Gosh!! As usual, another Veritas toughie!!...Took approximately 3 min. to knock off A, B and E and another 3 min to choose between C and D...Finally narrowed down to D
...At the end of it, I just hope that the OA is indeed correct..
My insights as follows:
Kindly note the key words as highlighted...
However, the most
popular new brand of athletic footwear in the last year is
not advertised on radio and television, and positions its product as "half the price - just as good."
Find the option that brings out the
'brand's popularity quotient' inspite of an absence of advertising efforts put in by the new brand. Also, NOTE that just because no there are no advertisements on radio/ TV, need not mean that there is no media exposure. With these thoughts in mind, attack the options
The new brand of footwear is constructed along the same lines as the products made by more expensive brands. ...so what?? Expensive need not imply popularity. Stimulus just indicates introduction of expensive and sophisticated products No mention of popularity..KILL
The new footwear brand has several celebrity spokespeople who are not athletes. ..Celebrity spokespeople who are not athletes-->again celebrity people need not be the reason for the popularity of the brand...quite likely that these celebrities are one of those belonging to a genre very less known and hence providing no link to the popularity factor
Most of the new brand's customers have come from personal recommendations. ..Actually this intensifies the paradox further. If most of the consumers have come from personal recommendations, how can it be popular?? '
Popular' implies that the brand is well known across a wide public spectrum...In order to sell popular products, personal recommendations would be least necessary...
The company's novel marketing approach has been repeatedly covered on several popular news shows. ...Catch your bait!!
This is it!!! Mind you, this option is very much compatible with the stimulus that says that there is no advertising of the product...The company's novel marketing approach being covered on TV is different from the product itself being advertised over television. Also, as this is covered on SEVERAL POPULAR news shows...this proves that the brand is at least well-known amongst the public at large. This option indeed covers the two key factors in the last sentence
popularity without advertisementLast year, the new footwear brand had sales that were less than half of the sales of the leading brand in the field....Guess, no need to explain this one.