Automobile manufacturers often offer incentive programs through which they discount the price of a car to their dealers for a promotion period when the product is advertised to consumers. Such incentive programs often result in a dramatic increase in the amount of product sold by the automobile manufacturers to dealers but may hurt the manufacturers’ profitability. Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports an argument for the incentive programs?
A. The amount of discount generally offered by manufacturers to dealers is carefully calculated to represent the minimum needed to draw consumers’ attention to the product.
B. For many consumer products, the period of advertising discounted prices to consumers is about a week, which is not sufficiently long for consumers to become used to the sale price.
C. More prestigious auto makers do not use incentive programs because they dilute the company’s brand name.
D. During such a promotion, retailers tend to accumulate in their warehouses inventory bought at discount; they then sell much of it later at their regular price.
E. If a manufacturer fails to offer such promotions but its competitor offers them, that competitor will tend to attract consumers away from the manufacturer’s product.