Good morning, Broadsheet readers! A lady may quickly lead the Navy for the primary time, DEI positions are disappearing, and WeightWatchers’ CEO explains to Fortune senior author Maria Aspan why she’s embracing the Ozempic period. Have a significant Monday!
– The tip of weight-reduction plan? Ozempic is all over the place nowadays: Awards reveals, subway advertisements, all the headlines—and the ballooning backside strains of the pharmaceutical firms promoting the brand new class of associated weight-loss medication. However this Huge Pharma gold rush has created a extra sophisticated panorama for one more huge enterprise: the $80 billion weight-loss {industry}.
For many years, firms like WeightWatchers, Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, and Noom have made billions of {dollars} by preaching diets, train, “behavioral adjustments”—and above all, willpower. However now it’s a lot simpler, and infrequently extra effective, to simply take a weekly shot of Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro, or one other so-called miracle drug. As clients embrace the pharma various to their conventional companies, WeightWatchers and Noom are attempting to pivot.
“We’re admitting that we’re studying; that the science has advanced—and due to this fact we should always, as effectively,” WeightWatchers CEO Sima Sistani advised me, about her firm’s March deal to purchase Sequence, a telehealth enterprise that enables sufferers to acquire digital prescriptions for the brand new weight-loss medication. Two months later, Noom formally unveiled Noom Med, the same telehealth platform.
I spoke with executives at each firms—in addition to clients, docs, analysts, and longtime diet-industry consultants—for a brand new Fortune characteristic in regards to the affect of the Ozempic period on the normal weight-loss {industry}. Even Dr. Linda Anegawa, Noom’s chief medical officer, predicts, “We’re in all probability trying on the demise of weight-reduction plan.”
Might we be so fortunate? This can be a enterprise story, in fact—WeightWatchers and Noom have each struggled financially in recent times, whereas 40-year-old Jenny Craig simply shut down after which offered off its model to Nutrisystem’s dad or mum firm—nevertheless it’s additionally a cultural and societal one.
WeightWatchers CEO Sima Sistani at MPW Subsequent Gen on Nov. 16, 2022. Stuart Isett/Fortune
Anybody who’s ever had the enjoyment of weight-reduction plan is aware of how boring, onerous, and emotionally fraught it’s—and it’s additionally near-impossible to succeed long-term. The common dieter regains greater than 80% of misplaced weight inside 5 years, in keeping with one meta-analysis of 29 long-term weight-loss research. However these outcomes haven’t stored the weight-reduction plan {industry} from making billions of {dollars}, for years, by promoting merchandise that essentially aren’t everlasting options.
So these enterprise pivots elevate loads of excellent questions in regards to the Ozempic period’s long-term unintended effects—for buyers and executives at WeightWatchers and Noom, for his or her (shrinking numbers of) workers, for his or her clients, and for society at massive.
“I do see this as the top of food regimen tradition. The main focus has shifted from weight reduction to weight well being,” acknowledges Sistani, who grew to become WeightWatchers CEO in 2022. Nonetheless, she’s fast to argue that her 60-year-old firm will at all times be an necessary a part of reaching that new form of well being: “I need to be clear that the way in which you obtain it’s by weight reduction.”
Can she and her conventional diet-industry opponents succeed at threading this needle? Learn the complete characteristic right here.
Maria Aspan
maria.aspan@fortune.com
@mariaaspan
The Broadsheet is Fortune’s publication for and in regards to the world’s strongest ladies. Subscribe right here.
ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
– Barbie world. Greta Gerwig made historical past this weekend as Barbie earned $377 million on the world field workplace, the largest debut ever for a female-directed movie. Girls moviegoers powered Gerwig to the document, accounting for 65% of ticket gross sales, in keeping with PostTrak. The Guardian
– Captain of the ship. President Joe Biden has nominated Adm. Lisa Franchetti to guide the Navy. If she’s confirmed, Franchetti would be the first feminine U.S. army service chief and first girl to serve on the Joint Chiefs of Employees. AP
– DEI dies? The way forward for range, fairness, and inclusion jobs is unclear as firms transfer away from DEI initiatives. Since final yr, staff within the range discipline have been laid off by the hundreds, whereas DEI executives at firms like Netflix and Disney are on their manner out. Wall Road Journal
– Anti-woke avalanche. Texas A&M president Katherine Banks resigned final week because the fallout over the college’s hiring of journalist Kathleen McElroy snowballs. Banks mentioned she takes duty for the messy contract negotiations that led McElroy, a former New York Instances editor, to stroll away from the function amid conservative backlash. Texas Tribune
MOVERS AND SHAKERS: Noorain Fatima Khan has been elected nationwide board president of Woman Scouts of the USA.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
– Commentator attracts penalty. An Australian commentator is below hearth over feedback he made about soccer powerhouse and up to date mother Katrina Gorry throughout Australia’s first World Cup match final week. Commentator David Basheer has obtained stark criticism for saying that “motherhood has not blunted [Gorry’s] aggressive instincts.” CNN
– Excellent is not price it. No person’s good, particularly not within the office, however making an attempt to realize the unattainable customary can really damage you. Brooke Taylor, who coaches feminine executives at companies like Goldman Sachs, tells Fortune why perfectionism, folks pleasing, and comparisons are “the largest issues that girls at this stage undergo.” Fortune
– Submit-Roe. 13 Texas ladies had been denied abortions regardless of having medical emergencies. Now, they’re suing the state to make clear what medical exceptions are legitimate, the primary lawsuit to take action since Roe v. Wade was overturned. Vice
ON MY RADAR
This U.S. World Cup group is one for the ages. All of the ages New York Instances
Barbara Corcoran: That is the No. 1 high quality that each one ‘worthwhile workers’ share CNBC
Meet the queenagers: the brand new class of employee in your workplace that’s lengthy been there Bloomberg
PARTING WORDS
“I need to be a farmer. I need to be a horse coach. I need to personal a Snickers manufacturing unit—I like Snickers…it could be a disservice to my soul to not reap the benefits of that and do issues that make me completely happy.”
—Actress and comic Tiffany Haddish on at all times making an attempt new issues