Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 1076, Celebrity Product Lines.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 1076.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
Visit our website at eslpod.com.
Download a learning guide for this episode that contains all of the vocabulary, words and definitions we use on this episode, as well as a complete transcript.
This episode is a dialogue between Nick and Jessica about selling things using the name of a famous person.
Let's get started.
The possibilities are endless.
You have to take advantage of being at the height of your career.
I don't know about lending my name to a celebrity product line.
Wouldn't people think I was selling out?
Of course not.
Most celebrities do it nowadays.
People expect you to leverage your fame into a successful business.
But licensing my name to a lot of products that I would then have to promote isn't exactly how I want to spend my time.
But think of the upside.
You would be building a brand with longevity hedging your bets for the future.
You mean in the future when I'm no longer as famous or as popular?
No, of course that's not what I mean.
You'll be a star forever.
But don't you want to get a piece of the pie while the getting is good?
I don't know.
What kind of merchandise are we talking about?
We can start with a clothing line and then branch out into household products, luggage and even weight loss products.
Weight loss products?
What are you implying?
Nothing.
I didn't mean weight loss products.
I meant food.
Glamorous, beautiful food.
See what I mean?
The sky's the limit.
Nick begins our dialogue by saying to Jessica the possibilities are endless.
A possibility is something that could happen.
When we say something is endless E-N-D-L-E-S-S we mean that There is no maximum.
It could be as many as possible.
The possibilities are endless then means that there are many possibilities.
Usually we're talking about good things that could happen.
Nick says to Jessica To be at the height H-E-I-G-H-T of your career.
C-A-R-E-E-R means that you are at the best moment or the most successful moment in your career, in your line of work and what you do.
Your career is your job.
It's the thing that you do to make money usually.
To be at the height of something means to be at the highest point, to be at a point where, in this case, you are the most successful.
Perhaps you are making the most money that you will ever make, or you are more popular than you will ever be.
Jessica says, I don't know about lending my name to a celebrity product line.
To lend L E N D means to let someone use something for a period of time.
Jessica is talking about lending her name.
To lend your name means to let your name be associated with something else.
In the United States it's popular for certain movie stars or music stars to lend their name to certain products, things that companies sell.
Sometimes they actually sell the product using the name of the person.
So, for example, there might be a kind of perfume product that is sold using the name of some famous actress or singer.
Perfume p-e-r-f-u-m-e is liquid that you put on your body to make you smell nice.
Usually we use the term perfume to refer to what a woman would put on her body.
Jessica doesn't know about.
She's not sure about lending her name to a celebrity product line.
A celebrity.
C-E-L-E-B-R-I-T-Y is a famous person, a famous actor, a famous singer, a famous podcaster.
All of these could be celebrities, except that last example.
Product refers to something that you sell.
A product line, L-I-N-E, is a group of products, a group of related things that you would sell.
So a celebrity product line would be a group of things that are sold using the name of a famous person.
Jessica says, wouldn't people think I was selling out?
The phrasal verb to sell out has a couple of different meanings.
Here it means to do something in order to make money, but to do something that somehow doesn't match with your principles or your morals, or your values or your identity, even
So, for example, a popular singer writes a song, the song becomes a hit, meaning it becomes very successful.
And then, a few years later, the singer will sell the song or the rights to use the song to a company in order for the company to use that song in a commercial.
Some people would say that the artist, the He sold out, meaning he's decided that he was going to get money for what he wrote rather than keeping himself as a real artist.
I don't know if this is really true, if you could consider someone selling their song to be selling out, but that's the idea behind the phrasal verb to sell out.
The other possibility or the other possible meaning of to sell out would be for a store to sell all that it has of a certain product, to no longer have any available because they have all been sold.
Nick doesn't think Jessica would be selling out.
He says most celebrities do it nowadays.
People expect you to leverage your fame into a successful business.
To leverage L-E-V-E-R-A-G-E means to use something that you have now in order to get something better in the future.
To leverage your influence, for example, would mean to use your influence in order to get a better situation or perhaps to make more money.
Leveraging your celebrity would be to use your fame, the fact that you are popular, in order to make even more money or perhaps to become even more famous.
Jessica says, Jessica is saying that, She doesn't want to license her name to a lot of products.
To license means to allow or to let another company or another person use something that you have created.
You might, for example, write a song.
And then you let another person use that song in order to make money.
You would license the song to that person, meaning that person has to give you some money for using your song.
Jessica doesn't want to have to promote a lot of products.
To promote here means to promote.
Let people know about something.
To go out and tell people, in this case, to buy these products.
When a writer publishes a book, he or she often goes and promotes the book by going on television programs and radio interviews and that sort of thing.
Nick says, but think of the upside.
The upside U-P-S-I-D-E of something is the advantage of something.
