The following appeared in a memo from the owner of a chain of cheese stores located throughout the United States.
"For many years all the stores in our chain have stocked a wide variety of both domestic and imported cheeses. Last year, however, all of the five best-selling cheeses at our newest store were domestic cheddar cheeses from Wisconsin. Furthermore, a recent survey by Cheeses of the World magazine indicates an increasing preference for domestic cheeses among its subscribers. Since our company can reduce expenses by limiting inventory, the best way to improve profits in all of our stores is to discontinue stocking many of our varieties of imported cheese and concentrate primarily on domestic cheeses."
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
The memo from the owner states that the chain of cheese stores all across the United states sold a variety of domestic as well as imported cheese. The memo concluded by saying that the most effective way cut the inventory cost is by discontinuing a variety of imported cheese and focus on domestic cheeses. because in most of the chain's newer stores, the best selling cheeses were the domestic ones and also a survey by Cheeses of the world magazine supported this claim. But the conclusion is flawed due to three evidences that can be found in the text.
First of all, it is stated that in the chain's "newer stores", the best selling cheeses were the domestic ones. Clearly, it cannot be determined whether the performance of the newer stores can be compared to the older stores. For instance, what if the states in which the newer stores were opened preferred domestic cheeses over the imported ones. That is, we cannot tell that due to increase in the sales of domestic cheddar cheese in the 5 newly opened stores in Washington can be compared to the numerous other stores opened in other states like New Jersey and Florida. Also, it is possible that the number of older stores are far higher than the number of newer stores opened. It is possible that the chain already has 10 stores and only 2 new stores were opened. Such a small number cannot determine the sales of other stores. Thus, this evidence weakens the owner's conclusion.
Secondly, according to the review conducted by the Cheeses of the World magazine, domestic cheese is preferred over imported cheese by their "subscribers". It has to be noted that the subscribers does not account for all the people that buy cheese from the chain's stores or just consume cheese in general. For example, it is possible that only 1% of the people who are subscribers of the World magazine actually buy cheese from the chain's stores. Therefore, the stores cater to over 10,000 people in a year, the survey only accounts for 100 of them, which is not a considerable amount. Thus, it is not wise for the chain to stop selling imported cheese only because a significantly small amount of their customers prefer domestic cheese over the imported ones. Therefore, this evidence further deteriorates the author's conclusion.
Finally, it is state that the "top five" selling cheeses in the newer stores are the domestic cheeses from Wisconsin. Being out of the top 5 can still be a very big number. Consider that what if in the top 20 cheeses sold in these stores, only the top five are domestic, and all the other 15 are imported. The chain's revenue will significantly drop if they discontinue selling some imported cheese. As a result, the owner's claim is seriously flawed.
The owner's decision of discontinuing stocking of a variety of imported cheese is a flawed decision as it is based on a series of unjustified assumptions. If the owner wants to go through with the decision, he should conduct a much more elaborate study that can answer the above mentioned three flaws and therefore, justify his action.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 24 15
No. of Words: 530 350
No. of Characters: 2478 1500
No. of Different Words: 205 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.798 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.675 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.454 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 191 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 120 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 77 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 36 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.083 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.642 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.792 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.34 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.525 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.138 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 308, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Because
...d cheese and focus on domestic cheeses. because in most of the chains newer stores, the...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 874, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'owners'' or 'owner's'?
Suggestion: owners'; owner's
...stores. Thus, this evidence weakens the owners conclusion. Secondly, according to...
^^^^^^
Line 9, column 372, Rule ID: WHO_NOUN[1]
Message: A noun should not follow "who". Try changing to a verb or maybe to 'who is a are'.
Suggestion: who is a are
... is possible that only 1% of the people who are subscribers of the World magazine actua...
^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 822, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
... this evidence further deteriorates the authors conclusion. Finally, it is state t...
^^^^^^^
Line 13, column 321, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'chains'' or 'chain's'?
Suggestion: chains'; chain's
... and all the other 15 are imported. The chains revenue will significantly drop if they...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, finally, first, if, second, secondly, so, still, therefore, thus, well, as to, for example, for instance, in general, as a result, as well as, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 30.0 19.6327345309 153% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 12.9520958084 77% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 11.1786427146 72% => OK
Relative clauses : 17.0 13.6137724551 125% => OK
Pronoun: 34.0 28.8173652695 118% => OK
Preposition: 63.0 55.5748502994 113% => OK
Nominalization: 4.0 16.3942115768 24% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2577.0 2260.96107784 114% => OK
No of words: 530.0 441.139720559 120% => OK
Chars per words: 4.86226415094 5.12650576532 95% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.79809637944 4.56307096286 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.68582834621 2.78398813304 96% => OK
Unique words: 217.0 204.123752495 106% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.409433962264 0.468620217663 87% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 804.6 705.55239521 114% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 13.0 4.96107784431 262% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 25.0 19.7664670659 126% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 44.636953301 57.8364921388 77% => OK
Chars per sentence: 103.08 119.503703932 86% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.2 23.324526521 91% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.04 5.70786347227 123% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 5.0 5.25449101796 95% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 8.20758483034 122% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 6.88822355289 58% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 11.0 4.67664670659 235% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.325539148421 0.218282227539 149% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.099351719307 0.0743258471296 134% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.080261484086 0.0701772020484 114% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.188564708656 0.128457276422 147% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0720684271975 0.0628817314937 115% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.1 14.3799401198 84% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 58.62 48.3550499002 121% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 12.197005988 84% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.91 12.5979740519 87% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.63 8.32208582834 92% => OK
difficult_words: 99.0 98.500998004 101% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.