Argument16
The following memorandum is from the business manager of Happy Pancake House restaurants.
"Butter has now been replaced by margarine in Happy Pancake House restaurants throughout the southwestern United States. Only about 2 percent of customers have complained, indicating that 98 people out of 100 are happy with the change. Furthermore, many servers have reported that a number of customers who ask for butter do not complain when they are given margarine instead. Clearly, either these customers cannot distinguish butter from margarine or they use the term 'butter' to refer to either butter or margarine. Thus, to avoid the expense of purchasing butter and to increase profitability, the Happy Pancake House should extend this cost-saving change to its restaurants in the southeast and northeast as well."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the recommendation is likely to have the predicted result. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
The manager, noting a few complaints from the customers that were offered margarine instead of butter in southwestern, attributes this result to customers' misusing of the norm or without any conception of the difference between margarine and butter, and subsequently recommends that the other Happy Pancake Houses in the southeast and northeast should follow the policy of cost-saving used in the southwestern. In order to evaluate the above standpoint objectively and precisely, we need to further answer a series of critical questions concerning the feedback from the customers, the usage habit of butter and margarine, and the other factors that might influence the profit of the restaurant.
Merely based on the some complaints from the customers, the author asserts that the dissatisfaction about changing the butter for margarine is lower than expected. However, the number of complaint may not serve as a convincing indicator, since it is quite possible that customers would either be reluctant to make a complaint, with the purpose to enjoy their meals, or never visit this restaurant again to express their dissatisfaction, instead of wasting time to make a complaint. Besides, chance is also high that the servants were so busy with serving their customers that fail to report the complaints, which makes the result of complaint groundless. Therefore, it is necessary for the manager to assign one employee to make an investigation about their customers' feeling of this change. If fewer complaint as is showed in the memo, it would be justifiable to conclude that customers do not care about this change, otherwise, the subsequent discussion of extending this new change will be rendered groundless.
Another perspective that deserves consideration in this argument is that how the people use the word to express the meaning of "butter" in the southwestern United States. In this memo, without any justification, the author certainly indicates that customers have no idea to distinguish butter from margarine or butter or used to use the butter to express the meaning of margarine or butter. It is true that this could be possible reason, but we still need more evidence to illustrate this issue. If there is any study report shows the residents are used to say butter for all the butter and margarine, then it will reinforce the conclusion of the author's recommendation. On the contrary, if any evidence shows that residents know clearly about the difference between butter and margarine, thus customers to Happy Pancake House might feel be guised, which could bring out an dissatisfaction with the restaurant, the recommendation of the manager will be open to dispute.
Granted that the change in Happy Pancake House restaurants could be feasible and effectively in southwestern, it is still unclear whether this policy would be suitable for the other branches, let alone to say profitable in the future. Its report from the manager seems impressive and lucrative on the surface, it may also be that some of the managers in the southeast restaurants are lacking the qualification to run a success business, such as limited leadership; or perhaps some of the restaurants are located in a business center, due to more competition from the other new fast-food companies, have less customers than before, thus, even if they could cut down the cost, there is still less possible to be success with this new change. Thus, only when we could answer that the other restaurants in southeast and northeast has a similar restaurants' locations, the customers' behavior, and the qualification of the managers and employees as in the southwestern, could we may say this policy take effect.
To summarize, the manager's advice is a well-intentioned attempt to enhance the profit of restaurant, but this argument suffers from several critical flaws and is therefore open to dispute.