Years ago, Weight Watchers helped Marcy Saucedo of Buford shed 75 pounds.
“You could eat a little bit of everything. You weren’t restricted,” she said, adding she’s not a fan of programs like the low-carb Atkins Diet that feature strict dietary guidelines.
When some of the weight came creeping back, Saucedo again turned to Weight Watchers, without similar success.
“I stuck to the thing exactly. I didn’t cheat. I ate all the food I should have but I was gaining a pound and a half every time I was going in,” she said of the program’s regular check-ins. “I was like, this isn’t working!”
A different plan helped her slim down again, but she might check out Weight Watchers in the future, given its recently announced rebrand.
After more than 50 years of focusing on point-counting and regular weigh-ins, the company will now be known as WW, or “Wellness that Works.” It will emphasize healthy lifestyle choices rather than concentrating chiefly on what the scale says.
“We will always be the global leader in weight loss, but now WW welcomes anyone who wants to build healthy habits — whether that means eating better, moving more, developing a positive mindset, focusing on weight … or all of the above!” the firm said in a statement.
“I’m going to look at it,” said Saucedo, intrigued by the reboot. “I’ll take a look at it to see if it’s something I’m interested in.”
The move comes three years after Oprah Winfrey became part owner and celebrity pitchwoman for Weight Watchers; she says she’s lost at least 40 pounds since. In January 2017, Winfrey released her points-friendly cookbook, “Food, Health and Happiness,” and frequently touts the Weight Watchers message in videos, social media posts and even a surprise visit to a Weight Watchers meeting.
“Inside every overweight woman is a woman she knows she can be,” she said in a video shortly after her partnership with the brand began. “Many times you look in the mirror and you don’t recognize your own self because you’ve gotten lost, buried in the weight that you carry.”
MORE: Watch Oprah break into song praising Weight Watchers
Points fans can keep tabulating, but WW’s new “WellnessWins” program is more broad.
"Members earn 'Wins' for their healthy habits, then redeem them for exclusive products and experiences," WW said in a statement on its site, which is still weightwatchers.com.
Obesity affects nearly 40 percent, or more than 93.3 million U.S. adults, according to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But in many quarters, keeping a positive body image and overall wellness has overtaken a strict emphasis on pounds and inches.
Plus-sized model Tess Holliday triumphed in gracing the cover of Cosmopolitan UK’s October 2018 issue, saying in a social media post, “If I saw a body like mine on this magazine when I was a young girl, it would have changed my life.”
Not all of the reaction has been kind, but Holliday has been cheerfully taking on detractors from her Twitter and Instagram accounts, where she has a combined following of nearly 2 million.
“People ask me all the time how I deal with all the folks who attack my size/body/motives,” she wrote the other day. “It’s simple: I laugh.”
A recent Huffington Post article titled "Everything You Know About Obesity Is Wrong" was accompanied by photos of interview subjects of various sizes, who were given the opportunity to choose exactly how they were styled and accessorized.
“We’re not going to become a skinnier country,” the now-viral article read. “But we still have a chance to become a healthier one.”
For Erika Redding of Southeast Atlanta, overall wellness trumps tracking every last calorie.
“I’ve had some major setbacks,” she said. “I lost a significant amount of weight and then put back on a lot, though not all of it. In the past few years, Weight Watchers has seemed to shift its focus to include more of the emotional aspects of weight. As someone whose weight issues are, for the most part, emotional, I appreciate that they are acknowledging that wellness is about so much more than weight.”
Jarred Schenke of Atlanta and his wife have each lost 20 pounds following Weight Watchers and have enjoyed the program.
“The point system is idiot-proof, which I can especially appreciate,” he said. “Their meetings have been nice, somewhat like an (Alcoholic Anonymous) meeting in that you’re there to seek support. But I find them less important to me than simply following the point system.”
For now, they’re going to wait and see what the brand’s institutional pivot means.
“Headed to a meeting later this week,” he said. “I’m sure this will come up.”
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