1. When does Black Friday date back to?
| A．The 1950s. | B．The 1990s. | C．The 2000s. |
| A．An event within stores. |
| B．An event only for online sales. |
| C．An online and offline shopping festival. |
| A．Small parts. | B．Technology items. | C．Home devices. |
| A．$7.16 billion. | B．$9.4 billion. | C．$38.4 billion. |
The International Workers’ Day, sometimes
People
A recent report
1. What is in the woman’s land?
| A．Oil. | B．Gold. | C．Gas. |
| A．$1,000 per day. |
| B．$1,100 per day. |
| C．$1,200 per day. |
| A．Buying something. |
| B．Talking about the land. |
| C．Signing a contract. |
4 . Shrinkflation has made British shoppers unhappy. For years, producers have quietly shrunk product sizes rather than rise prices. A multipack(合装包)of Fazzles, used to cost £1 ($1.36) and contain eight bags. Now it contains six. Cadbury’s Creme Eggs used to come by the half-dozen; now they come in fives. Quality Street, a chocolate box, weighed 1.2kg in 2009; today, just 650g.
The logic of Shrinkflation is that consumers are less likely to notice it than its alternative: higher prices. For years, the government has worked on the same principle. Taxpayers paid roughly the same, but government services became worse. Now an era of price increases in the form of tax rises has begun. In a nasty combination of inflation and shrinkflation, voters will be expected to pay more for less.
It will be an awkward shift. Since coming to power in 2010, the Conservatives (保守党) have used shrinkflation just as retailers do. In the early austerity (财政紧缩) years, the government shrank (收缩，减少), but its cost did not. As a percentage of GDP, it fell from a peak after the financial crisis of 46% of GDP to 39%. Taxes stayed around their historic norm of about 32% of GDP. But citizens received fewer services.
And, as when shoppers fail to notice the missing packet of Frazzles, voters did not care much at first. Weekly bin collections became fortnightly or monthly. Once-generous legal aid became mean; in-work benefits fell; police solved fewer crimes. But eventually voters and shoppers start to feel confused. Was a box of Quality Street always so small? Were the police always so used to fraud (诈骗)? Moreover, shrinkflation cannot continue forever. Just as people will not buy an empty packet of Frazzles, taxpayers will not pay for government services that are not provided at all. Eventually prices must rise — as the Conservatives are discovering. By 2026 the tax burden will be 36% of GDP, the highest since the post-war era, under Clement Atlee. This will cause several problems such as one of expectations. Atlee’s government promised a new Jerusalem (耶路撒冷): voters accepted higher taxes in return for a welfare(福利)state. Similarly, when New Labour governments raised taxes in the 2000s, they provided more in return. They increased national insurance, in order to bring heath care spending in line with other European countries. Schools were rebuilt and repaired; civic art, though sometimes of questionable quality, appeared in town squares.
Unfortunately, this time higher spending will at best stop things getting worse. Sajid Javi, the health secretary, admits that the health-and social-care systems will struggle even after a 2.5 percentage-point rise in national insurance,
“Is that all we get for £12bn” asked the Daily Mail, a newspaper that lends to see eye-to-eye with the Conservatives, when the plan to cut hospital waiting-lists was announced. British voters are often said to want American taxes and a European welfare government. Instead, they face paying European taxes for services as insufficient as those in American.
1. Shrinkflation refers to the process of items ______.| A．shrinking in size or quantity while their prices remain the same |
| B．shrinking in size or quantity while their prices become higher |
| C．expanding in sire or quantity while their prices remain the same |
| D．expanding in size or quantity while their prices become lower |
| A．Consumers will pay higher taxes for government services. |
| B．Consumers are more sensitive to price increases in products. |
| C．Consumers can hardly notice the changes in government services. |
| D．Consumers are unwilling to pay for government services. |
| A．Critical. | B．Unconcerned. | C．Supportive. | D．Doubtful. |
| A．Both inflation and shrinkflation exist in Britain. |
| B．The Americans pay high taxes for poor services. |
| C．The British government will be costlier with fewer services. |
| D．The Daily Mail is in favor of the current economic policy. |
5 . For the past three decades, companies and consumers have benefited from cross—border connections that have helped to maintain a steady supply of electronics, clothes, toys and other goods so abundant that it has managed to keep prices low across the board.
However, as the pandemic and the Russia — Ukraine conflict continue to weigh on trade and business ties, that period of plenty appears to be undergoing a partial reversal. Companies are rethinking where to source their products and are stockpiling inventory (库存), even at the potential cost of lowering their efficiency and increasing their operation expense. If the situation lasts for very long,
American economists are debating whether recent supply chain troubles and geopolitical conflicts will result in a shake-up of global production, in which factories that had previously been sent offshore or areas with fewer tax regulations, move back to the United States or into other more stable countries. If this happens, a decades-long decline in the prices of many goods could come to an end. We may even witness a slide backwards, meaning a potential boost in prices and overall inflation as a result.
