Comparison on Making Polite Requests in English an Essays

Comparison on Making Polite Requests in English and in Chinese Abstract: Polite requests play an important role in daily communication. Different culture has various ways of making request. In order to get rid of misunderstanding, it is necessary to clarify the different polite expression of making request in diverse culture. This paper chooses to compare English and Chinese polite request making. Key words: Politeness; Request; English; Chinese Introduction With the development of mass media and information technology, communicative borders are removed and people become closer and closer. Therefore, it is necessary to understand the different lifestyles of various cultural community. However, the main reasons of successful communication does not only include how well a language is spoken, but also some personal and cultural elements. When considering social context, non- verbal communication plays an important role in language learning. A very interesting topic in this large field is politeness, since forms of politeness are often misinterpreted and lead to misunderstandings. So I chose to have a closer look at the differences between politeness in Chinese and English. Politeness is known as a courteous manner that displays respects, show deference in society where people live and communicate together (OED online). Furthermore, according to Brown and Levinson (1978), politeness theory is the speaker's expressions use toward receiver in soft manner of Face Threaten Acts (FTAs) to saving face of addressees. There are four main strategies in politeness theory as: bald-on record, positive politeness, negative politeness and off record. Bald- on record, a type is commonly with people known each other very well and very comfortable in their environment, is reduce the impact of FTAs. Off record is removing the speakers from any imposition whatsoever (Zhan, 1992). "Positive politeness is redress directed to addressee's positive face" (Brown and Levinson, 1978, p.101), while negative politeness is making a request less intrude into a person's private. Alternatively, request is a type of speech of act where the speaker ask or demand from the hearer to perform an act which is for the benefit of the speaker. A request has two parts: head act and modifiers. Head act is the main utterance which conveys a complete request and can stand by itself without any modifiers for express demand. The head act is follow by modifiers that moderate or exaggerate the impact of the request on the addressee. For example, "Could I borrow your dictionary, please?" where "Could I borrow your dictionary" is head act and "please" is modifier. So, every culture, every language has different ways to making requests in politeness. Therefore, the scope in this research is compared the differences expression of politeness requesting in two languages: English and Chinese. Following to House and Kasper (1981), their research claimed that speakers prefer to choose negative politeness strategies than positive politeness because when the relative face threat is high because negative politeness strategies are easily compensation than positive politeness strategies. To evaluate the difference of politeness in making request in two languages English and Chinese, the research will analyse three difference situations in classroom, at restaurant and at home. Discussion In English grammar, in order to make a polite request, people usually use the modal verbs like can, could, will, would to allow the speaker to ask their need by asking for or giving permission, and so on. The formation of making a polite request is: (Leech, Cruickhank, Ivanic, 2001) Modal Verb (Could/ Can/ Will/ Would) + Subject + Base Verb +.... ? For example, Can you give a book? So, in this sentence, "can" is a modal verb, "you" is subject and "give" is base verb. In Chinese grammar as like as English grammar, speakers use optatives verbs (e.g. ?,,?)to express wishes, making a request, and have permissions. Follow to the grammar rule, the optatives verb put before the main verb and add"?" - question particle at the end of the sentence: (Wang, 1996) S + Opt. Verb + Main Verb + Obj. + (e.g. ) Or in an affirmative-negative question, the negative adverb should be put between the optatives verb instead of the main verb: (Wang, 1996) S + Opt. Verb + ? (Negative Adv.) + Opt. verb + Main Verb + Obj. ? (e.g. ) Additionally, in imperative sentences or interrogative sentences English is adding the conventional expression "please" to make their requests more polite and to make soften their utterance text (E.g. Please give me a book! or Could you give a book, please?) (Leech, Cruickhank, Ivanic, 2001) On the other hand, Chinese grammar has many strategies to making a request in politeness by using reduplication of verbs, using

Response to an Ineffective Editorial essays

Response to an Ineffective Editorial essays Response to an Ineffective Editorial In an October 1st, 2004 editorial in the New York Post titled John Delivers in Do-Or-Die Situation, the author, Deborah Orin, claims that Kerry came through when he most needed to with one if his best debates, while Bush suffered perhaps the worst he has ever had. Although Orin states the editorials point in the title, her writing lacks clarity and adequate information to prove her point. Orin describes the debate as the worst debate that President Bush has ever had while Democrat John Kerry scored one of his best. She explains its almost as if Bush and Kerry swapped places because Kerry was more alert than the typical extremely attentive Bush. Bushs behavior during this debate is depicted by the author as hesitant and defensive where as Kerrys is described as more focused and aggressive. Orin believes Kerry proved his strongest points when he most needed to because he was falling behind in the polls. He was on message and unyielding, and he had those answers that America was formerly searching for in him all along. According to the author, the debate could give Kerry a fresh start. He validated himself as a potential commander-in-chief and set himself on a more equal footing. However, Orin recognizes that Republicans disagree with her and say although the polls show that Kerry won the debate his victory will not decide the final vote. Two debates stil l remain. Orin ended her article speaking of the mannerisms of Bush and Kerry. Bush made countless irritated facial expressions as he listened to Kerrys remarks, whereas Kerry kept a smile on his face while Bush was speaking. While Orins opinion on the debate is evident, she does not thoroughly explain the reasons for her analysis or use information to support her views. ...

