argument65 fly away小组第二十六次作业

honeyviolaUID: 2199703

The following appeared in a memo from the president 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, the five best-selling cheeses at our newest store were all 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."

The argument concludes that the demands of imported cheeses are decreased and by limiting the inventory of imported cheeses the profits of the cheese company may be enhanced. The argument cites the phenomena in their newest store and a survey to explain why they need to discontinue stocking imported cheese. The argument suffers from several flaws, which render it unconvincing.

A threshold problem with the argument is that the newest store may be just one special example which is not applied to other chain stores. The regional differences should not be ignored. And with the increasing changes of our preference to cheese, maybe next year the domestic cheeses are not attractive as last year.  

A second problem involves the fact that the survey about the preference of domestic cheeses from magazine subscribers. The world magazine may publish all over the world and the situation is different obviously in the world. So the world preference is not equal to the country’s preference. Moreover, there is no evidence to cite the method of choosing the subscribers and whether the subscribers can deputize for other customers.

A final problem with the argument is that it asserts that decrease the stock of imported cheeses may not improve profits. The cost of stock may be higher than before because the stock of domestic cheeses increases largely. As we could not know whether the imported cheeses need to be diminished and what’s the prospect of domestic cheeses, discontinue stocking many of varieties of imported cheeses is not a wise decision.

In sum, the argument is weak on several grounds. To strengthen it the arguments’ proponent must provide clear evidence that the newest store is same as other chain store and preference change not fast. Moreover, the argument’s proponent must show that the preference in the world is also the same as the country and the method of improving profits have strong reasons.