A recent sales study indicates that consumption of seafood dishes in Bay City restaurants has increased by 30 percent during the past five years. Yet there are no currently operating city restaurants whose specialty is seafood. Moreover, the majority of f

The author states that the consumption of seafood dishes in Bay City restaurants has increased by 30% during the past five years. This is based on a sales study. The study can not be completely trusted. First of all, the study would have shown increase for other dishes as well, that point is not mentioned in the argument. If this is true then the reasons would be numerous, like increase in the population or increase in the number of people who prefer restaurant meals rather than home-cooked meals. Also, the restaurants might have fed wrong data to the survey agency in order to project their sales in a positive manner for publicity purposes.

Then the author presents a relation between two-income families and popularity of seafood dishes. This comparison is baseless and irrelevant. The two quantities are like apples and oranges. And if that would have been the reason, then the popularity of other dishes would also have been affected. Also, if the two-income families prefer healthy food, then they would opt for a variety of options as they would have got bored with the same la-carte day after day.

Then, the author proposes that, a new Captain Seafood restaurant that specializes in seafood would be quite popular and profitable. This conclusion is based on the above argument which is rife with loopholes as already described. Also, it cannot be said with such certainty that the restaurant would be a a hit as the people may not necessarily be accustomed to going to an only seafood restaurant. Also, a social group may consist of people with different tastes and that group might not prefer such a restaurant at all. Also, the people may not be determined to experiment with new foods. Thus, at least initially, the restaurant would not be a sure shot hit.

To conclude, the argument does not make a cogent case as the sources and surveys cannot be completely trusted, the reasons for the above mentioned observations could be numerous, the comparison mentioned above is absurd and the people might not be ready to experiment with foods.