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marmalade and radicchio

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marmalade and radicchio

by nikhilsrl » Wed Mar 16, 2011 1:49 am
A vendor at a farmers' market wishes to increase sales of her organic radicchio. A 5-for-the-price-of-4 sale was successful in increasing sales of her organic peach marmalade, so the vendor decides to offer the same deal on the radicchio.

Which of the following is an assumption on which her plan depends?

a. Consumers enjoy radicchio as much as they enjoy peach marmalade

b. Consumers who are willing to purchase large quantities of marmalade, which has a shelf life of one year, will be similarly willing to purchase large quantities of radicchio, which has a shelf life of 5-10 days.

c. Radicchio is currently in season.

d. Due to the secret recipe used for the vendor's peach marmalade, the vendor has fewer competitors selling a comparable peach marmalade at the farmers' market than selling radicchio.

e. The profit from selling 5 bunches of radicchio for the price of 4 will be greater than the profit from selling 5 jars of peach marmalade for the price of 4.

OA is B but why not A.
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by bubbliiiiiiii » Wed Mar 16, 2011 2:51 am
IMO A.

Though given B as the answer .. I am not able to justify it.

I feel A is better than B. In A, the word enjoy is broad and considers all the aspects of buyers who consider buying the product. However, B focusses only on the shell life which, I agree to be among the many factors for purchasing the product, is very specific about needs of a consumer.

Looking forward for opinion.
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by aspirant2011 » Wed Mar 16, 2011 9:56 am
In B nothing is mentioned about the shelf life in the argument.............i dont know how OA can be B :-(
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by force5 » Wed Mar 16, 2011 11:46 am
A vendor at a farmers' market wishes to increase sales of her organic radicchio. A 5-for-the-price-of-4 sale was successful in increasing sales of her organic peach marmalade, so the vendor decides to offer the same deal on the radicchio.

Which of the following is an assumption on which her plan depends?
the conclusion is- offering the 5 for 4 deal will increase the sale of organic radicchio.

choices

a. Consumers enjoy radicchio as much as they enjoy peach marmalade (its ok)

b. Consumers who are willing to purchase large quantities of marmalade, which has a shelf life of one year, will be similarly willing to purchase large quantities of radicchio, which has a shelf life of 5-10 days. ( its ok)

c. Radicchio is currently in season. ( O scope)

d. Due to the secret recipe used for the vendor's peach marmalade, the vendor has fewer competitors selling a comparable peach marmalade at the farmers' market than selling radicchio. ( o scope)

e. The profit from selling 5 bunches of radicchio for the price of 4 will be greater than the profit from selling 5 jars of peach marmalade for the price of 4. ( o scope)

now comparing A and B

The premise is
A vendor at a farmers' market wishes to increase sales of her organic radicchio.
A 5-for-the-price-of-4 sale was successful in increasing sales of her organic peach marmalade,

Its not about how enjoyable the sale is. Its about whether customers will buy and the plan will succeed or not. For example i might like eating fresh banana's but i wont buy a bag full of banana's even at low price because i know that the shelf life of the fruit is small.

This is also known as establishing the feasibility of the premise.
Hence The clear choice becomes B

i hope that helps.
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by David@VeritasPrep » Wed Mar 16, 2011 4:57 pm
An assumption is something that is required by the argument.

Choice A is not required by the argument. Look at choice A, "Consumers enjoy radicchio as much as they enjoy peach marmalade" - this is more than what is required!!

Do consumers really have to enjoy radicchio AS MUCH AS they enjoy peach marmalade? Can they not have peach marmalade as their number 1 food and radicchio as a close number 2?

Do you see that this is not a good assumption because it is too strong? If I am trying to prove that some human being can run a 4 minute mile I do not need to prove that every one can do this. Only that one person can.

For this question Choice B is a better answer. "Consumers who are willing to purchase large quantities of marmalade, which has a shelf life of one year, will be similarly willing to purchase large quantities of radicchio, which has a shelf life of 5-10 days. " You see if this is not true, if in fact consumers are NOT willing to purchase quantities of radicchio than the 4 for 5 sale will not work. So this is more of a required assumption.

I will say that this is not perfect and that Choice B could be worded a bit better. For example, is 5 a lot of radicchio?
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by manish.jaipatna » Tue Mar 29, 2011 6:05 pm
David@VeritasPrep wrote:An assumption is something that is required by the argument.

Choice A is not required by the argument. Look at choice A, "Consumers enjoy radicchio as much as they enjoy peach marmalade" - this is more than what is required!!

Do consumers really have to enjoy radicchio AS MUCH AS they enjoy peach marmalade? Can they not have peach marmalade as their number 1 food and radicchio as a close number 2?

Do you see that this is not a good assumption because it is too strong? If I am trying to prove that some human being can run a 4 minute mile I do not need to prove that every one can do this. Only that one person can.

For this question Choice B is a better answer. "Consumers who are willing to purchase large quantities of marmalade, which has a shelf life of one year, will be similarly willing to purchase large quantities of radicchio, which has a shelf life of 5-10 days. " You see if this is not true, if in fact consumers are NOT willing to purchase quantities of radicchio than the 4 for 5 sale will not work. So this is more of a required assumption.