The period of global integration before the pandemic made many of the things Americans buy cheaper. Computers and other forms of technology made factories more efficient, and they rolled out sneakers, kitchen tables, and electronics at a pace unmatched in history. Companies slashed their production costs by moving factories offshore, where wages were lower. The adoption of steel shipping containers and ever larger cargo ships allowed products to be transported from Bangladesh and China to Seattle and Tupelo and everywhere in between at astonishingly low prices.
Those changes, however, had consequences for American factory workers, who saw many jobs disappear. Katherine Tai, the U. S. trade representative, said that, while American consumers have enjoyed the “luxury” of low prices for imported goods for a long time now, the system upon which it was built has always been a very “fragile” one. Americans are not just consumers, but also workers who have to compete in a global marketplace for talent where globalization “has damaged opportunities and wages for average American workers”.
“Some returning is occurring — let’s make no mistake about that.” Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala., the Director-General of the World Trade Organization, said in an interview. But the data shows that most businesses are reducing their risk by building up their inventories and finding additional suppliers in low-cost countries, such as Vietnam and Mexico. This process could end up helping more deeply integtate poorer countries in Africa and other parts of the world into the global value chains, said Dr. Okonjo-Iweala.
The intertwined trajectory (轨迹) of globalization, low prices, and inflation on the whole will be closely watched by economists over the years to come. “It would certainly be a different world.” Jerome H. Powel, the chair of the Federal Reserve, said when asked about a possible move away from globalization. “It’s not obvious how dramatically conditions will change,” he said. “But it’s clear that it’s slowed down.”
1. Which of the following best fits the blank in Paragraph 2?| A．the trend of global integration |
| B．a shift away from fine-tuned globalization |
| C．the benefit of cheap and plenty goods |
| D．an upcoming economic crash |
| A．A potential decline in prices of goods can be expected. |
| B．American companies may locate their offshore factories in Africa. |
| C．Efficient transportation makes bulk buying convenient for Americans. |
| D．Inflation has a role to play in the shake-up of globalization. |
| A．Katherine Tai takes a neutral position concerning globalization. |
| B．American factory workers face heightened competition from domestic rivals. |
| C．American consumers generally benefited from global integration. |
| D．Exported goods lead to the lower wages of average Americans. |
| A．The Era of Cheap and Plenty May be Ending |
| B．Globalization: Crisis or Opportunities? |
| C．New Winners in the Post-globalization Era |
| D．The Future of Global Economy |
BEIJING — The 2024 Spring Festival box office (票房) in China, within the holiday’s first three
Running from Feb.10 to Feb. 17 this year, the Spring Festival period traditionally serves as a profitable period for movie ticket sales. The extended holiday contributes
On Feb.10, eight films were put on, eager
This success narrowly beat the comedy Pegasus 2
During the Spring Festival, the animation Boonie Bears: Time Twist
As the Year of the Dragon approached, sales of products with dragon elements have seen explosive
Since January, products with dragon-themed elements, such as clothing, daily necessities and gold jewelry
Chinese consumers who buy dragon-themed goods are hoping
Spring Festival is the traditional festival Chinese people attach the most importance to, and it’s also
8 . In the more and more competitive service industry, it is no longer enough to promise customer satisfaction. Today, customer “delight” is what companies are trying to achieve in order to keep and increase market share.
It is accepted in the marketing industry, and confirmed by a number of researches, that customers receiving good service will promote business by telling up to 12 other people; those treated badly will tell their tales of woe to up to 20 people. Interestingly, 80 percent of people who feel their complaints are handled fairly will stay loyal.
New lineages for customer care have come when people can obtain goods and services through telephone call centers and the Internet. For example, many companies now have to invest (投资) a lot of money in information technology and staff training in order to cope with the “phone rage (愤怒)” — caused by delays in answering calls ,being cut off in mid-conversation or left waiting for long periods.
“Many people do not like talking to machines,” says Dr. Storey Senior Lecturer in Marketing at City University Business School, “Banks, for example, encourage staff at call centers to use customer data to establish instant and good relationship with them. The aim is to make the customer feel they know you and that you can trust — the sort of comfortable feelings people have during face-to-face chats with their local branch manager.”
Recommended ways of creating customer delight include: under-promising and over-delivering (saying that a repair will be come out within five hours, but getting it done within two ); replacing a faulty product immediately: throwing in a gift voucher (购物礼券) as an unexpected “thank you” to regular customers; and always returning calls, even when they are complaints.
