Sales of iphones have increased dramatically over the last year. In order to take advantage of this increase, Apple plans to expand production of its own Apple store, while continuing its already very extensive advertising of its iphone product.
Which of the following, if true, provides most support for the view that Apple cannot increase its sales of phones by adopting the plan outlined?
A) Although it sells all of the phones that it produces, Apple's share of all phone sales has declined over the last year.
B) Apple's average inventory of phones awaiting shipment to retailers has declined slightly over the last year.
C) Apple has made the brand name of Apple phones widely known, but few consumers know that Apple owns this brand.
D) Apple's phone is one of three brands of phone that have together accounted for the bulk of the last year's increase in sales.
E) Despite a slight decline in the retail price and a push in advertising, sales of Apple phones have fallen in the last year.
OA: E
Please explain why the answer is E and not C?
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Tommy Wallach
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This question is gibberish. Answer choice (E) conflicts with the actual argument:
"Sales of iphones have increased dramatically over the last year."
(E) ...sales of Apple phones have fallen in the past year."
Maybe this question is trying to act as if there could be both Apple phones and Apple iphones, but given that we all know that isn't true in real life, this seems silly. ALSO, the GMAT never uses companies from real life for exactly this reason. FINALLY, even if we do assume that, knowing about Apple phones that weren't iPhones wouldn't actually weaken an argument about just iPhones, which HAVE seen increased sales.
I'd just ignore this question.
-t
"Sales of iphones have increased dramatically over the last year."
(E) ...sales of Apple phones have fallen in the past year."
Maybe this question is trying to act as if there could be both Apple phones and Apple iphones, but given that we all know that isn't true in real life, this seems silly. ALSO, the GMAT never uses companies from real life for exactly this reason. FINALLY, even if we do assume that, knowing about Apple phones that weren't iPhones wouldn't actually weaken an argument about just iPhones, which HAVE seen increased sales.
I'd just ignore this question.
-t
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shenoydevika
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Isn't this a terrible copy of an OG question? Something about telephones and Mammoth Industries?
Thanks a ton Tommy for looking into it.Tommy Wallach wrote:This question is gibberish. Answer choice (E) conflicts with the actual argument:
"Sales of iphones have increased dramatically over the last year."
(E) ...sales of Apple phones have fallen in the past year."
Maybe this question is trying to act as if there could be both Apple phones and Apple iphones, but given that we all know that isn't true in real life, this seems silly. ALSO, the GMAT never uses companies from real life for exactly this reason. FINALLY, even if we do assume that, knowing about Apple phones that weren't iPhones wouldn't actually weaken an argument about just iPhones, which HAVE seen increased sales.
I'd just ignore this question.
-t
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ceilidh.erickson
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Good memory! Here's the question you were thinking about: https://www.manhattangmat.com/forums/sal ... t4582.htmlshenoydevika wrote:Isn't this a terrible copy of an OG question? Something about telephones and Mammoth Industries?
Note that the original question makes a distinction between ALL phone sales and Mammoth's phone sales. This iphone question does not. As Tommy said, that makes it totally nonsensical.
I'd avoid studying from whatever source wrote this question.
Ceilidh Erickson
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tanviet
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there is a similar question in og. this question is typical of og question and should be studied carefully.rjain84 wrote:Sales of iphones have increased dramatically over the last year. In order to take advantage of this increase, Apple plans to expand production of its own Apple store, while continuing its already very extensive advertising of its iphone product.
Which of the following, if true, provides most support for the view that Apple cannot increase its sales of phones by adopting the plan outlined?
A) Although it sells all of the phones that it produces, Apple's share of all phone sales has declined over the last year.
B) Apple's average inventory of phones awaiting shipment to retailers has declined slightly over the last year.
C) Apple has made the brand name of Apple phones widely known, but few consumers know that Apple owns this brand.
D) Apple's phone is one of three brands of phone that have together accounted for the bulk of the last year's increase in sales.
E) Despite a slight decline in the retail price and a push in advertising, sales of Apple phones have fallen in the last year.
