Pronounce Top 50 Brand Names in English

hi i’m vanessa from speak english with

vanessa.com

netflix nike toyota let’s talk about it

[Music]

do you use netflix do you wear nike

shoes do you drive a toyota

well you’re not alone there are many

global brands that are used

internationally

in fact it’s quite rare to find

something that was 100 percent

made in your country maybe the cotton of

this shirt was grown in one place

the thread was put together in another

place the dye

for the color was made in another place

the cloth was put together in another

place and then it was sewn

somewhere else and finally it landed in

the store

near you needless to say we live in a

connected global economy so i would like

to help you today

to pronounce 50 most common brands that

you will hear as you travel

and then as you interact with people

internationally

these are brands for clothing food money

beauty food drinks there’s so many

categories

there’s a lot to learn before we get

started i want to make a quick note that

there are many ways to pronounce these

brands

but let’s imagine that you are walking

around new york city

someday when we’re allowed to do that

again you’re walking around new york

city and you want to look for

this store so you approach someone and

you ask them

where is ash a m

they’re gonna say what so i would like

to help you pronounce these

name brands the same way that is pretty

standard in the u.s

if you asked them where is hm

they’ll say oh yeah it’s right over

there or if you ask them where’s the

closest

ikea i want you to be able to find what

you’re looking for

communicate clearly and have other

people feel comfortable

understanding what you’re talking about

so let’s get started i’m gonna say each

name brand

two times i want you to listen the first

time and the second time i would like

you to speak out loud and repeat with me

you might hear birds in the distance or

an airplane overhead

don’t worry we are out here in my

backyard enjoying a little bit of

greenery so i hope that this will add to

the lesson let’s get started with our

first category which is clothing

gucci gucci

notice the ch sound in the middle of

this word gucci

next is chanel chanel

don’t be fooled this word has a ch

but we don’t say ch it sounds like

be quiet chanel chanel

next is louis vuitton

louis vuitton we do not say

luis the s is lost

instead we say louis vuitton

nike nike

adidas adidas

h m h

m i didn’t really say h and

m instead i just said the letter n

h n m h m

h m zara

zara our next category is electronics

can you say with me

google google

apple apple del

del make sure you have a clear l sound

with your tongue out of your mouth

dell microsoft

microsoft notice the middle vowel that’s

happening in this

word micra microsoft this is a schwa

sound it kind of sounds like a

sound microsoft microsoft

samsung samsung

amazon amazon

our next category is media youtube

the vowel is the same here you youtube

notice how my lips don’t really change

youtube

facebook facebook

don’t forget a clear f sound at the

beginning

facebook instagram

instagram tick tock

tick tock this is the same sound that a

clock makes

tick tock tick tock tick tock twitter

twitter in american english the t’s in

the middle of this word

change to a d sound listen when i say

this

twitter twitter

twitter on twitter you send a tweet

whatsapp whatsapp

this is kind of a play on words because

sometimes when we greet someone

we say what’s up what’s up

but here they’ve kind of changed this to

be clever to say

what zap because it’s an application on

your phone so that’s where the

uh expression originated from whatsapp

next we have zoom zoom which we are all

becoming more and more familiar with

this year right

skype skype skype

maybe you watch netflix netflix

or

this also has the same vowel

let’s go to our next category which is

money

visa visa

make sure that your lips vibrate when

you say this v

visa master card

master card american

express american express

sometimes you’ll see this written simply

as a e

but it stands for american express

make sure in that second word you have a

clear x sound express

express or you might pay with paypal

paypal our next category are cars

do you have a toyota i do

let’s make sure that the second t in

this word changes to a d

this is what happens in american english

often when there is a t

between two vowels let’s say it together

toyota toyota

bmw bmw

sometimes we give these cars a cute name

and call them

beamers do you have a beamer

look at that cute beamer or you might

say

mercedes mercedes

the full word is mercedes-benz but we

often just say

mercedes ford

ford audi

audi porsche

porsche notice this word has an

s-c-h but we don’t say porch

a porch is where i’m sitting right now

it’s like a deck a place on the back of

your house

or on the front of your house but make

sure for this car

we don’t say ch instead you just say

it’s a porsche

the next category are stores restaurants

hotels

all of this kind of mixed together our

first one is

mcdonald’s mcdonald’s

mcdonald’s sometimes we call this

mickey d’s i know as a kid or maybe this

is just a kid thing

sometimes kids say i want to go to

mickey d’s

i want to go to mickey d’s this is uh in

my opinion a rather unfortunate thing

that has spread from the us

around the world fast food but we all

know it

so we need to make sure we say it

correctly mcdonald’s at least

in the american style way right

kfc kfc

subway subway ikea

ikea costco

costco notice that t is often silent

sometimes we might say

costco but usually we just toss it out

costco costco fedex

fedex ups

ups hilton

hilton marriott

marriott the next category are food and

drinks so we’re going to get started

with a very common

name brand coca-cola

coca-cola we often just call this coke

i want to go to the store to buy some

coke

now this is also a word for a type of

drug

cocaine so i think that in general the

context will be pretty clear

if you are not a drug user people will

not think that you’re buying a drug

they will know that you’re gonna buy the

carbonated

sweet drink coca-cola if you say i

need to buy some coke or i’m gonna go

buy some coke or can you bring some coke

to our house for the dinner party

they’ll know that you’re talking about

coca-cola most likely

pepsi pepsi

starbucks starbucks

a long time ago my husband used to work

at starbucks

and they often joked around that it’s

actually called

five bucks bucks is a slang way to say

dollars and every drink is a little bit

at least the reputation is that it’s a

little bit overpriced

so they say that everything costs at

least five bucks

when you go in you’re gonna spend

probably five bucks which is a lot for a

cup of coffee

you can get plain coffee for less but

anyway this is kind of a silly nickname

for starbucks i’m gonna go to five bucks

nestle nestle

next we have the two most popular maybe

not the two most delicious

but the two most popular beers are

corona

a little bit ironic nowadays right i

would like to drink some

corona not the virus please

and the second one is budweiser

sometimes we just shorten this to

bud budweiser bud

our final category for the 50 most

common brand names are

beauty products the first brand name is

maybelline

maybelline gillette

gillette don’t say gillette

instead we say j gillette

colgate now this one has a true g sound

colgate colgate and the final one

is dove dove be careful with that v

sound make sure your teeth are on your

lip

dub dub congratulations on practicing

these pronunciations and also

exercising your pronunciation muscles

now i have a question for you

what brand names do you like let me know

in the comments

and also read each other’s comments to

learn more thank you

so much for learning english with me and

i’ll see you again next friday for a new

lesson

here on my youtube channel bye the next

step is to download my

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confident english speaker

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thanks so much bye