play in any city of your choice on the tour. Just see our website for more details.

As Brecht himself once said, ‘Everyone needs help from everyone.’ By contributing to our disaster fund, you will be doing your bit to support community arts and help our young theatre group to literally rise from the ashes. Thank you!

Alison Chadwick

My name’s Alison Chadwick and this is my story. I started my T-shirt business, Alison’s Tees, back in university as a hobby. Friends and fellow students used to ask me where I got my T-shirts from and when I told them I designed them myself everyone said that was cool.

Then I thought, you know anyone can design their own T-shirt. It’s simple, it’s fun and it’s creative. On my website you can choose the colour and style but more than that, you can have any design or logo you like printed on it including photos to make your very own unique T-shirt. Friends will be amazed. Before we finally produce the T-shirt, you’ll receive a photo of the design for final approval.

No more shopping for hours looking for something you actually like. No more low-quality shop-bought products. All our T-shirts are 100 percent organic cotton and ethically sourced. We’re helping independent cotton farmers. We work hand-in-hand with our suppliers to ensure highest-quality tees.

Thanks to previous crowdfunding our business has been a big success. Now we need your support and your money to help us develop our mobile app so our users can design and order their own tees on their smartphones, anytime, anywhere.

Marcos López

If you like travelling, you’ll love our new tour guide mobile app. It’s like an audio guide but on your mobile phone, so you carry it with you all the time. I’m Marcos López and I’m one of the founders of Holidapp. It’s the ultimate travel companion. It’s like having an audio guide but on your smartphone. You’ll never want to buy another guidebook or tourist map again in your life. You’ll find out about the places you’re visiting whenever you want in a new, original and entertaining way.

Our app is free to download and quick and easy to use. Enter the desired location and for just €10 you will get an expert guide to one of over 30 destinations in Europe and the USA. And the list of places is growing longer each month.

The guide features audio tours by experts in their towns, from qualified tour guides to local storytellers of all ages with a passion for the place where they live. Our platform is free to our guide contributors and they receive 70 percent of the revenues generated by their guides.

Each travel guide on our app comes with high-quality photographs and can use your geolocation to help you get the most from your guide. We need your backing to help us cover the cost of production, audio recording, programming and photography. We’d also love to hear what you think of the guides so we can keep improving our service.

A

1   F – Linda is the CEO of Ensign.

2   T – I’ve always been fascinated by the sea and marine life and school biology lessons reinforced that, so I decided that I wanted to become a marine biologist.

3   F – I took a year off to volunteer on a Greek island protecting loggerhead turtles.

4   T – So was it this experience that made you want to clean up the water? – Yes, that’s right.

5   T – Tina had been reading about crowdfunding and suggested we try it.

6   T – … we tried academic institutions, but they just weren’t interested … they said that our idea wouldn’t work.

7   F – We are making a profit and enough money to pay ourselves good salaries.

8   F – … we have a PA and an engineering assistant for Tina. We outsource other tasks. We don’t employ someone to do our accounts, for example.

B

1 marine waste   2 seas   3 knowledge   4 degrees

5 academic   6 media sites   7 angel   8 two years   9 profit

10 PA, assistant

C

      B

      A is incorrect because Linda had always been interested in the sea and the creatures that live in it and she didn’t say that she wanted to be an engineer.

      C is incorrect because Tina, not Linda, designed and built the system. The idea came to Linda while she was on a Greek island protecting loggerhead turtles. She didn’t study engineering. Ms. Carlin is Linda’s business angel. The company specializes in waste management.

Audioscript

I = Interviewer   L = Linda

I:   I’d like to welcome Linda Gass to our programme today. You may have heard of her; she is one of our up-and-coming young entrepreneurs. Linda is the CEO of Ensign, a young company specialising in marine waste management. Her partner, Tina, who is an engineer, is the brains behind a new clean-up system for the world’s seas. Welcome to the programme, Linda.

L:   Thank you!

I:   To begin with, Linda, perhaps you can tell us how this all started.