OA: E
Please explain why the answer is E and not C?
I will explain why you fall in love with C, the treacherous girl, which is popular on og book
in Strengthen/weaken question, we look for information whicn increases doubt/belief that the evidence causes the conclusion. the information which increase doubt/belief that the conclusion will happen disregarding the evidence is the TRAP.
a very effective way not to fall in love in this TRAP is prethinking an assumption.
prethinking an assumption helps you realize the information which strengthen/weaken the prethought assumption or other assumption (if the assumption you prethink is not the assumption , on which the strengthener/weakener is based) and so help you realize the information which increase belief/doubt that evidence causes the conclusion. you will never fall in love with the treacherous girl, choice C.
if we do not prethink an assumption, we alway want to find the information which increase the belief/doubt that the conclusion will happen. This is the goal before we go to answer choice and this goal kill us by bring us to the treacherous girl , choice C. this situation happen with most strengthening/weakening question. prethinking assumption help us reduce time a lot and increases accuracy/confidence.
pls comment, pls, thank you
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Tommy Wallach
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Hey Duong,
Hm. Not sure I quite agree with your point there. Prediction is a double-edged sword, actually. And while it's often very strong on assumption questions, it's not very strong on strengthen/weaken questions. Why? Because S/W questions are allowed to bring in new information, which means there are often an infinitude of ways the argument can be strengthened or weakened.
That being said, I do recommend trying to predict the answer. However, the rule is very clear: Whatever you predict, you still must read and consider all five answer choices. Do not predict an answer, then simply look for that answer in the answer choices, until you are at a very advanced level (I'd say verbal score above 45-46).
And finally, your bigger point here is dangerous. The way to avoid a trap answer is not to predict the answer. You have to learn to defuse traps even without knowledge of what the answer is going to be. It is bad advice to say that you shouldn't pick C because you already knew the answer was going to be something else.
Remember, I don't like this question very much. But the reason (C) is wrong is that it's irrelevant. The question is about whether Apple can increase its sales. Now, this question sucks, so of course it makes no sense that Apple could make the brand name of an Apple phone well known without people knowing that Apple owns the brand. That is ridiculous, and a good reason to ignore this stupid question. However, the fact remains that you can increase the sales of a product without people knowing who sells it. For example, Kellogg (cereal company) could advertise Cinnamon Toast Crunch really heavily, increasing sales, and it wouldn't matter at all whether people knew Kellogg made it. This is why (C) is wrong, not because it fails some kind of prediction test.
-t
Hm. Not sure I quite agree with your point there. Prediction is a double-edged sword, actually. And while it's often very strong on assumption questions, it's not very strong on strengthen/weaken questions. Why? Because S/W questions are allowed to bring in new information, which means there are often an infinitude of ways the argument can be strengthened or weakened.
That being said, I do recommend trying to predict the answer. However, the rule is very clear: Whatever you predict, you still must read and consider all five answer choices. Do not predict an answer, then simply look for that answer in the answer choices, until you are at a very advanced level (I'd say verbal score above 45-46).
And finally, your bigger point here is dangerous. The way to avoid a trap answer is not to predict the answer. You have to learn to defuse traps even without knowledge of what the answer is going to be. It is bad advice to say that you shouldn't pick C because you already knew the answer was going to be something else.
Remember, I don't like this question very much. But the reason (C) is wrong is that it's irrelevant. The question is about whether Apple can increase its sales. Now, this question sucks, so of course it makes no sense that Apple could make the brand name of an Apple phone well known without people knowing that Apple owns the brand. That is ridiculous, and a good reason to ignore this stupid question. However, the fact remains that you can increase the sales of a product without people knowing who sells it. For example, Kellogg (cereal company) could advertise Cinnamon Toast Crunch really heavily, increasing sales, and it wouldn't matter at all whether people knew Kellogg made it. This is why (C) is wrong, not because it fails some kind of prediction test.
-t
Tommy Wallach, Company Expert
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