Organizational culture is fundamentally about symbolic meaning and as Essay - 1

Organizational culture is fundamentally about symbolic meaning and as such cannot be managed. Discuss - Essay Example By symbolism people consciously give shape and form to their own reality. Reality does not constitute of objects to which humans react, rather it is the social environment within which people act according to their own perspective of the situation. Any object or action can be called a symbol when it has a differentiated meaning from its actual self. An object or action becomes a symbol when it is not perceived by their apparent form but by the meaning applied to it by the members of the organization. For instance a large desk is not viewed as an object of convenience for various activities, but is regarded as a representative of the organization’s power, status and influence. Thus, the desk becomes a cultural symbol of the organization’s status (Schultz, 1995, p.76). Organizational culture is imbibed with abstract aspects like feelings, emotions and thought processes of people, and also with objects for their symbolic values rather than their instrumental values. Organi zational culture is thus not easy to manage since many profound aspects of culture like visions and feelings of people must be considered with great value when objective is to bring possible changes to organizational culture. This paper focuses on the interconnection of symbolism and organizational culture. ... In the last few decades, most academics have been suggesting that the idea of culture is the environment and the climate created by the organization for management of its people. Organizational culture is the system of feelings, thoughts and beliefs of a group of people associated with an organization, and the meaning that people attach to their actions. It reflects the views of the employees about the way things are done in an organization (O’Donnell & Boyle, 2008, p.viii). Thus, culture provides a sense of identity to an organization. The culture of an organization encompasses everything that it is good at and all the things that worked in the past. These concepts are generally accepting by the employees who have been working in an organization for a long period. When new employees join the organization, they learn about the legends of the organization. With time such legends become the norm which means they become the normal and accepted pattern of behavior. (O’Donne ll & Boyle, 2008, pp.4-5) In recent times management theories have been emphasizing on the managers the importance of creating a strong cultural ambiance within the organization (O’Donnell & Boyle, 2008, p.viii). The fascinating thing about culture is that it indicates a phenomenon that is hidden beneath the surface and is invisible but has powerful impact. Culture shapes the behavioral patterns of the members of a group through the common beliefs that are held in that group (Schein, 2010, p.14). It has been suggested that â€Å"culture and leadership are fundamentally intertwined.† (Schein, 2010, p.xi) There are three elements to this – 1) the leaders are

Problems and Parallels Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Problems and Parallels - Essay Example The species homo erectus was almost human, because it was an advanced hominid which walked upright on two legs. This species disappeared 230,000 years ago and was replaced by homo sapiens. The word sapiens comes from Latin and means â€Å"knowing† and it refers to the larger brain size and greater intelligence of homo sapiens. Humans share a large percentage of their genes with apes and chimpanzees but their larger brain size and differences in the physical structure of their hands and their speaking organs make it easier for humans to adapt and learn new skills like tool use and language. Quite a lot of the social behaviors of humans and apes are similar and some chimpanzees have even been taught to speak sign language, and so the overlap is perhaps bigger than we might expect just by looking at the hairy bodies of other primates. 2. It was once thought that Neanderthals with their larger body size and heavier skulls were an earlier form of humanoid but scholars now accept that they are part of the same species as homo sapiens and probably interbred with the more slender form of human that we resemble today. Archeologists have discovered that the two species overlapped in time by many thousands of years, and it may be that the higher intelligence and better adaptability of anatomically modern humans gradually squeezed the Neanderthals to the edges of the known world until they died out. Homo florensiensis skeletons found just a few years ago have set the scientists rethinking the whole definition of homo sapiens because these tiny 1 meter tall pygmy like people have some similarities with older forms of hominid, and yet apart from their reduced size, seem also very similar to modern humans. They, too, seem to have co-existed with modern humans in the same area at the same time, and may have lasted until about 12,000 years ago, which is longer than the

Analysing The Film Saving Private Ryan Film Studies Essay

