Argument65 *自由女神小组*第十九次作业

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Argument65 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."


In the memo, the president in a chain of cheese stores in the United States claims that the best way to improve profits is to discontinue stocking many various of imported cheeses and mainly concentrate on domestic cheeses, based on a survey, the sales of cheeses at their newest store and the decrease of stock expenses. However, the speaker's assertion is very specious for several grounds.

First, the speaker asserts that the five best-selling cheeses were all domestic Cheddar cheeses from Wisconsin at their newest store Last year. But the president does not mention other stores' cheese sales in their chain, perhaps it was only the newest store that sold out most domestic cheeses, but other stores sold out larger number of imported cheeses. What's more, can the Cheddar cheeses be representative of average domestic cheeses? As we all know, there are a wide variety of domestic cheeses, if consumers did not often buy other kind of domestic cheeses, it can not prove the domestic cheeses will be popular. Meanwhile, from the memo, at the top five best-selling, the Chedder cheeses come from only one company, Wisconsin. This may demonstrate that people choose domestic cheddar cheeses because of the products of Wisconsin, if Wisconsin's cheeses are different form other domestic companies, people may not buy domestic cheeses except Wisconsin's, so the imported cheeses are dominant in their chain. Furthermore, the sales of cheeses were last year, even though the sales of the newest stores can stand for of the whole stores in the chain and the cheeses from Wisconsin are representative of national domestic cheeses, the market has always been changing, consumers are very likely to turn to imported cheeses rather than domestic ones this year.

Secondly, the recent survey by Cheeses of the World magazine was unconvincing. We do not know whether most or all these subscribers come from the United States. It is very likely that these subscribers are come from different countries, and Americans just occupy a little part. In this situation, the survey was meaningless since the chain located in the United States, unless subscribers from other nations have the same trend for choosing cheeses. In addition, how many people subscribed this magazine, perhaps there was only one percent of the whole cheese consumers or even less. If so, the result of this survey was questionable. Furthermore, assume that the respondents can be the representative of average American cheese consumers, an increasing preference for domestic cheese can prove nothing. It is just a trend, perhaps they did not frequently buy domestic cheeses before, and gradually they began to buy domestic cheeses, however consumers still buy imported cheeses as the main cheeses

Finally, the president claims that they should discontinue stocking varieties of imported cheese in that limiting inventory can reduce expenses. Assume that consumers buy domestic cheeses more than imported cheese, but it is not equal that people do not buy imported cheese, if the revenue from selling imported cheese more than the inventory expenses, it still need stock imported cheese to get profit.

To sum up, that the Chain should concentrate primarily on domestic cheeses rather than imported cheeses maybe not the best way to get profit. Neither the survey nor the sales of the newest store can be convincing.