TOPIC: ARGUMENT1 - The following appearedin a memorandum written by the vice president of Nature's Way, a chain ofstores selling health food and other health-related products.
"Previous experience has shown thatour stores are most profitable in areas where residents are highly concernedwith leading healthy lives. We should therefore build our next new store inPlainsville, which has many such residents. Plainsville merchants report thatsales of running shoes and exercise clothing are at all-time highs. The localhealth club, which nearly closed five years ago due to lack of business, hasmore members than ever, and the weight training and aerobics classes are alwaysfull. We can even anticipate a new generation of customers: Plainsville'sschoolchildren are required to participate in a 'fitness for life' program,which emphasizes the benefits of regular exercise at an early age."
WORDS: 531
TIME: 00:30:00
DATE: 2011-3-4 11:22:13
The core of demonstration in the memo aboverests on the assumption that there are many residents who are highly concernedwith leading healthy lives in Plainsville. Considering that, the author putsforward
a suggestion that Nature’s Way should buildtheir next new store in Plainsville. In order to make his assumption impregnable,the author provides
severalfacts. However, this argument turns out to be feeble
for the reason that both the main demonstration andthe verification of the assumed premise contain several logical flaws ofimmense importance.
Firstly,the facts provided by the author do not verify the assertion that the residentsin Plainsville are concerned with healthy lives. The author notes that thePlainsville merchants report that the sales of running shoes andexercise clothing are at an all-time high, and the local health club has morebusiness than ever, reporting full fitness and weight training classes.However, these facts are impotent insufficient to establish a
correlation with the residents' conditions. Theauthor pays scant attention to some other reasons of immense importance; it isentirely possible that the shoes and exercise clothing are purchased by peoplewho are not local. Besides, without details of the sales and business at thelocal health club, the author cannot
prove thatthe sales rate and business are really great. Perhaps sales were low for manyyears, and it has only experienced a tiny augmentation this year. It is thesame case for the local health club. Without providing more details, theauthor's conclusion is unverifiable. Secondly, another example concerning withschoolchildren's “fitness for life” program is provided to indicate that theyare anticipating
new generation of customers.This deduction is illogical. Participating in the program doesn't result in thefact that the students are concerned with their health. It is possible that itis the school’s policy to force
them to do so.
Ultimately, even assuming that theresidents in Plainsville are highly concerned with leading healthy lives as theauthor claims,
there is no incontrovertiblereason to assert that the stores will ultimately be profitable. The author paystoo much attention to the impact of potential consumers and ignores many other majorreasons which can also determine the profit of a company. For example, house rentsin Plainsville being unfavorably exorbitant, or tax, especially for companies producinghealth products, being much higher
than in otherregions. In addition, the author fails to provide any information about themarket conditions in Plainsville. Perhaps there is a big and leading companyproducing health products. Intensified competition would decrease
the possibilities for making profits easily.
In summary, the author's assertions onlyscratch the surface of this argument and they are
notwell supported. Without considering many details and case to case conditions,the author can not prove that a new store in Plainsville will ultimately beprofitable. If the author wants to be reliable, he must sustain the argument toprove that the three facts above have an iron-clad causal correlation withresidents’ concerning about healthy lives. Furthermore, more details are necessaryto verify that the new store will be profitable. Without this comprehensiveanalysis, the company runs the risk of financial loss. |