Analysing The Film Saving Private Ryan Film Studies Essay Saving Private Ryan is an award-winning film directed by Stephen Spielberg. He is particularly remembered for directing films such as Jaws, Jurassic park and Indiana Jones. The phenomenal directors first film he created himself was a war film, which shows he was fascinated from a young age. The film stars famous actors such as Tom Hanks and Matt Damon; it hit the public by storm in the summer of 1998 and is significantly remembered for its epic and horrific 27 minute opening sequence. This scene is very emotional as we witness countless soldiers being slaughtered. The film was awarded five academy awards, including one for best sound and one for best screenplay to name a few. Stephen also won best director for directing the film. Saving Private Ryan had tremendously satisfying reviews that resulted in comments including Spielberg spares the viewer nothing of the horrors of battle and an important film that deconstructs war machines into separate, frightened men as it so likely was. S pielberg wanted to show us what war was really like, he wanted to put chaos on the screen , which is different to many other war films, for example, Inglourious Basterds, which focuses on a fictional storyline that does not include non-fictional happenings and does not show the horrors of the war itself. Spielberg wanted his audience to feel like those green recruits. As a result, the vast majority of the shot were at eye level and he made a great deal of use of handheld cameras throughout the film. The resulting images are shaking and chaotic resulting in an audience feeling like they were there, many audiences even said that while watching the battle scenes they felt queasy. The de-saturated colour emphasised the blood in the second scene which was to depict the fact that a devastating amount of men died in the battle, and it was a particularly scarring experience for them all. The first scene of the film starts off with a low-angle close-up shot of a de-saturated coloured American flag flapping in the wind to show respect for those that fought in the war, age and the victory of the outcome. There is non-diagetic sound playing in the background of military drums, so we know right from the beginning this is an active war film. Subsequent to this we see the future Ryan (although we do not know this yet) walking hastily to a grave in a war cemetery, he is cut off from his family, showing he is cut off from the world, because this was his own personal experience, he is limping which shows he was injured in some way or it is just because he is so old, the camera recognises this through a range of medium shots and long shots of Ryan and his family as he walks in front of them. When Ryan gets to a certain grave, we know there is significance as he breaks down and cries, this shows hes remembering what happened to these men and is emotional about it, the war must h ave had an impact on him because of the chaos and horrors that occurred during it. The camera then makes an extreme close up into his eyes which then links to his thoughts which is the sound of shooting and fighting, this then fades in as we smoothly progress into the first war scene. As we think the elderly man is thinking this, we believe throughout the film that he is truly Captain Miller, when he is actually not. Overall, this introductory scene gets the audience ready for the shock they will experience later. This is effective from the camera angles and Spielberg chose the quiet and tranquil sounds in the scene to contrast the loud sounds of the scenes to come. Merged from the scene with the elderly man, in the next scene we see a landing craft with many frightened soldiers waiting to be told to go and fight. We feel like we are there with them on the craft as Spielberg used the camera effect of panning to go around all the soldiers. We see soldiers being sick, soldiers kissing lucky charms and soldiers shivering. The panning then stops and a close up is made at a man drinking from his water bottle. His hands are shaking to show fear of what is about to happen. The man looks up to reveal he is a captain, we later hear he is Captain John Miller, this depicts the fact that everybody was scared, it didnt matter how high up you were. The use of panning was effective because the viewer feels like they are really there and experiencing what is going on, this helps the viewer to feel empathy for the soldiers in the landing craft. The tension rises as the men continue to look pale and frightened until the landing crafts barrier opens. As soon as th e landing craft opens, we are moved to behind the craft, as though we are watching over the men. The chaos starts immediately, this show an obvious contrast to waiting for battle bits of flesh are flying everywhere and the fear erupts at once, screaming occurs. Spielberg also shows chaos through handheld cameras during this scene, we feel as though we are there and the fighting takes over all other emotions, the hand held cameras also show that this film is from the soldiers prospective. There is also a long shot of the men running to their target point from the Germans prospective. It shows us just how much of a slaughter this battle was as the Germans have a clear view of the whole beach, they are bound to kill many. We see hundreds of soldiers already injured and one stands out from the rest as he is screaming for his mum. This distinguishes just how young some of these soldiers were, some were even