Weight Watchers and Meal Prep: How I Reach My Goals By Outsourcing The Heavy Lifting
Weight Watchers, now known as WW, is one of the longest-standing weight loss programs around. So what is it? And does it work?
How WW works
Based on your starting weight, how many pounds you want to lose and your food preferences, you receive a set amount of points you’re allowed to consume daily.
The amount of points increases if you exercise.
Each food represents a number of points, foods with high levels of sugar and saturated fat have more points.
Use WW app to figure out point values of meals and account for daily points.
This method aims to foster a sustainable lifestyle change rather than a quick-fix approach, emphasizing moderation and mindful eating.
Bloomberg Second Measure reports that WW new customer counts spike in the early months of the year with a small uptick in early spring as well, but new customer counts generally decline throughout the rest of the year.
They state that “many customers lose their appetite for weight-loss programs as the months go on” and found that WW customer retention from the cohort that made their first purchase in January 2022 was 40% after six months and just 25% after 12 months.
WW may work for some (after all it has been around for 60 years), but it’s important to stay aware of how you’re working with the system as it definitely isn’t right for everybody. One person even reports “it took decades to shed the pain” after being on WW as a 10-year-old. In 2019, obesity expert Yoni Freedhof said WW’s child weight loss app Kurbo “does everything wrong.”
Even putting potential psychological impacts aside, a study that followed nearly 15,000 people enrolled in WW for seven months showed that only half of the participants lost weight while in the program, and those who did on average lost just 0.2–0.4 pounds per week. A second study revealed results of 0.3 pounds lost per week over six months. A 2022 study that’s the basis for the company’s advertisement that “WW members lose 2x more weight than doing it on their own” showed a weight loss rate of 0.2 pounds per week over 12 months.
There are many other ways to outsource weight loss and get the support you really need that might work better for you, including hiring a personal chef. Personal chefs are able to work with you to achieve your goals while eliminating compulsions. They use a sustainable method in changing your eating habits by preparing healthy meals that also taste delicious. If this seems like it could be a good solution for you, explore getting matched with a personal chef today.