I will say that this is not perfect and that Choice B could be worded a bit better. For example, is 5 a lot of radicchio?

Hi David,

I am still not satisfied with answer B. Why can't it be A. In B , there is a huge difference between shelf life of marmalade(1 year) and radicchio(5-10 days). So why would someone buy it if they don't like it. Take an example, if a person don't like curd will he/she buy it if there is an offer although curd has a shelf life of one month. I feel A is better choice.
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by singh181 » Tue Mar 29, 2011 8:05 pm
manish.jaipatna wrote: Hi David,

I am still not satisfied with answer B. Why can't it be A. In B , there is a huge difference between shelf life of marmalade(1 year) and radicchio(5-10 days). So why would someone buy it if they don't like it. Take an example, if a person don't like curd will he/she buy it if there is an offer although curd has a shelf life of one month. I feel A is better choice.
Option A does not says that people dont like radiocchio. It says they like radicchio as much as they like marmalade. Option A is out scope because we are not interested in what people like. Our assumption in this question is if something works for marmalade, it will work for radiocchio as well. (b) brings out a dissimilarity between the products.
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by David@VeritasPrep » Wed Mar 30, 2011 4:16 pm
Singh181 is right...

As I said above, this is an assumption question and answer choice A is not required It might be nice to know that the "Consumers enjoy radicchio as much as they enjoy peach marmalade."

But this is not a requirement of the argument.

Look at choice B - it literally says it there, "Consumers would be willing to purchase large quantities of radicchio" that is the assumption. Right? What if we take the opposite? What if consumers are not willing to purchase large quantities of radicchio? The plan falls apart!

So B is the one...
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by cindybrown » Thu Mar 31, 2011 12:24 am
good expl force5
thanks David for confirming
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by 007.r.mason » Thu Mar 31, 2011 9:31 pm
If we are trying to find which one is the best then B probably is the best, but I am not sure it qualifies as an assumption. An assumption, by definition is supposed to be true for the argument to hold true. I don't believe that the B needs to be true. Here is why.

1. B assumes that the people who buy the deal now (i.e. radicchio) are the same people who bought the deal earlier (i.e. marmalade). I am not sure if the argument mandates that (read how the choice starts.. Consumers who..)

2. how do I know that 5 radicchio is a lot and that consumers would need to preserve it. Is this common knowledge. Why does radicchio have to be on the shelf. why cant the consumers freeze it if they are getting a smoking deal on it.

Again, my point is that these choices have layers of assumptions over them and they dont have to be true for the conclusion to hold true. I would also like to point out one more thing; the conclusion in the argument is just "sales increase" and not "similar sales increase". So any increase in sales (even if some consumers buy it) will satisfy the conclusion.
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by jaymw » Fri Apr 01, 2011 7:01 am
What's the source of this?
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by nikhilsrl » Sat Apr 02, 2011 9:02 am
jaymw wrote:What's the source of this?
Source is MGMAT - one of the CATs.
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by tapdoanhp » Wed Dec 14, 2011 6:55 am
I am still not convinced with the expl since consumer bases of the two products may be different. The premise says that Consumers who are willing to purchase large quantities of marmaladeare also willing to buy radicchio in large quantity. But what about other consumers who are not willing to buy marmalade but ready to buy radicchio in large quantity? If they purchase a lot of radicchio, the plan will succeed without assuming B.
Hence, B is still is not a good choice... Am I right?
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by bharti.2010 » Wed Dec 14, 2011 7:58 am
IMO: B is the correct answer.

Explanation: Vendor want to increase sale of radicchio. To increase sale he need to sell more quantity of radicchio.
Premise: A 5-for-the-price-of-4 sale was successful in increasing sales of her organic peach marmalade.
Conclusion: the vendor decides to offer the same deal on the radicchio.

Assumption: As the deal of 5-for-the-price-of-4 sale was successful in increasing sales of her organic peach, same will be true for radicchio. Or customer will buy the same quantity of radicchio as they did for peach.

Only option B meets this assumption.
Option A is just saying that "Consumers enjoy radicchio as much as they enjoy peach marmalade". It doesn't say anything about selling same quantities of both. In absence of B, I would have chosen A. B is the better option than A.
In absence of B
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by tuanquang269 » Wed Dec 14, 2011 8:27 am
A vendor at a farmers' market wishes to increase sales of her organic radicchio. A 5-for-the-price-of-4 sale was successful in increasing sales of her organic peach marmalade, so the vendor decides to offer the same deal on the radicchio.

Which of the following is an assumption on which her plan depends?

Choice A is unnecessary. I will try to negate A and B

a. Consumers do not enjoy radicchio as much as they enjoy peach marmalade => what happens then? The argument does not make any correlation between interests and sales. So, this choice is incorrect.

b. Consumers who are willing to purchase large quantities of marmalade, which has a shelf life of one year, will NOT be similarly willing to purchase large quantities of radicchio, which has a shelf life of 5-10 days. => this choice shows clearer that the customers only want to buy small quantity of radicchio. So, the plan of vendor is collapsed.
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