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Weight Watchers

Leading the changing culture of weight health

  • Brand Futures

The challenge

After acquiring prescription weight-loss player Sequence, Weight Watchers was uniquely positioned to take a market leadership position in GLP-1 solutions.

 

But while GLP-1 drugs have revolutionized the landscape of weight loss and weight health, the market still lacked meaningful data on consumer and cultural attitudes towards GLP-1s – and the people who use them.

 

We partnered with Weight Watchers to shed new light on perceptions and stigma surrounding GLP-1 use, helping the original weight health pioneer to establish a thought leadership position in this complex new landscape.

Decode

We identified a cultural gap where Weight Watchers could take a meaningful position: the new landscape of weight stigma. We conducted nuanced quantitative analysis to compare the attitudes of Americans across the weight and weight-loss spectrum, as well as 1:1 interviews to better understand the lived and subconscious experiences of GLP-1 users. We found powerful evidence that weight stigma is evolving along with the GLP-1 landscape, and that new stereotypes correlated with GLP-1 usage were emerging. Crucially, we uncovered ways to combat this stigma, in particular through educating around nascent concepts like food noise: persistent, intrusive thoughts about food that impact over half of people living with obesity.

Recode

In partnership with Weight Watchers’ medical team and weight-loss advocacy group STOP Obesity Alliance, we developed a plain-language report to dissect the persistence and evolution of weight stigma. We shared key data points and data visualization to bring the experience of living with obesity to life – and identified a set of strategies for clinicians and the population at large to close the empathy gap. Most importantly, we established a unique perspective for Weight Watchers that drew from its historic equities in behavior change, while acknowledging new research linking weight loss and chronic conditions.

Transform

Our proprietary thought leadership report added nuance and direction to Weight Watchers’ internal understanding of GLP-1 stigma and barriers preventing people from seeking care. After launching on Weight Watchers’ corporate site, the report generated significant organic PR and features in outlets like Essence and EatingWell, positioning WW as a thought leader in this nascent field. Following our report, Weight Watchers released a new campaign that speaks to underlying issues like PCOS and psychological barriers as part of the contemporary journey to weight health.