Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers swit

Question

Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands. Yet the manufacturers have been spending an amount equal to 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines. It follows from these figures that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay, and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising.

Of the following, the best criticism of the conclusion that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay is that the conclusion is based on

(A) computing advertising costs as a percentage of gross receipts, not of overall costs
(B) past patterns of smoking and may not carry over to the future
(C) the assumption that each smoker is loyal to a single brand of cigarettes at any one time
(D) the assumption that each manufacturer produces only one brand of cigarettes
(E) figures for the cigarette industry as a whole and may not hold for a particular company

TWIN QUESTION: surveys-show-that-every-year-only-10-percent-of-cigarette-smokers-swit-283639.html

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Official Answer

E

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mymba99 · Accepted Answer

Paraphrasing the argument: 
Inspite of spending large amounts of money, only 10% switched brands. (in the entire industry)
So, why to spend so much money when you see only 10% results?

Sounds reasonable. But there is a problem.

Lets say the entire smoking industry consists of 2 companies A and B with 50 customers each.
And each company spends money to make customers switch the brand. 
So total industry smokers = 100.

After 1 year, lets say 10 smokers from A switched to B. 
So, A = 40, B = 60. So we can say in the entire industry, 10 % swithced the brand.
 BUT , lets see what B's CEO thinks. TO him, the increase is 20%. ( last year = 50, this year = 60, percentage of increase = 20).
And if you tell him   "why to spend so much money when you see only 10% results?"   he will not accept it.Because he is seeing good results.
But at the same time, A's CEO may accept the above statement.

So now, the fact(10% swithched brands) which is true to the entire industry is  NOT  true to the company B. (due to +ve change)

And thats exactly what option E is saying.
nice question. +1 to you.

KarishmaB · Answer

Check its detailed video solution here: https://youtu.be/3s0tWn3tiT8?feature=shared - every year only 10 percent of smokers switch brands. - manufacturers spend 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines. Conclusion: Inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay, and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising. The conclusion seems reasonable. The companies spend 10% of gross receipts on marketing but only 10% people in the entire industry switch brands. It seems that so much marketing budget may not have been of much use. the best criticism of the conclusion is that the conclusion is based on (A) computing advertising costs as a percentage of gross receipts, not of overall costs This is not a criticism. The figures could be represented in any terms. They still stay the same. (B) past patterns of smoking and may not carry over to the future There is no discussion of future. The conclusion talks about past "... did not pay ... would have been no worse off ..." (C) the assumption that each smoker is loyal to a single brand of cigarettes at any one time No such assumption is made. 10% people switch brands even if they are using multiple brands. (D) the assumption that each manufacturer produces only one brand of cigarettes No such assumption. A manufacturer could produce multiple brands and advertise for all. Still only 10% people switch brands. (E) figures for the cigarette industry as a whole and may not hold for a particular company This says that though the "10% people" figure seems small industry wise, it may be a good number for a company. Say there are 5 brands (A, B, C..) with each having 20 loyalists for a total of 100 smokers. Say 10 of these 100 switch brands (from B, C, D and E) and come over to A. Now A has 30 loyalists. That is a 50% increase in its customer base. So the 10% marketing budget may have been worth it. Hence this is the criticism of the conclusion. Answer (E)

Ashwin_Mohan · Answer

Let me try and explain this to you.

Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands. Yet the manufacturers have been spending an amount equal to 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines. It follows from these figures that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay, and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising.

Of the following, the best criticism of the conclusion that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay is that the conclusion is based on
(A) computing advertising costs as a percentage of gross receipts, not of overall costs
(B) past patterns of smoking and may not carry over to the future
(C) the assumption that each smoker is loyal to a single brand of cigarettes at any one time 
(D) the assumption that each manufacturer produces only one brand of cigarettes
(E) figures for the cigarette industry as a whole and may not hold for a particular company

Break this down.

Conclusion : Inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay dividends.

Evidence 1 : Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands.
Evidence 2 : Cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising.

What really links the evidence to the conclusion?

1. That the surveys are accurate and that they can be generalised. 
2. The companies sales are dependent on the survey(no matter what the company does).

What can turn this around??

