The following appeared in a memo to the board of directors of Bargain Brand Cereals.
"One year ago we introduced our first product, Bargain Brand breakfast cereal. Our very low prices quickly drew many customers away from the top-selling cereal companies. Although the companies producing the top brands have since tried to compete with us by lowering their prices and although several plan to introduce their own budget brands, not once have we needed to raise our prices to continue making a profit. Given our success in selling cereal, we recommend that Bargain Brand now expand its business and begin marketing other low-priced food products as quickly as possible."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The directors of bargain brand cereals recommend that bargain brand now expand its business and begin marketing other low-priced food products as quickly as possible because the first product, bargain brand breakfast cereal, brought success to the company due to its low price. The memo seems plausible at the moment, there are several logical fallacies that the directors misconstrued.
First, the directors neglect the possibility of situation changing during those years. there could be economical crisis on the previous year, so the people wanted to retrench their expenses. As a result, the purchase of bargain brand breakfast cereal have increased. However, as a year passes, the situation get ameliorated and people may return to their favorites. The directors should examine closely whether anything have changed measuring against the previous year.
Also, the directors didn’t mention an accurate number of price, increasing rate of the customers and the number of customers. The directors indicated that “very low” prices “quickly” drew “many” customers away from the top-selling cereal companies. There is no information about how low the cost is and how many customers changed sides. For instance, 1000 customers would be many, but comparing to entire population of the nation, for example a million, it is very small proportion. To validate the recommendation, the directors should validate those numbers precisely.
Furthermore, the directors didn’t explain whether the continued making profit was increasing or decreasing at the moment. The profit could be still on the side of plus on an entire year, but its quantity could be decreasing, from $100 million per month to $1 million per month. It would unwise to decide to expand the business even though the profit is continuously provided if it is decreasing. The directors should draw appropriate explanation whether the profit is increasing, not shortly but continuously.
Finally, the directors has unwarranted assumption that the success of the selling is due to its low price. There could be other reasons why the bargain brand breakfast cereal was so successful. It could be due to its advertisement, as very popular pop star introduced it as one’s daily meal, or its nutrition is better comparing to other competing companies. In order to make a conclusion considerable, the directors should make the assumption warranted by examining whether there are other reasons why it achieved such success.
In conclusion, the directors should verify and explain precisely several assumptions and data mentioned above.
Comments
e-rater score 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: 20 15
No. of Words: 403 350
No. of Characters: 2121 1500
No. of Different Words: 198 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.48 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.263 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.785 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 171 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 134 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 91 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 73 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 20.15 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.611 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.65 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.328 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.583 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.083 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 6 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 88, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: There
... situation changing during those years. there could be economical crisis on the previ...
^^^^^
Line 3, column 103, Rule ID: ECONOMICAL_ECONOMIC[1]
Message: Did you mean 'economic' (=connected with economy)?
Suggestion: economic
...ging during those years. there could be economical crisis on the previous year, so the peo...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 254, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...decreasing, from 00 million per month to million per month. It would unwise to de...
^^
Line 7, column 256, Rule ID: NODT_DOZEN[1]
Message: Use simply: 'a million'.
Suggestion: a million
...creasing, from 00 million per month to million per month. It would unwise to decide to...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, finally, first, furthermore, however, if, may, so, still, for example, for instance, in conclusion, as a result
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 18.0 19.6327345309 92% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 12.9520958084 100% => OK
Conjunction : 11.0 11.1786427146 98% => OK
Relative clauses : 4.0 13.6137724551 29% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 20.0 28.8173652695 69% => OK
Preposition: 36.0 55.5748502994 65% => OK
Nominalization: 13.0 16.3942115768 79% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2210.0 2260.96107784 98% => OK
No of words: 400.0 441.139720559 91% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.525 5.12650576532 108% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.472135955 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.91451110823 2.78398813304 105% => OK
Unique words: 210.0 204.123752495 103% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.525 0.468620217663 112% => OK
syllable_count: 657.9 705.55239521 93% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 4.96107784431 60% => OK
Article: 15.0 8.76447105788 171% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 19.7664670659 106% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 22.8473053892 83% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 43.1105734356 57.8364921388 75% => OK
Chars per sentence: 105.238095238 119.503703932 88% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.0476190476 23.324526521 82% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.80952380952 5.70786347227 102% => OK
Paragraphs: 6.0 5.15768463074 116% => OK
Language errors: 4.0 5.25449101796 76% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 13.0 8.20758483034 158% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 3.0 6.88822355289 44% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 5.0 4.67664670659 107% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.336739369142 0.218282227539 154% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0934019309339 0.0743258471296 126% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.123149898305 0.0701772020484 175% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.162431367629 0.128457276422 126% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.124974954861 0.0628817314937 199% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.1 14.3799401198 98% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 52.19 48.3550499002 108% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 12.197005988 88% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.79 12.5979740519 117% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.84 8.32208582834 106% => OK
difficult_words: 108.0 98.500998004 110% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 12.3882235529 85% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 11.1389221557 86% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6
---------------------
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.