Aiming for customer delight is all very well, but if services do not reach the high level promised, disappointment or worse will be the result. This can be eased by offering an apology and an explanation of why the service did not meet usual standards with empathy (for example, “I know how you must feel”), and possible solutions (replacement, compensation or whatever suggests best meets the case).
Airlines face some of the toughest challenges over customer care. Fierce competition has convinced them that delighting passengers is an important marketing tool, while there is great potential for customer anger over delays caused by weather, unclaimed luggage and technical problems.
For British Airways staff, a winning telephone style is considered vital in handling the large volume of calls about bookings and flight times. They are trained to answer quickly, with their name, job title and a “we are here to help” attitude. The company has invested heavily in information technology to make sure that information is available instantly on screen.
British Airways also says its customer care policies are applied within the company and staff are taught to regard each other as customers requiring the highest standards of service.
Customer care is obviously here to stay and it would be a foolish company that used slogans such as “we do as we please”. On the other hand, the more customers are promised, the greater the risk of disappointment.
1. We can learn from Paragraph 2 that .| A．well-treated customers promote business |
| B．unsatisfied customers receive better service |
| C．Satisfied customers catch more attention |
| D．complaining customers are hard to satisfy |
| A．customers often use phones to express their anger |
| B．customer care becomes more demanding |
| C．people still prefer to buy goods online |
| D．customers rely on their phones to obtain services |
| A．“I’m sorry for the delay.” |
| B．“I appreciate your understanding.” |
| C．“I know how upset you must be.” |
| D．“I know it’s our fault.” |
| A．Face-to-face service creates comfortable feelings among customers. |
| B．A company should promise less but do more in a competitive market. |
| C．Companies that promise more will naturally attract more customers. |
| D．Customer delight is more important for airlines than for banks. |
9 . Dear boss — You have always tried to attract young and youngish consumers, and our consultants have always come up with new ways to label them. I don’t need to remind you that “millennials” and, increasingly, “Gen Z” are our most important markets. The trouble is that coming up with rules to define a swathe of humanity is more art than science. It is liable to apply stereotypes. Luckily you have me, and I’m here to tell you that much of what is written about marketing to today’s most prized consumers is a myth.
Social media has just changed the ways people discover brands from viewing television, newspapers and magazines to surfing Instagram and TikTok; it has weakened the power of marketing as a whole. Such is the ease with which digital natives can fact-check our tricky marketing claims that it is getting harder to build brand loyalty. Online, communication is cheap and prices are readily Googled.
There is a similar temptation to think that physical shops no longer matter. Young consumers love their Amazon deliveries. But what works best is the seamless combination of the digital and physical worlds. Remember those online-only influencer-backed beauty brands like Glossier, which took the world by storm during the pandemic? It turns out that they struggle to get repeat business and have had to pair up with physical retailers. If we want to succeed, we need to offer the best of both physical and virtual worlds.
Gen Z will consider a brand’s sustainability and social impact, but considering something isn’t surrendering to it. They are never brand-slaved. It is chiefly youngsters who buy cheap “fast-fashion” outfits to wear once and then send to landfill. Also, youngsters care less for consumer boycotts than its virtue-signaling parents, thus open to various brands. No wonder, most brands originate from youngsters with duel identities of producers and consumers.
What determines the shopping mode of a generation is their mindset. In Gen Z, lies are easily exposed online, where everyone loves a takedown and hates hypocrisy. We are people just as our young customers are and people will always buy sincerity.
1. What is the article primarily warning readers against in marketing?| A．The excessive use of digital advertising and ignoring traditional media. |
| B．The use of influencers and social media platforms for product promotion. |
| C．Focusing solely on Gen Z without considering other demographic groups. |
| D．Relying on outdated perceptions of young consumer behaviors. |
| A．Young consumers are less interested in brand loyalty. |
| B．Digital natives can check out marketing claims. |
| C．Young consumers prefer shopping in physical stores. |
| D．Social media platforms are misguiding in brand establishment. |
| A．Physical stores are becoming obsolete due to the rise of e-commerce. |
| B．Young consumers only prefer online shopping and home deliveries. |
| C．A combination of digital and physical retail experiences is most effective. |
| D．Physical stores should be completely replaced by digital marketing strategies. |
| A．They commit to social justice and boycott unethical brands. |
| B．They consider a brand’s sustainability but are not controlled by it. |
| C．They are indifferent to a brand’s quality and social influence. |
| D．They only support brands that are created by their peers. |
In a wooden fan workshop in Jiangxi Province, Yu Xiuying is busier than usual. As she paints, bright flowers
The fans Yu painted in Ganzhu Township will be sold to Spain. The small town has
The town’s fan industry dates back to the early 1980s. When working in Suzhou, Yu noticed that from streets to sidewalks, from parks to tourist
