GMAT Essays (AWA)

The following appeared in a memorandum written by the assistant manager of a store that sells gourmet food items from various countries:

"A local wine store made an interesting discovery last month: it sold more French than Italian wine on days when it played recordings of French accordion music, but it sold more Italian than French wine on days when Italian songs were played. Therefore, I recommend that we put food specialties from one particular country on sale for a week at a time and play only music from that country while the sale is going on. By this means we will increase our profits in the same way that the wine store did, and we will be able to predict more precisely what items we should stock at any given time."

Discuss how well reasoned you find this argument. In your discussion, be sure to analyze the line of reasoning and the use of evidence in the argument. For example, you may need to consider what questionable assumptions underlie the thinking and what alternative explanations or counterexamples might weaken the conclusion. You can also discuss what sort of evidence would strengthen or refute the argument, what changes in the argument would make it more logically sound, and what, if anything, would help you better evaluate its conclusion. (used with permission from mba.com)

The argument by the assistant manager of store that sells gourmet food items from various countries is completely unreasonable. He considers the case of A local wine store and implies that he can follow the same approach of playing songs of the country while serving food specialties from the same particular country and reap profits out of the same. The argument cannot be taken as is for the following reasons.

The manager picks a specific store performance for only one month i.e., last month. Now it is not mandatory that the one month performance of the wine store can be generalized and also what applies for one store need not for other. You cannot decide a food store scenario from a wine store case study. For instance, If we observe the reason behind the financial success of bar that arranges flickering lights that operate as per the background music, can we follow the same for a food store or a supermarket. The customers may leave instead either because they experience strain to their vision or because they cannot see a label or price on an item properly .

One aspect is the wine store sold more French than Italian wine on days when it played recordings of French accordion music and vice-versa. In other-words manager wants to say that songs encouraged the country people to have it more. We have no reason to assume the same since it may be a case that the customers who came to drink french/Italian wine may have requested the store people to play their country music. In that case manager cannot assume that this strategy will help food court to get better at profits and other aspects.

Manager recommends that store keeps food specialties from one particular country on sale for a week at a time and play only music from that country while the sale is going on. If the store puts food specialties from one country on sale, then the customers who buy the items regarding other country may leave since they need food as per their requirement anyway. Moreover, this sale will also affect customers who buy mixed food specialties of more than one country. Many working people coming to shopping in a hurry to buy something and may or may not pay attention to music getting played. So manager cannot assure the success he predicted earlier.

The manager makes an abrupt plan to increase our profits in the same way that the wine store did and expects that he can predict more precisely what items store should stock at any given time. Since there is no info whether wine store reaped profits because of the music strategy or last month success is a just a coincidence of a parties by few rich people, we cannot be assured of profits. Also it is not certain what makes the manager think that he can predict what items are to be stocked rather he may have depend on the available stock to decide on the outcome in reverse.

For the above reason, the argument is a completely unreasonable with existing evidences. It may become more reasonable if it is supported by additional information and evaluated again. The best outcome can be expected when he compares a reasonable case study of a food store and applies relevant informatio.

Hi Meera.

This essay seems better than I recall your last essay being. You made some good points and the structure is ok.

At the same time, I am craving better organization and flow, of the entire essay and within paragraphs or even within sentences. At times you seem to be just writing a stream of consciousness, in which one idea follows another without that much coherence.

For instance, in the second paragraph you start off saying that "The manager picks a specific store performance for only one month i.e., last month." In the next sentence you begin by continuing to talk about that short one month time frame, but by the end of the sentence you are already talking about something else, the differences in store types. The paragraph continues to talk about store types only to then jump into a comparison between a bar and the food store.

While the paragraph does succeed in making a couple of points, I really wish that you had made the reason why a month is not long enough clearer and that you had used a food store versus wine store example rather than jumping to using a bar as an example.

The next paragraph starts off with the words, "One aspect". What that one aspect is of is not made clear. While there is some organization to your paragraphs, and while you did make some decent points, generally I think you need to take the time to make things more clear, and you would be better off making things clear and talking about fewer things, than talking about many things without making them clear. By reducing the number of things that you mention, you may also make figuring out what to say about them easier for yourself.

Often the best AWA essays include only a few ideas, even one per paragraph. A tight paragraph discussing one idea and making something clear is probably better than a paragraph that discusses two or three ideas without saying much about any of them.

The concluding paragraph is possibly the best one. Notice the following. In the first sentence of the last paragraph you made an assertion. The second sentence develops the discussion about that assertion. The third sentence further adds to the discussion of that same assertion and wraps things up.

I think that you need to make all of your paragraphs more like that last one, more focused and organized in a way that flows and develops one idea, or maybe two ideas, more coherently.

You might try working on your essays on an untimed basis, getting accustomed to developing simple outlines of how you will coherently discuss a few ideas and then wrap up. Also, there are some good AWA templates around. If you have not looked at them I suggest you do. I think that you will find that the best essays discuss just a few ideas rather coherently, fairly thoroughly and in well organized ways.