The good result or consequence that can happen if you do a Now, when you're young, is that when you are old, you will have money to live on.
The upside is the advantage.
The opposite of upside is, of course, downside.
D-O-W-N-S-I-D-E.
The downside of something would be the disadvantage, the negative consequence of some action.
Nick says A brand B-R-A-N-D is a name or a symbol that is associated with a certain kind of product.
You can think of, for example...
The kind of toothpaste that you use in the morning to clean your mouth, to brush your teeth.
The toothpaste is made by a certain company.
The name would be the brand of that toothpaste.
Often that same brand, that same name, will be used with a whole set of products.
A line of products, we might call them.
Longevity, L-O-N-G-E-V-I-T-Y, refers to how long something lasts.
Usually it refers to a long life or a long existence.
Nick is talking about Jessica's brand as having longevity.
It will survive for many years.
This will allow her to hedge her bets.
To hedge H-E-D-G-E your bets B-E-T-S means to reduce your risk, to protect yourself against bad things that might happen in the future.
Nick is saying here that if Jessica gives her name to all of these different products, she would make a lot of money now, and then she wouldn't perhaps have to worry about making money in the future.
Jessica says, you mean in the future when I'm no longer as famous or as popular?
Nick says, no, of course that's not what I mean.
Jessica is concerned that sometime in the future she won't be popular and Nick doesn't want her to think that, doesn't want her to think that Nick believes that someday she won't be popular.
Of course, we all know that eventually celebrities lose their popularity, are no longer popular.
Nick says, you'll be a star forever, meaning you will be famous forever.
But Don't you want to get a piece of the pie while the getting is good?
There are two expressions here.
The first one is a piece of the pie or to get a piece of the pie, P-I-E.
To get a piece of the pie here refers to get part of something, to obtain a part of something.
Often some amount of money, and that's what Nick is talking about here.
A pie is normally a dessert that you eat, but here it's referring simply to getting some money that is available to be got.
The second expression is while the getting is good.
While the getting G-E-T-T-I-N-G is good means to get something before it disappears.
To get something while there is still an opportunity to get it.
Jessica says, I don't know.
What kind of merchandise are we talking about?
Merchandise, M-E-R-C-H-A-N-D-I-S-E, are products, things that you can buy, things that are sold by companies.
Merchandise usually refers to physical products.
Jessica wants to know what kind of merchandise Nick is talking about.
Nick says we can start with a clothing line and then branch out into household products, luggage and even weight loss products.
A clothing line would be clothes that are sold under a particular name.
Shirts, pants, dresses, that sort of thing.
The phrasal verb to branch B-R-A-N-C-H out means to go into a different area, a different kind of in this case product from the one that you started with.
A celebrity might start with selling shirts that have his name on it.
And then he could branch out and sell pants and shoes and socks and other types of clothing.
That would be branching out.
Nick is suggesting that Jessica can branch out into all sorts of things after she starts selling clothing.
One of the things she can start selling in the future is weight loss products.
Weight loss refers to becoming thinner, losing some of the weight that you have, not being as fat as you are now.
I mean, I'm not saying you're fat, you who are listening to this episode, but you know people in general Americans have this problem.
Jessica says, what are you implying?
She thinks that Nick is calling her fat.
And of course, you never want to call a woman fat.
Nick says, I'm not implying anything, meaning I'm not saying that you are overweight.
I didn't mean weight loss products.
I mean, and then he changes his idea, food, glamorous, beautiful food.
See what I mean?
Meaning, do you understand me?
The sky's the limit.
The expression the sky's S-K-Y apostrophe S the limit means that there are many, many possibilities, many things that you can do.
There are no limits.
There are no restrictions.
You have a lot of choices, usually good choices.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
The possibilities are endless.
You have to take advantage of being at the height of your career.
Of course not.
Most celebrities do it nowadays.
People expect you to leverage your fame into a successful business.
But licensing my name to a lot of products that I would then have to promote isn't exactly how I want to spend my time.
But think of the upside.
You would be building a brand with longevity, hedging your bets for the future.
You mean in the future when I'm no longer as famous or as popular?
No, of course that's not what I mean.
You'll be a star forever.
But don't you want to get a piece of the pie while the getting is good?
I don't know.
What kind of merchandise are we talking about?
We can start with a clothing line and then branch out into household products, luggage and even weight loss products.
Weight loss products?
What are you implying?
Nothing.
I didn't mean weight loss products.
I meant food.
Glamorous, beautiful food.
See what I mean?
The sky's the limit.
How good can your English be if you continue listening to ESL Podcast?
Well, the sky's the limit.
There are many, many possibilities if you continue listening to the wonderful scripts by our wonderful script writer, Dr Lucy Say.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcasts.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2015 by the Center for Educational Development.
