The following appeared in a memorandum from the owner of Movies Galore, a chain of video rental stores.
“In order to reverse the recent decline in our profits, we must reduce operating expenses at Movies Galore’s ten video rental stores. Since we are famous for our special bargains, raising our rental prices is not a viable way to improve profits. Last month our store in downtown Marston significantly decreased its operating expenses by closing at 6:00 P.M. rather than 9:00 P.M. and by reducing its stock by eliminating all movies released more than five years ago. Therefore, in order to increase profits without jeopardizing our reputation for offering great movies at low prices, we recommend implementing similar changes in our other nine Movies Galore stores.”
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be addressed in order to decide whether implementing the recommendation is likely to have the predicted result and explain how the answers to those questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
It might seem logical, at first glance, that the owner's claim on the best way of increasing their profit is to decrease the store's operating expenses seem logical. However, if the owner's argument is carefully contemplated, there are some fundamental weaknesses with the owner's reasoning and assumptions making his claim fallacious. In what follows, I will aptly delve into those flaws, and try to see the subject more minutely.
First of all, the owner assumed that there are two options that they can utilize to increase their profit- increasing rental prices and decreasing stores' operating costs. However, if we accept that since Movies Galore's reputation is due to their low rental prices and increasing prices would not be a good idea, the owner's assumption that the best way to increase profit is decreasing operating costs is faulty. It seems that there are more and better ways to increase profit without decreasing stores' operating costs. For instance, they may easily increase their profits by having more and interesting advertisements on billboards and TV commercials, or they can close some of their stores that are not profitable. Hence, the owner's assumption that the best way of increasing profit is decreasing operating expenses does not seem logical and acceptable without proofing is claim and further analyzing alternatives.
Secondly, according to the owner, Marston has decreased its operating expenses by closing the store earlier and eliminating some movies; but it is not argued that if it has increased the profit or not. We don't know if this method concluded increasing the profit over the last month or not. Moreover, by utilizing this method, he has observed that the operating expenses are reduced during the last month, and it is only measured for one month. So, how can we expand this to the other months? Obviously, one month is not enough to argue that closing the store earlier and eliminating some movies will also have the same results in the following months. Hence, even if we accept that the best way to increase profit is decreasing operating expenses, the owner's assumptions the Marston method is useful and advantageous both in the following months and increasing profits.
Last but not least, in the case that we accept the owner's claim that the Marston method is useful and will decrease operating expenses for the long term and will increase the store's profit, his arguments still as some serious weaknesses. By doing exploiting the same methodology, we get similar results in other stores. However, there are no logics provided supporting the author's position. Therefore, this method may or may not be useful in other stores. For example, assume that one of the store's costumers mostly rent videos between 6 and 9 P.M. as a result of which this method would conclude to decreasing the profit. It is possible that in another neighborhood, people are mostly a fan of movies that are released more than five years ago, so how eliminating those movies is the optimal idea for that store? I believe that the owner must come up with different ideas and solutions for different stores in order to increase profit in all of them.
To recapitulate, despite the argument suffers from several problems and is unconvincing, but we cannot absolutely rely on it or refuse it without perusing any additional assumptions and reasoning. The author can strengthen his assertion by changing states referred to as the mentioned solutions. Without these changes, the argument is implausible, and the reasoning is faulty.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 24 15
No. of Words: 583 350
No. of Characters: 2914 1500
No. of Different Words: 249 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.914 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.998 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.636 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 224 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 160 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 111 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 75 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.292 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.28 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.75 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.309 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.512 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.161 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 181, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'owners'' or 'owner's'?
Suggestion: owners'; owner's
... expenses seem logical. However, if the owners argument is carefully contemplated, the...
^^^^^^
Line 1, column 271, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'owners'' or 'owner's'?
Suggestion: owners'; owner's
...re some fundamental weaknesses with the owners reasoning and assumptions making his cl...
^^^^^^
Line 7, column 317, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'owners'' or 'owner's'?
Suggestion: owners'; owner's
...ng prices would not be a good idea, the owners assumption that the best way to increas...
^^^^^^
Line 7, column 728, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'owners'' or 'owner's'?
Suggestion: owners'; owner's
...res that are not profitable. Hence, the owners assumption that the best way of increas...
^^^^^^
Line 11, column 206, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
... it has increased the profit or not. We dont know if this method concluded increasin...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, hence, however, if, may, moreover, second, secondly, so, still, then, therefore, for example, for instance, as a result, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 28.0 19.6327345309 143% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 16.0 12.9520958084 124% => OK
Conjunction : 29.0 11.1786427146 259% => Less conjunction wanted
Relative clauses : 20.0 13.6137724551 147% => OK
Pronoun: 58.0 28.8173652695 201% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 54.0 55.5748502994 97% => OK
Nominalization: 9.0 16.3942115768 55% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2991.0 2260.96107784 132% => OK
No of words: 582.0 441.139720559 132% => OK
Chars per words: 5.13917525773 5.12650576532 100% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.91168771031 4.56307096286 108% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.71325210576 2.78398813304 97% => OK
Unique words: 259.0 204.123752495 127% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.445017182131 0.468620217663 95% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 926.1 705.55239521 131% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 12.0 4.96107784431 242% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 6.0 8.76447105788 68% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 6.0 1.67365269461 358% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 9.0 4.22255489022 213% => Less preposition wanted as sentence beginnings.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 24.0 19.7664670659 121% => OK
Sentence length: 24.0 22.8473053892 105% => OK
Sentence length SD: 56.9325715942 57.8364921388 98% => OK
Chars per sentence: 124.625 119.503703932 104% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.25 23.324526521 104% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.29166666667 5.70786347227 110% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 5.0 5.25449101796 95% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 17.0 8.20758483034 207% => Less positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 6.88822355289 73% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.67664670659 43% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.162795399387 0.218282227539 75% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0502986750541 0.0743258471296 68% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.036222469413 0.0701772020484 52% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.088827778209 0.128457276422 69% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0347282219342 0.0628817314937 55% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.9 14.3799401198 104% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 47.12 48.3550499002 97% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.7 12.197005988 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.83 12.5979740519 102% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.06 8.32208582834 97% => OK
difficult_words: 119.0 98.500998004 121% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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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.