FitBit, Calorie Counter, My Fitness Pal, Google Fit, Jawbone, FuelBand, and countless other free applications, fitness tracking gadgets, and websites have revolutionized the weight-loss industry by providing continuous monitoring, data aggregation, customized analysis, and daily goal-setting for millions of Americans from the convenience of their smartphone.Weight Watchers has just over 2 million current subscribers. The reality? Over 51 million American adults are using digital applications to track their health. As late as 2013, CEO David Kirchhoff claimed he didn’t see wearable devices - along with social media and other technologies - as a threat. Weight Watchers failed to predict, acknowledge, or respond to competitive signals from players who digitized and revolutionized the weight-loss industry.
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So how did Weight Watchers fail to capitalize on these trends? They went wrong in three key digital transformations of the weight-loss industry: Shifting competition, shifting technology, and shifting consumer demand. In the last quarter alone, membership has declined 15%, and Weight Watchers was among the most-shorted stocks on the NYSE in February of 2015 (Bloomberg). Unfortunately, Weight Watcher’s stock has posted a 78% decline in the past three years and quarterly revenue has declined for the past eight periods. The weight-loss industry is booming and seems to be growing rapidly as changing forms of transportation, sedentary work habits, and poor nutrition run rampant in American society. In this rapidly shifting era of digital transformation for health, personal fitness, and weight loss, Weight Watchers has unfortunately responded far too slowly and incrementally to keep pursuit with digital innovations that will likely render it obsolete.Ĭreated in 1961, Weight Watchers has a solid history of weight loss support centers, food products, and diet programs to help the 70% of Americans who are overweight or obese to lose weight.
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