Mapping the Grocery Deit Fad Scene

I am what you might consider a yoyo dieter. I have bought into a lot of diet fads. I buy anti-oxidant, super fruit chews that say they help you lose weight because they rid your body of free radicals. I drink “Lean Shakes”, a protein based, meal replacement shake that is supposed to help you lose weight in a “healthy way.” And most recently, I joined Weight Watchers.

For this walk, I spent a few hours walking around the grocery store trying to map the Weight Watchers fad that seems to have taken over Frys and probably most other grocery stores. It seems to me that a least one third of the aisles could be deemed the scene of the Weight Watchers member.

In one of the frozen food aisles, a whole side has Weight Watchers friendly food. It hasn’t been put out by Weight Watchers, but the Lean Cuisines, Healthy Choice, Smart Balance, and other microwavable meals have a circle on them that contains their Weight Watchers point value. (For those who don’t know what a Weight Watchers point is here is a quick overview: each member gets a certain amount of points per day, usually somewhere between 20 and 30. Every food and drink has a point value assigned to it. These microwavable meals tend to be worth 5 or 6 points.)

In the soup aisle, at least half of the soups also have the same circle showing their point value. Progresso Light Soups seem to range from 0 to 2 points. The ones that are only broth and vegetables are 0. This is interesting to me because it seems to me that all food should be worth something. How can a food not have any food value? I also found that all the vegetable in the produce section are worth 0 points. They don’t have a circle point sticker on them, but my Weight Watchers point pamphlet tells me this.

In the dairy section, I found individual cream cheese packets and yogurt that have the Weight Watchers logo on them. In the drink aisle, I found Weight Watchers smoothies. In the bread aisle, I found Weight Watchers bread and muffins and cookies.

While mapping the grocery store, it seems like diet fads have over taken the aisles, but the fad that seems to be the most prevalent is Weight Watchers.