Option 1 : Surveys are not accurate
Option 2: Companies sales are not dependent on the survey and they can influence customers to change brands by different strategies.

Option 1 is not there in the answer choices
Option 2 is what E talks about...hence E.

C was close (if 'at any one time' was not present in the answer choice), what it does is weakens what the survey tries to prove, and thus strengthens option 1.

anujsp · Answer

Hi.. can you please help me with eliminating option c?

abhimahna · Answer

Hey  anujsp  ,

C is very easy to rule out.

We are already given than 10% of the customers are still switching brands. That means atleast some were there who switched.

But C is saying each smoker was loyal. Isn't that breaking the premise?

Hence, C is wrong.

Does that make sense?

Gladiator59 · Answer

I think we rule out C more so by the fact that it helps strengthen the conclusion rather than weaken it as is the question prompt. Even though you are correct in pointing out that each smoker is not loyal to one brand due to the fact that 10% are changing it.

E was harder to digest as OA.

Is it only by the virtue of " bad among the worst " that E ends up weakening the conclusion?

E was harder to digest as OA.

Is it only by the virtue of " bad among the worst " that E ends up weakening the conclusion?

abhimahna · Answer

Hey  Gladiator59  ,

I would never jump to the conclusion if I see there is any thing that is breaking the premise. This is strictly not allowed. The moment I see each person is disloyal in option C while 10% disloyal in the premise, I will reject C without a second thought.

E very well explains the weakner. It says it may happen that the survey is for the entire industry while concluding the same thing for each of the cigarette company shouldn't be a good idea.

Does that make sense?

Gladiator59 · Answer

Hi  abhimahna , thanks for writing back.

I realized how E fits in perfectly by reading other answers again.

Also, I get the point you are trying to make. Any option which breaks premise has to be discarded.

Best,
Gladi

gmatexam439 · Answer

Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands. Yet the manufacturers have been spending an amount equal to 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines. It follows from these figures that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay, and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising.

Of the following, the best criticism of the conclusion that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay is that the conclusion is based on

(A) computing advertising costs as a percentage of gross receipts, not of overall costs -- Cost is a cost that the company incurs 
(B) past patterns of smoking and may not carry over to the future -- The argument doesn't compare future/past patters 
(C) the assumption that each smoker is loyal to a single brand of cigarettes at any one time -- This doesn't help us in reaching at the conclusion 
(D) the assumption that each manufacturer produces only one brand of cigarettes -- This doesn't help us in reaching at the conclusion 
(E) figures for the cigarette industry as a whole and may not hold for a particular company -- Correct. The argument is wrongly comparing 10% figure of ALL the companies and the reaching a conclusion specific to one company

rish2708 · Answer

How to neglect option A?
Here what I perceived:
"and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising."
This is the conclusion we have to weaken.
It says that economically they are weak because of advertising. What if the gross is still proper? 
Option a says that

computing advertising costs as a percentage of gross receipts, not of overall costs

So just based on advertising costs we can't say that advertising costs economlically to the company

Please let me know where I was wrong..

Posted from my mobile device

NinetyFour · Answer

To be honest this question is challenging because B, C, and E all present criticisms of the conclusion. If someone can share insight into why D is better than B and C, I'd love to know

kanakdaga · Answer

Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands. Yet the manufacturers have been spending an amount equal to 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines . CONCLUSION : It follows from these figures that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay /b], and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising. Of the following, the best criticism of the conclusion that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay is that the conclusion is based on (A) computing advertising costs as a percentage of gross receipts, not of overall costs. INCORRECT: overall costs are irrelevant when it clearly stated as a percent of some other components. It would have been relevant if the conclusion would have mentioned overall costs as a base. (B) past patterns of smoking and may not carry over to the future. INCORRECT: if we look at the conclusion, it is still based on the evaluation of past results. "companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising." There is no link to the future. The argument is not basing any prediction or future claim on the basis of the past patterns. It is evaluating the past results on basis of past actions of the companies. (C) the assumption that each smoker is loyal to a single brand of cigarettes at any one time. INCORRECT. This clearly is not the assumption let alone a loophole. it is explicitly mentioned that 10% of people did switch. So "each" rules out this option. (D) the assumption that each manufacturer produces only one brand of cigarettes INCORRECT. If we negate the conclusion, this answer choice does not support the negated conclusion. Strategy for weakening: negate the conclusion and look for supporting the negated conclusion - inducing smokers to switch brands paid off. one brand of cigarettes doesn't really contribute. (E) figures for the cigarette industry as a whole and may not hold for a particular company CORRECT. Now there we have a major discrepancy pointed out. 10% of all smokers versus at least one company that could have benefitted. This supports the negated conclusion that inducing smokers did pay off. PLEASE KUDOS IF THIS HELPS