L:   Sure, I’d be delighted to. I’ve always been fascinated by the sea and marine life and school biology lessons reinforced that, so I decided that I wanted to become a marine biologist.

I:   And so you did!

L:   Yes, but I took a year off to volunteer on a Greek island, protecting loggerhead turtles.

I:   So was it this experience that made you want to clean up the water?

L:   Yes, that’s right. Tourism and fishing pollution create huge problems for marine life.

I:   But you didn’t do anything immediately?

L:   No. I didn’t have the knowledge that was needed to build a system that could rid the sea of plastic. Luckily, when I was in university, I met Tina and she had the engineering knowledge that I lacked. We hit it off as soon as we met and became great friends. We encouraged each other to do our practical projects for our courses. We both got first-class honours degrees and then moved in together to do our master’s degrees.

I:   And you did yours in Business Studies and Marketing, I believe.

L:   That’s right. That’s helped a lot, especially when we needed funding to build the system that Tina designed.

I:   And how did you raise the money?

L:   Well, to begin with, we tried academic institutions, but they just weren’t interested. So, Tina had been reading about crowdfunding and suggested we try it. In the beginning, I said that it wasn’t a good idea. I wanted our work to be recognised by professors and other academics. I knew that we could help the world’s seas and oceans, but they said that our idea wouldn’t work.

I:   And they were wrong!

L:   Yes. We advertised for funds on social media sites and persuaded reputable journalists to write about our work. We set up Ensign and haven’t looked back. We have a wonderful business angel, Ms Carlin, who has ploughed funds into our work and found us new backers, so now we’re going from strength to strength with several new projects in the pipeline.

I:   And how long have you been in this business?

L:   Only two years in fact, although it seems more like ten because of all the experience we’ve had. I can’t believe how lucky we’ve been. We’re making a profit and enough money to pay ourselves good salaries.

I:   Are you the only employees in Ensign?

L:   Well, we were to start with, when we set up, but now we have a PA and an engineering assistant for Tina. We outsource other tasks. We don’t employ someone to do our accounts, for example.

I:   And you find that works?

L:   So far but, of course, I think that soon we will need one on a fulltime basis.

I:   How about the marketing? Do you do that alone?

L:   No. Tina and I both have a hand in that and so does Ms Carlin. She’s full of innovative ideas.

I:   Well, it was very interesting talking to you Linda and I look forward to hearing about your next project.

L:   Thank you.

1 Canning   2 natural   3 capacity   4 factory

5 business plan   6 500,000   7 Tuesday   8 3 pm

Audioscript

Listen to a man calling an entrepreneur’s advice centre.

A:   Good morning, Advice Centre, how can I help you?

B:   Hello, I’m calling to make an appointment to talk to someone about expanding my business.

A:   Okay. And you are …?

B:   Michael Canning.

A:   Is that with double N?

B:   Yes. C-A-N-N-I-N-G.

A:   Right. And the name of your business?

B:   InfaSmooth.

A:   Can you tell me something about your business?

B:   I make natural organic creams for babies and infants and I sell them online, but they’re so popular that I can’t keep up with all the orders.

A:   So what do you think you need?

B:   I’ve been making them in my workshop at home but I need to increase capacity so that means finding a suitable factory. And I’ll need more staff.

A:   Okay, that’s great. It sounds as if you’re doing really well. Have you prepared a business plan for this expansion?

B:   Yes, I have.

A:   That’s great. It will speed up the process. So how much do you need?

B:   I’m looking for an investment of €500,000.

A:   Right. There are a couple of venture capital companies who might be interested. They meet potential clients here once a week. How does Wednesday at 2 p.m. sound for a meeting with AAfirstinvest? Oh sorry, they’ve changed their day next week to Tuesday. Would that be okay?

B:   Absolutely.

A:   Let’s see if Whatstart can fit you in on Friday next week. Ah, good, they can see you at 10 a.m. or 3 p.m. Which do you prefer?

B:   Erm, morning or afternoon? I think the afternoon would be better. Thanks. Are your offices in Arden Court?

A:   Yes, number 23, but I’ll email you all the details.

B:   Thanks.