as young as 15, which is the same age as me, I feel empathy for the boys who died in this scene as if I was there I would feel really sick and terrified, I know this as when I watched the scene I truthfully felt like I was there. Many soldiers try and get away from the chaos by going underwater, underwater it is slow, muffled and quite, which is a contrast to outside which is fast and extremely loud. We then see bullets coming into the water and killed soldiers there and then. This portrays the fact that there is no way of getting away from the chaos of the war, there is always a big chance you will be killed. Miller having entered the water leaves, there are many reverse angle shots to show what he is seeing on the beach. There is a jerky close up of Miller in slow motion when he goes into a state of shock because of a shell going off right next to him. Because of this he takes his helmet off and hears muffled sounds, he goes into a dream. As soon as Miller puts his helmet back on, reality hits him and the shocks and horrors resume. In the next scene we find many low angled shots of injured men being treated, the true horrors of war a proclaimed by the fact that the Germans are still shooting at the dying men, and the medics trying to save them, the audience sees that the war was not all victory and triumph, but instead ended millions of peoples lives from brutal attacks, like the one in this film. The attacks are so brutal because of the fact that the soldiers on the beach were so vulnerable, there are many low angled shots of the beach to emphasise this. We see Captain Miller on a sandbank with many other soldiers as he finds out he is the last surviving captain of the mission and so he is in charge. As he is being told this a man is shot in the helmet but luckily the helmet saves this, he removes the helmet in amazement and is then shot again and dies. The audience feel for this man as it was so unlucky how he died; it showed how unlucky soldiers were in this battle as so many were slaughtered cold heartedly. This shocks the audience as they get to understand how devastating the war was. In this scene we see Miller with P. Daniel Jackson, Jackson is a Sniper and when the Germans were winning, Miller sent him on a death trail to try and get to a sniper to kill the Germans shooting at where they were. He runs it and I know from many of my classmates as well that we all felt triumph for him. He had risked his life for his fellow soldiers which was an honourable thing to do. When he begins to aim with his sniper, he zones out of everything and the sound becomes muffled, this is because he is concentrating on getting the enemy and has learnt over his training how to do this. The muffled tone makes the scene more realistic and helps the audience to understand his concentration. In the last few scenes of the fighting sequences we see many happenings; one was when there was a reverse angle close up shot of Miller and two soldiers who had killed two surrendering Germans. At first Miller finds what they are doing wrong, but you can see understanding in his facial expressions as the horrors of the fight they had just witnessed and made their hate for the Germans greater. When I watched this I understood what they felt when they saw opposing soldiers, they were the ones who killed their friends and were out to kill them. After the fighting has stopped and everything is calm, the soldiers have mixed reactions. The Sniper began to pray to God, one man broke down a cried, while other soldiers joked with each other, and this showed they were all different but got through the horrors of battle together. The second in command puts soil into a pot and labels it France, we then see from his bag hes been to Africa and many other places, this indicates he is very experienc ed and thats why hes been more calm than most of the others. After this we see millers shaking hand shaking while he took a gulp of his water as he did at the start of the fight scene, this indicates the end of the battle. We then see a long shot of the beach; this shows the red sea and all the dead bodies. This had the most impact on me because there was a lot of blood and a lot of bodies, more than I had imagined, the de saturated colour emphasised the blood as it did throughout the battle scene. To conclude I found the opening scene equipped me well for the rest of the film as Spielberg had flung me right into the deep end, I knew after this scene that there were more scenes like this and knew the blood and gore that would come from it. I found the whole of the sequence very realistic and shocking, the gore was amazing because it looked so real and the men dying gave me a great insight into what war was like for all the soldiers that fought in great battles. Spielberg certainly did succeed in putting chaos on the screen as I definitely found the whole of the war scene chaotic and horrific, the realism contributed to the chaos created on the screen. Spielberg definitely put me off every wanting to go to war as well! Overall I think the film was a great success, it wasnt all heroic like some of the war films are, Spielberg showed war as it was, and for that he deserves the respect he got for a spectacular film.He ha

Define the Term Micr

