英国卫报:小冰块下的大生意(5)

The freezer aisle¹ of a major supermarket is a cutthroat place to stake a claim: the product, after all, is frozen water, so no retailer² in its right mind is going to stock competing brands.

大型超市的冰柜是一个竞争激烈的地方：毕竟产品是冷冻水，所以没有哪个头脑正常的零售商会储备竞争对手的品牌。

Relationships with major retailers³ are king, and when The Ice Co didn't have them, it bought up the companies that did (most notably⁴ Polarcube, in 1997, which unlocked the coveted⁵ Asda account).

和大型零售商搞好关系就是王道，The Ice Co在不具备这种关系时，它会去收购那些具备这种关系的公司(其中最著名的是1997年收购Polarcube，它打开了令人垂涎的阿斯达超市的份额)。

A move into a new facility in 2006 allowed the growing company to move its production line into the 21st century – ice is now escorted through it by robots,

2006年，这家成长中的公司搬到了新工厂，使其生产线进入21世纪的标准——冰块现在由机器人护送，

untouched by human hand – and to solve the perennial⁶ problem of cold storage.

不受人工影响，并解决了长期存在的冷藏问题。

Ice, unsurprisingly, is a seasonal⁷ product, and the laborious⁸ task of building up enough stock to survive the summer begins months ahead of time.

没错，冰块属于季节性产品，而建立足够的库存以迎合夏季的大量需求需要提前几个月开始准备。

Then came an overextension: London. The capital proved inhospitable ground from the moment The Ice Co opened an office there in 2007:

之后出现了过度扩张：伦敦。自2007年The Ice Co公司在伦敦开设办事处以来，事实证明，伦敦不适合发展：

competition from Eskimo Ice ("king of the cube in London", The Ice Co begrudgingly⁹ admits) and a slew¹¹ of other brands was robust¹².

来自爱斯基摩冰(“伦敦冰立方之王”，虽然Ice公司不想承认)和其他众多品牌的竞争十分激烈。

"It was very, very difficult to keep control of," Metcalfe said: "There was no loyalty¹³."

“这是非常、非常难以控制的，”梅特卡夫说：“我们没有忠诚的消费者。”

When The Ice Co entered London, ice was ￡7 per 12kg bag. Seven years later, it was ￡3.50.

The Ice Co公司进入伦敦时其冰块是每袋12公斤，价格7英镑，7年后降到了3.5英镑。

This price pressure, combined with the highly fragmented nature of the local market – dozens if not hundreds of individual businesses,

事实证明，价格压力加上当地市场的高度分散——与少数全国性零售商相比，就算没有数百个，

as opposed to a handful of national retailers – proved too much of a challenge, and The Ice Co closed its London office in 2014.

也有几十个个体企业——是一个巨大的挑战，The Ice Co于2014年关闭了其伦敦办事处。

By this point, though, there were other, more promising¹⁴ signals that things had started to change.

然而，在这一点上，出现了其他更有希望的信号，表明事情已经开始发生变化。

To call what happened in the years following 2007's Great Recession the "British Ice Boom" is only overselling it insomuch as our consumption of ice still lags way behind the US.

把2007年经济大衰退后的几年发生的事情称为“英国冰块的繁荣”只是夸大其词，因为英国的冰块销量仍远远落后于美国。

But it would be entirely¹⁵ fair to say that, in the UK, ice was finally starting to get cool.

但可以这么说，在英国，冰终于“酷”起来了。

When the American author Matt Yglesias ignited a Twitter firestorm by referring to Europe as "a continent where they don't have ice cubes" in September this year,

今年9月，美国作家马特·伊格莱西亚斯称欧洲是“一个没有冰块的大陆”，在推特上引发了一场风暴。

he was in fact far from the first American to note the dearth¹⁶ of ice in continental¹⁷ beverages¹⁸.

事实上，他远不是第一个注意到欧洲饮料缺乏冰块的美国人。

In Notes from a Big Country (published 1998), Bill Bryson wrote about the various culture shocks he experienced after returning to the US after decades spent in the UK,

在比尔·布莱森于1998年出版的《大国笔记》一书中，他描述了自己在英国生活数十年后回到美国后经历的各种文化冲击，

chief among them "the staunch conviction that ice is not a luxury item".

其中最主要的一点就是“坚信冰不是奢侈品”。

And in his 2001 New Yorker profile of the ice magnate James Stuart, "The Emperor of Ice", Ian Parker would compare the US's voracious¹⁹ demand for ice to that of Europe,

2001年，伊恩·帕克在《纽约客》上对冰业巨头詹姆斯·斯图尔特的简介《冰之王》中，将美国对冰的贪婪需求

a region "stuck at an earlier stage of development", citing the British capital as ground zero of ice parsimoniousness²⁰

与“停留在较早发展阶段"的欧洲进行了比较，并将英国首都伦敦称为“冰块的洼地”。

("Few things are more amusing to an American iceman than a gin-and-tonic in a London pub: the grudging¹⁰ tongs²¹, the single cube").

