[求助]GWD-4-Q5

xyloaries

    Extensive research has shown that the effectsof short-term price promotions on sales are themselves short-term.  Companies’ hopes that promotions might have apositive aftereffect have not been borne out for reasons that researchers havebeen able to identify.  A price promotionentices only a brand’s long-term or “loyal” customers; people seldom buy anunfamiliar brand merely because the price is reduced.  They simply avoid paying more than they haveto when one of their customary brands is temporarily available at a reducedprice.  A price promotion does notincrease the number of long-term customers of a brand, as it attracts virtuallyno new customers in the first place. Nor do price promotions have lingeringaftereffects for a brand, even negative ones such as damage to a brand’s reputationor erosion of customer loyalty, as is often feared.
    Sowhy do companies spend so much on price promotions?  Clearly price promotions are generally run ata loss; otherwise there would be more of them. And the bigger the increase in sales at promotion prices, the bigger theloss.  While short-term price promotionscan have legitimate uses, such as reducing excess inventory, it is the recognizableincrease in sales that is their main attraction to management, which istherefore reluctant to abandon this strategy despite its effect on the bottom line.

The passage suggests thatevidence for price promotions’ “effect on the bottom line” (line 40) isprovided by
A.   the lack of lingering aftereffects fromprice promotions
B.   the frequency with which price promotionsoccur
C.   price promotions’ inability to attract newcustomers
D.   price promotions’ recognizable effect onsales
E.    the legitimate uses to which management canput price promotions
答案选B。


我对这道题的理解是，文章最后一句话讲，管理层由于价格促销可以明显的增加销量，所以不顾它对利润的负面影响，仍然不愿意放弃它。题目问能够支撑“价格促销对利润的负面影响”的证据来源于哪里。
可是如果按照我的理解，似乎没有选项是正确的。尽管可以用排除法得到B，但是文章中并没有提到价格促销的频率啊。
是不是我的理解有问题呢？还请指教。

苏格拉底屠夫

我也有这个问题，觉得文章第一句可能是一种解释吧···