Question 1 Define the term MICR and explain what it is. Using a suitable example, discuss how does MICR readers work and what is it used for? Answer: MICR, or Magnetic Ink Character Recognition, is a character recognition technology used primarily by the banking industry to facilitate the processing of cheques and makes up the routing number and account number at the bottom of a cheque. It allows computer to read account number off printed documents. Its different and unlike with barcodes or other similar technologies, MICR codes can be easily read by humans. MICR characters usually contain iron oxide.They are printed in special typefaces with a magnetic ink or toner and in the form of either and E-13B or CMC-7 Font. Each font series is made up of a series of numbers and symbols specifically designed for readability on check sorting machines which read and extremely high rates of speed. The machine can always determine what each series of number signifies quickly, due to the symbols provide a beginning and end pint for each group of numbers. Line placement, character placement skew and quality are several critical components of printing MICR; the line must be precisely positioned in the MICR Clear Band area.The use of magnetic printing allows the characters to be read reliably even if they have been overprinted or obscured by other marks, such as cancellation stamps and signature. The magnetic scanning of a typical check has a smaller error rate than with optical character recognition systems. As for well printed MICR documents, the â€Å"can’t read â€Å"rate is usually less than 1% while the misread rate is in the order of 1 per 100,000 characters. A cheque is a suitable example to discuss how MICR readers work and what it is use for does.When a bank receives a check for payment, is uses an MICR inscriber to print the amount of the check in MICR characters in the lower-right corner. The check then is sorted or routed to the customer’s bank, al ong with thousands of others. Each check is inserted in an MICR reader, which sends the check information – including the amount of the check – to a computer for processing. When you balance your checkbook, verify that the amount printed in the lower-right corner is the same as the amount written on the check; otherwise, your statement will not balance. Some retailers use MICR reader to minimize their exposure to check fraud.Corporations and government agencies also use the technology to speed up the sorting of documents. The banking industry has established an international standard not only for bank numbers, but also for the font of the MICR characters. This standardization makes it possible for people to write checks in other countries. Question 2 Discuss what a laser printer is and how it differs from Thermal Printers. Answer: A laser printer is a high-speed, high quality nonimpact printer. It’s a printer that uses a focused beam or light to transfer text an d images on to paper.Though contrary to popular belief, the laser does not actually burn the images on to the paper. The laser beam will fire at the surface of a cylindrical drum called a photoreceptor instead of as a paper passing through the printer. This drum has an typically positive electrical charge, that is reversed in areas where the laser beam hits it. The laser beam is able to print patterns such as text and pictures on to the photoreceptor by reversing the charge in certain areas of the drum. Once the pattern has been created on the drum, it is coated with toner from a toner cartridge.The positively charged toner clings to areas of the drum that have been negatively charged by the laser. The drum is given a strong negative charge which allows the toner to transfer and stick to the paper when the paper is passing through the printer. Laser printers do not use ink therefore they have less smearing problems that ink-jet printers and are able to print pages faster. While lase r printers typically cost more that inkjet printers, most laser toner cartridges last longer than ink cartridges, which makes their cost per page is about equal.Based on this reason, businesses tend to use laser printers, while consumers are more likely to use inkjet printers. A thermal printer generates images by pushing electrically heated pins against heat-sensitive paper. Basic thermal printers are inexpensive, but the print quality is low and the images tend to fade over time. Self-service gas pumps often print gas receipts using a built-in lower-quality thermal printer. Many point-of-sale terminals in retail and grocery stores also print purchases receipts on thermal paper.Two special types of thermal printers have high print quality and can print at much faster rates than ink-jet and laser printers. A thermal-wax-transfer printer generates rich, nonsmearing images by using heat to melt colored was onto heat-sensitive paper. Thermal wax-transfer printers are more expensive tha n many color laser printers. Both printers have advantages and disadvantages; by comparing we are able to differentiate them. The advantages of a laser printer are it is an accessible and efficient office document printer. The document quality is very high, except for barcodes.There are a few disadvantages for a laser printer. It prints labels in sheets and resulting in waste. Its label and wristband adhesives can ooze from fuser and cause jamming. The barcodes require more ink and the toner is driving