What do Charles Barkley, Mariah Carey, and Janet Jackson have in common? They’re the new 2012 diet pushers for popular weight loss programs, and they’re all black (see the commercials below, courtesy of YouTube). Every year, diet and weight loss companies choose a celebrity to be the face of their programs with the hope that we ordinary people will come in droves “like a moth to a flame burning by the fire.” Last year’s big hit was Academy Award winner and former American Idol contestant Jennifer Hudson for Weight Watchers. This was a great move for the company because it attracted many more African-Americans to the Weight Watchers program; and this is a good thing because many African-Americans are overweight and dying of preventable diseases that can be attributed to obesity.
This year, Weight Watchers is trying to reach black men by selecting Charles Barkley as their spokesman. This is also great because of the many healthy risks facing African-American men because of their weight issues. This “marketing strategy” of using black celebrities seems to be working, as more and more black people are trying out Weight Watchers because they think “if someone who looks like me can do it so can I.” And I guess the other companies took note of this “trend” of using black celebrities, as Nutrisystem and Jenny Craig each selected Janet Jackson and Mariah Carey (respectively) to be the spokeswomen for their weight loss programs.
I appreciate these companies reaching out to African-Americans to encourage them to lose weight. But I worry that it’s just a ploy to get them through the door, where they won’t see anyone that looks like them. When I was on Weight Watchers, I went to a few different centers for meetings, and not one of the meeting Leaders or even the ladies working at the front check-in stations were non-white. I can’t speak for Jenny Craig and Nutrisystem, but I worry that these companies will lure African-Americans to their program, but that they will fail because they might not get the support they need. When a white woman sees a white meeting Leader who lost the weight and became a marathon runner or something, she feels inspired and hopeful that she can do it, too. When a black woman sees this Leader, she might not feel as inspired. There are cultural differences that matter when it comes to getting the support you need. There are some things that work for white women that don’t work for black women, and vice versa.
To be fair, in order to be a Weight Watchers meeting Leader, you must have successfully completed the program, aka reaching a goal weight within the healthy BMI range and becoming a lifetime member. Perhaps, no black people who became lifetime members wanted to be meeting Leaders? Or, to be even more cynical, maybe not enough (or none at all) black people are reaching their goals and becoming lifetime members?
In a perfect world where people weren’t opportunistic beings that only care about themselves and their bottom lines, I’d like to think that’s the real reason behind these companies’ choosing black spokespersons to promote their programs- to help more black people to get healthy, lose weight, and keep it off. But I fear that at the end of the day, not enough is being done to retain minority members, and even worse, I fear these companies don’t even care.