(“对一个美国冰人来说，没有什么比在伦敦酒吧里喝一杯杜松子酒和奎宁水更有趣的了：不情愿的钳子，一块冰”)。

1 aisle   

n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道

参考例句：

• The aisle was crammed with people.过道上挤满了人。
• The girl ushered me along the aisle to my seat.引座小姐带领我沿着通道到我的座位上去。

2 retailer   

n.零售商(人)

参考例句：

• What are the retailer requirements?零售商会有哪些要求呢？
• The retailer has assembled a team in Shanghai to examine the question.这家零售商在上海组建了一支团队研究这个问题。

3 retailers   

零售商，零售店( retailer的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• High street retailers reported a marked increase in sales before Christmas. 商业街的零售商报告说圣诞节前销售量显著提高。
• Retailers have a statutory duty to provide goods suitable for their purpose. 零售商有为他们提供符合要求的货品的法定义务。

4 notably   

adv.值得注意地，显著地，尤其地，特别地

参考例句：

• Many students were absent,notably the monitor.许多学生缺席，特别是连班长也没来。
• A notably short,silver-haired man,he plays basketball with his staff several times a week.他个子明显较为矮小，一头银发，每周都会和他的员工一起打几次篮球。

5 coveted   

adj.令人垂涎的；垂涎的，梦寐以求的v.贪求，觊觎(covet的过去分词)；垂涎；贪图

参考例句：

• He had long coveted the chance to work with a famous musician. 他一直渴望有机会与著名音乐家一起工作。
• Ther other boys coveted his new bat. 其他的男孩都想得到他的新球棒。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 perennial   

adj.终年的；长久的

参考例句：

• I wonder at her perennial youthfulness.我对她青春常驻感到惊讶。
• There's a perennial shortage of teachers with science qualifications.有理科教学资格的老师一直都很短缺。

7 seasonal   

adj.季节的，季节性的

参考例句：

• The town relies on the seasonal tourist industry for jobs.这个城镇依靠季节性旅游业提供就业机会。
• The hors d'oeuvre is seasonal vegetables.餐前小吃是应时蔬菜。

8 laborious   

adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅

参考例句：

• They had the laborious task of cutting down the huge tree.他们接受了伐大树的艰苦工作。
• Ants and bees are laborious insects.蚂蚁与蜜蜂是勤劳的昆虫。

9 begrudgingly   

小气地，吝啬地

参考例句：

• Then, begrudgingly, I clean up – which doesn't really take that much time. 于是，为了省钱，我打扫干净－－那也不需要花很多时间。
• His terrible directness made me feel peeved, and begrudgingly I conceded that he was right. 他的坦率让我恼火。我承认他是对的，但十分不甘心。

10 grudging   

adj.勉强的，吝啬的

参考例句：

• He felt a grudging respect for her talents as an organizer.他勉强地对她的组织才能表示尊重。
• After a pause he added"sir."in a dilatory,grudging way.停了一会他才慢吞吞地、勉勉强强地加了一声“先生”。

11 slew   

v.（使）旋转；n.大量，许多

参考例句：

• He slewed the car against the side of the building.他的车滑到了大楼的一侧，抵住了。
• They dealt with a slew of other issues.他们处理了大量的其他问题。

12 robust   

adj.强壮的，强健的，粗野的，需要体力的，浓的

参考例句：

• She is too tall and robust.她个子太高，身体太壮。
• China wants to keep growth robust to reduce poverty and avoid job losses,AP commented.美联社评论道，中国希望保持经济强势增长，以减少贫困和失业状况。

13 loyalty   

n.忠诚，忠心

参考例句：

• She told him the truth from a sense of loyalty.她告诉他真相是出于忠诚。
• His loyalty to his friends was never in doubt.他对朋友的一片忠心从来没受到怀疑。

14 promising   

adj.有希望的，有前途的

参考例句：

• The results of the experiments are very promising.实验的结果充满了希望。
• We're trying to bring along one or two promising young swimmers.我们正设法培养出一两名有前途的年轻游泳选手。

15 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

16 dearth   

n.缺乏，粮食不足，饥谨

参考例句：

• There is a dearth of good children's plays.目前缺少优秀的儿童剧。
• Many people in that country died because of dearth of food.那个国家有许多人因为缺少粮食而死。

17 continental   

adj.大陆的，大陆性的，欧洲大陆的

参考例句：

• A continental climate is different from an insular one.大陆性气候不同于岛屿气候。
• The most ancient parts of the continental crust are 4000 million years old.大陆地壳最古老的部分有40亿年历史。

18 beverages   

n.饮料( beverage的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• laws governing the sale of alcoholic beverages 控制酒类销售的法规
• regulations governing the sale of alcoholic beverages 含酒精饮料的销售管理条例

19 voracious   

adj.狼吞虎咽的，贪婪的

参考例句：

• She's a voracious reader of all kinds of love stories.什么样的爱情故事她都百看不厌。
• Joseph Smith was a voracious book collector.约瑟夫·史密斯是个如饥似渴的藏书家。

20 parsimoniousness   

参考例句：

21 tongs   

n.钳；夹子

参考例句：

• She used tongs to put some more coal on the fire.她用火钳再夹一些煤放进炉子里。
• He picked up the hot metal with a pair of tongs.他用一把钳子夹起这块热金属。