The company was in financial trouble last year, losing money and being forced to sell property at a loss. This resulted in across-the-board pay cuts for employees. This year, the CEO is focused on making a profit at all costs and asked accountants for estimates on moving production to China or Thailand to get more value for money spent. The company must decide whether moving overseas outweighs potential social issues.

1. Business English
Idioms

2. I’m going to tell you a story about a company that is
in financial trouble.
I will show you pictures and I’d like you to guess the
idioms using the pictures and the context of the
story.

3. ante up

4. at a loss

5. across the board

6. back on (their) feet
last year
this year

7. at all costs

8. bean-counter

9. ball park figure

10. bang for your buck

11. 1. What was the company’s problem?
2. What would you do if you were the CEO of
this company?

12. I’m going to tell you a story about a company that is in financial trouble. I will show you pictures
and I’d like you to guess the idioms using the pictures and the context of the story.
Last year the company had to ante up a lot of money in taxes, and they were forced to sell some
of their property at a significant loss. Because they lost so much money last year, they had to
institute across the board pay cuts; everyone’s salary decreased significantly. This year, the
company is back on its feet and the CEOs vowed to make a profit at all costs. They asked the
bean counters to give them a ball park figure on how much the company would earn by moving
production to China or Thailand. They found that they would get a lot more bang for their buck if
they moved to China, but they were concerned that they might have problems with human rights
organizations and social activists.
What was the company’s problem?
What would you do if you were the CEO of this company?
Or
Put the idioms in order to match the words in bold in the story.

13. 1. I had to ante up a lot o money to get my car fixed.
2. The computer company decided to give the workers
an across-the-board increase in their salary.
3. He plans to go to school at all costs.
4. We were forced to sell the computers at a big loss.
5. The contractor gave us a ball park figure for the cost
of repairing the new building.
6. My sister is back on her feet after losing her job last
year.
7. We were able to get a lot of bang for our buck when
we advertised on the Internet.
8. We asked the bean-counters to look over the figures
in the new budget.
a. including everyone or everything
b. return to good financial health
c. pay, produce a necessary amount of money
d. at any expense of time, effort, or money
e. a rough estimate or figure
f. value for the money spent
g. an accountant
h. sell something and lose money