up the costs. Lastly, output susceptible to toner flaking and smudging. As for thermal printers it has more advantages than a laser printer, such as it is designed specifically for label and wristband printing, print on demand which does not lead to wastage, it is simple to operate and the best part are its durable, it has low maintenance and its does not have toner expenses.The disadvantages of a thermal printer are, for example they cannot print 8 1/2- by 11-inch documents and the p rinters are not readily available in hospitals today. Referencing List Question 1 – http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Magnetic_ink_character_recognition – http://www. whatismicr. com/index. html – Pg 281 from Discovering COMPUTERS by Gary Shelly Question 2 – http://www. techterms. com/definition/laserprinter – Pg 321 from Discovering COMPUTERS by Gary Shelly -http://www. datarayusa. com/index. php? option=com_content&view=article&id=52&Itemid=70

Red Lobster Case

Bill Daren, restaurant entrepreneur opened his first restaurant at age 18. After opening a few other restaurants, his passion for seafood drove him to open a restaurant with top quality seafood called Red Lobster. Red Lobster was founded in 1968 in Lake Land Florida. One month after its opening Red Lobster, Daren had to expand the restaurant due to its high demand. After two years he had opened four other locations. In 1970 the chain was sold to General Mills, Daren was still the president.By 1975, apart from having a new president, Red Lobster was the first casual dining chain to achieve national scale, to advertise on network television and to have a national seafood distribution system, which was an important competitive asset. In 1982 general Mills Restaurants, Inc used Red Lobster operation platform to create Olive Garden. This corporation also opened other chains such as Longhorn Steakhouse and Capital Grille. Red lobster had an immense success and their goal was always to sust ain the companies historical affordability positioning.Red Lobster stated having some problems; this restaurant had always been top quality seafood with a really affordable price. Some customers were not attracted by the generous portions of affordable food as imagined but instead they were attracted to the desire to use a meal occasion as an opportunity to connect with family and friends. Red Lobster never thought that â€Å"experientials† were their customers and they were not marketing for them. Restaurants were not physically adapted for â€Å"experientials. † Some other issues were that Red Lobster many competitors, also value focus chains such as Chili’s, Applebee’s and Olive Garden.This chains also had seafood in their menus and their menus were much cheaper that one in Red Lobster. In a survey made in 2004, customers believed that Red Lobster was under a category of low-end seafood restaurants that served mass-produced frozen seafood, much of it f ried. Red Lobster never thought that they could be categorized like a low-end seafood restaurant. The appearance of the restaurant and pictures of fried food in the menus were causing customers to question the quality of the food. After doing this investigation, Red Lobster realized that many changes needed to be made.They had many issues that could be easily solved and that could help them in their image to the customers. 2. In 2004 a major leadership change came when Lopdrup became the president of Red Lobster. Prior to the new leader there were indication that the restaurant Red Lobster had slowly begun a downward trend since its place as a forerunner in the industry. Sales in many of the stores had slowly increased but this was mostly due to the aggressive promotions executed in the recent years, but the numbers were nowhere near where the management team wanted them to be.The ratings of Red Lobster’s guest experience had leveled off throughout the recent years and the pe rcentage of â€Å"excellent† ratings had not increase and were stuck at 64%, while the other restaurant owned by the same company was higher at 68%. Also in recent years due to a few factors the seafood category competition had strengthened and dampened the most current efforts of Red Lobster. The introduction of aquaculture has also had a massive effect on the seafood industry. This new movement allows seafood products to be produced in huge numbers with low cost.Since then aquaculture has led to dramatic declines in the cost of seafood, and allowed many new competitors to enter the industry thus increasing competition. The aquaculture had converted salmon and shrimp from luxury items originally sold in Red Lobsters into a mainstream product that is now being sold in many other restaurants that formerly did not carry the pricey product. This also allowed many restaurants not in the seafood category to begin offering seafood, which presented a huge problem to Red Lobster who now has to compete with those outside their specific food restaurant category.Even with the cost declines, seafood was still much more expensive than other proteins, which caused Red Lobster’s menu to more expensive than other value restaurant chains like Chili’s, Applebee’s, and Olive Garden. This presented the problem that Red Lobsters current layout was narrow focused in comparison to many of the other restaurants it competes with. 3. Red