Pas4867 · Answer

C, I can see is definitely wrong. If each smoker only ever smokes one brand at any given time, then getting those 10% to switch brands will actually be very good for the company. It doesn’t matter if they only smoke on brand at a time, because we know that 10% do switch every year. In fact, this only strengthens the argument, since it cleanly breaks the smokers into distinct groups which in turn makes the statistics on them switching groups much clearer.

Looking at the rest, E is the right option. The conclusion is that spending money to convince smokers to switch brands did not pay off.

The evidence presented in favor of this conclusion is that only 10% of smokers switch brands every year and that dropping advertising efforts would not negatively effect the cigarette companies, economically. This conclusion relies on two assumptions, that these surveys are accurate and that the sales for any particular company are dependent on the information presented in the surveys.

E refutes the second assumption, stating that while these figures might reflect true for the industry as whole, they do not necessarily apply to each company.

None of the other options address these two assumptions, so E is the best answer.

bn1 · Answer

What if an option meaning is not clear & understanding the meaning takes much time?Is practicing is the only solution.?

GMATNinja · Answer

Hi  bn1 , unfortunately there is no short, easy answer to your question, but check out our  CR Guide for Beginners  and see if that helps.

Priyanka1293 · Answer

Why is C wrong? 
There could be a possibility that cigarette smokers start smoking new brands without really switching from their bold. 
They started smoking cigarettes of 2 brands instead of just 1.

MartyTargetTestPrep · Answer

I guess one could argue that a smoker who starts smoking two brands rather than one has switched to smoking the second brand at least some of the time, unless that smoker has started smoking cigarettes two at a time, an unlikely scenario.

In that case, the part time switch could be included in the 10 percent who switched.

Overall, while your logic makes some sense, probably it wouldn't constitute support for a GMAT CR correct answer, because it involves two "what if,"s: "what if someone starts smoking two brands rather than one" and "what if we don't consider that action a switch."

jawele · Answer

Indeed, this one is hard to solve in less than two minutes ...

Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands. Yet the manufacturers have been spending an amount equal to 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines. It follows from these figures that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay,  and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising.  ( can be ignored as the questions explicitly tells us what we need to do )

Of the following, the  best criticism of the conclusion that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay  is that the conclusion is based on

(A) computing advertising costs as a percentage of gross receipts, not of overall costs  what do we know about costs? Since we would have to make assumptions to come up with a likely effect, this cannot be the correct choice 
(B) past patterns of smoking and may not carry over to the future  this strengthens the conclusion because B well applies to the conclusion: only 10% switch brands and smokers will continue to switch as they pick one brand over another (e.g. concentration of the switchers on one brand may benefit some manufacturer, but this choice argues against such an idea) 
(C) the assumption that each smoker is loyal to a single brand of cigarettes at any one time  since it's an assumption, we can negate to check whether it weakens the conclusion: knowing that smokers are not loyal to one brand does seem to affect the argument as we know nothing about those brands - smokers will keep changing one or more brands 
(D) the assumption that each manufacturer produces only one brand of cigarettes  again, since this is an assumption, we can negate it, but the negation doesn't add to the argument because there doesn't seem to be a reasonable link between the # of brands produced and smoker behaviour associated with the brands 
(E) figures for the cigarette industry as a whole and may not hold for a particular company  this strengthens because if 10% of smokers switch to one brand, then that brand receives a commensurate bump in its revenues

priarav · Answer

I understand that the assumption is "figures for the cigarette industry as a whole and may not hold for a particular company", but why is this a  criticism  of the conclusion if the conclusion is based on this assumption? On the contrary, isn't this statement a support for the conclusion?

Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers swit

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Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers swit

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