lobster is faced with many critical decisions in its near future. After conducting massive amounts of market research it was revealed to Red Lobster the different psychographics regarding the patrons who often utilized their restaurants.The customers were grouped into 5 main categories which included experiential, indulgent, traditionalist, eclectics, and frugal. The information received showed that experiential customers account for 23 percent, indulgent with 24 percent, traditionalists at 18 percent, eclectics the lowest w ith 7 percent and frugal with the highest at 28 percent of their total cliental. The fact that experientials accounted for nearly one-fourth of the total customer base was a surprise for Red Lobster’s management and since currently the organization only semi-concentrated on the traditionalist, frugal, and indulgent.This proposed a problem, should Red Lobster change its approach in respects to product, price, place, promotion, and positioning to better accommodate the needs of the experiential psychographic? With respect to Red Lobster’s positioning was it beneficial for them to keep the â€Å"fresh and approachable seafood† position and if it was decided to not be the right move what would the right position be for the restaurant? This question concerning the positioning also brings up another question, whether the drastic positioning change undertaken would allow the company to keep the restaurant name as Red Lobster.After deciding what position the company wan ted to take were Red Lobster’s advertisements appropriate for the positioning they wanted? The next option in regards to promotion is if it was beneficial to continue their traditional frequent price promotions? Also since each of the different customer bases has different attitudes towards prices, raising or lowering the price points of Red Lobster was another alternative course of action that could be commenced. This also feeds into the product aspect of Red Lobster. Should they be widening the menu further beyond seafood to gain market share from the other premium casual chains?Red Lobster is also faced with the choice to open new locations in relation to the clienteles they plan to focus on, and whether or not to remodel the current restaurants around this concentration. 4. In regards to evaluating each specific course of action, I will begin by going assessing the situation of Red Lobster changing it focus and including the experientials. The main benefit from this would be the fact that the experiential groups is considered one of the best customers for a casual dining chain and were predominantly profitable because they are more likely to order desserts and appetizers and wine.Also this group tends to order more items and are less price sensitive compared to the other groups of indulgent, frugal, and traditionalist. However if decided to focus on this group there would be many changes need towards the current position, price, place, and promotion. Since the experientials have very high culinary standards and high expectations for service and atmosphere, Red Lobster would need to reassess their current â€Å"place† situation. To account for the higher standards of atmospherics desired by this group it would be necessary for Red Lobster to remodel their current tores to a more upscale restaurant. This will attract more experientials, but would be very costly for the company. In regards to promotions alterations would also be required. With R ed Lobster currently offering many price promotions to draw in the frugal and more price sensitive groups this would not be an issue with the experientials. Therefore the current promotions would need to be changed to align with the experiential groups. This would be a benefit in regards to less promotional expenses and higher margins.With respect to Red Lobsters positioning they may need to adjust this in order to accommodate the experientials needs for high service, upscale atmosphere, diverse menus, and culinary expertise. Changing the Red Lobster position could be very costly and challenging due to the fact that the company will need to undue all of its prior positioning efforts and modify what the fact that customers see Red Lobster as a low end restaurant serving mass-produced frozen seafood into the thought of it being a high end establishment that offered top quality, fresh seafood prepared with culinary expertise.If the Red Lobsters focus is shifted and all of these aspects modified the company may see their current customers become aggravated at the alterations and discontinue patronizing the establishment. However if Red Lobster chose to stay with its current configuration aimed at the frugal, traditionalist, and indulgent groups they would not need to massively alter its current price, place, promotion, and position situations.This would be much less of a cost burden when compared to changing the focus towards experientials and would have a lower risk of loosing their current loyal customers. Nevertheless the lack of change could also result in a continued downward trend in the restaurants overall performance. Red lobster could also have the alternative to continue down the same path oriented towards the traditionalist, frugal, and indulgent but update their positioning in regards to their stance in product, price, promotion, and positioning.