University of Central Florida Weight Watchers International Inc Case Study I want someone to write this report for meAnswer the three questions in a report

University of Central Florida Weight Watchers International Inc Case Study I want someone to write this report for meAnswer the three questions in a report way from the reading attached below The length should be 1000 words In the introduction you should summarize the important points from the text Make sure you read the rubric and do your best Thanks In your presentation you need to provide a summary of the case and then address the following
questions
1. What are Weight Watchers vision and mission? (Search online)
2. What internal resources and assets does Weight Watchers have that may give it a
competitive advantage?
3. How should Weight Watchers compete?
CASES
CASE
7
WEIGHT WATCHERS INTERNATIONAL INC. *
During 2013, Weight Watchers celebrated 50 years of
weight loss success. To mark the occasion, Weight Watchers created the 3608 program, which has been called the
“Points Plus program with a 21st-century makeover.” By
monitoring the amount of carbs, fats, fiber, and proteins in
the food choices people make on a daily basis, and using
current scientific research into why people eat what they
eat, Weight Watchers could help guide members toward
making healthier eating decisions in all sorts of situations.1
This 50-year celebration came after significant financial
gain as well. In 2011 Weight Watchers hit a new revenue
record of $1.8 billion.2 2012 saw a slight reduction in revenue but still beat all pre-2011 numbers.
Weight Watchers, while the undeniable industry standard, had lost some of its luster in recent years, as many
potential consumers considered it the prior generation’s
answer to weight loss or simply not the right weight-loss
choice for them. Aware of this stigma, Weight Watchers
had set out to reinvent itself. Originally started in 1963
by Jean Nidetch as a support group for women in her
home, Weight Watchers International Inc. had grown into
a multibillion-dollar weight-loss goliath in four decades’
time. In November 2010 Weight Watchers had introduced
the new PointsPlus system. This replaced the old caloriecounting system by considering where the calories came
from. Even though calories still counted, PointsPlus
encouraged people to eat a wide variety of healthy foods—
split between three meals plus snacks within an individualized calorie level. With a counting system based on dietary
guidelines, dieters were encouraged to maximize their
PointsPlus allowance by choosing more “Power Foods,”
the healthiest, most filling foods, such as whole grains,
lean meats, low-fat dairy, and unlimited quantities of fresh
fruit and nonstarchy vegetables.
Although doctors and nutritionists gave the Points
program (both the original and the subsequent Points
Plus version) a thumbs up,3 Weight Watcher’s CEO David
Kirchhoff felt it wasn’t enough. Citing evidence from
behavioral scientists, in 2012 Kirchhoff said he “realized
that Weight Watchers needed to take into account social,
environmental and behavioral factors that led members to
fail.”4 Weight Watchers had always believed in behavior
*This case was developed by Professor Alan B. Eisner, Pace University;
Professor Helaine J. Korn, Baruch College–City University of New York; and
graduate student Jennifer M. DiChiara, Pace University. Material has been
drawn from published sources to be used for class discussion. Copyright ©
2013 Alan B. Eisner.
change, encouraging people to be mindful of what they
ate, but just counting calories, as the PointsPlus system
did, was not enough. The 3608 program added two new
components to tracking caloric intake: “spaces,” which
included tips for how to handle eating situations in the different environments members might encounter, and “routines,” which encouraged members to create new habits
for themselves—for instance, changing just three small
behaviors a day such as walking an extra five minutes,
eating lunch at the same time, and drinking an additional
glass of water. These 3608 components—tracking, spaces,
and routines—were even available as apps on the Weight
Watcher website and Apple or Android mobile devices. By
adding the mobile apps and other online social networking support to the direct face-to-face support of the weekly
meeting, Kirchhoff believed Weight Watchers now had
a program that tied everything together and that people
would be willing to pay for it.5
The market for weight-loss products was growing and
obesity levels were on the rise in more and more parts of
the world, which made weight management an attractive
industry for firms, especially deeply entrenched firms such
as Weight Watchers. However, faced with increased competition from other weight-loss programs such as Jenny
Craig and the Biggest Loser franchise, Weight Watchers
had to increase customer value and seek new target segments to preempt the competition and stay on top of its
promising industry. In the highly competitive weightmanagement industry, Weight Watchers International
Inc. was in a position where it had to remain cognizant
of the major trends that had the potential to adversely
affect industry and firm profitability and revenues. Those
trends, as they related to Weight Watchers and the weightloss industry, included the temporary emergence of fad
diets, decreased effectiveness of marketing and advertising programs, the need for developing new and innovative
products and services, the development of more favorably
perceived or more effective weight management methods
(such as pharmaceuticals and surgical options such as the
Lap-Band), and the threat of impairment of the Weight
Watchers brand and other intellectual property.6
The challenge for Weight Watchers was repositioning
itself and creating a forward-focused diet plan for the 21st
century while staying true to the mission initially established by Jean Nidetch, Weight Watchers’ founder. The
brand needed to remain relevant and, at the same time,
pursue additional medium- to long-term initiatives, such
as reaching out to new market segments.7 How could
CASE 7 :: WEIGHT WATCHERS INTERNATIONAL INC. C29
Weight Watchers retain market leadership while staying
hip, relevant, and preemptive? While Weight Watchers had
made the effort to introduce new products for several years
and had been in the process of shifting its strategic focus
from narrow- to broad-based differentiation, the question
still remained whether the company could stay true to its
core values, mission, and models and, at the same time,
embrace effective expansion.
History and Expansion
Jean Nidetch began Weight Watchers in an unlikely, and
unintended, way. The origins of Weight Watchers started
when Jean invited six women into her home to help both
herself and her neighbors and friends lose weight by communally discussing their weight-loss issues. Nidetch’s
belief, which became the core of the Weight Watchers
philosophy, was that anyone could be given a “diet” but
the group and social setting of “talk therapy” was the true
component not only to losing weight but also to keeping it
off. She believed in fostering success through group support, and she created a simple reward system that included
pins and tie bars to reward increments of weight loss. The
idea was simple, yet very effective!8
The basic concept of the Weight Watchers plan consisted of two components. First, there was the Weight
Watchers program, and second, there was the group support. The program was essentially a food plan and an activity plan. The food plan was intended to provide people
with the educational tools they needed for weight loss as
well as to provide control mechanisms so that individuals could find their way to healthier food choices. The
company radically simplified the food selection process
involved in dieting by assigning each food a corresponding
point value, which eliminated the need to tally calories.9
In the past, Weight Watchers had been recognized more
for its food plan, but by 2012 it was getting noticed for its
activity and cause marketing plans as well. For instance,
Weight Watchers underwrote a policy summit initiated by
the Pentagon to address “the growing national security
threat posed by a shrinking pool of Americans lean enough
to serve in the military.”10
Nidetch had accomplished what she set out to do and
much more. Weight Watchers, originally targeting primarily
women, ages 25 to 55, experienced a rapid expansion. Of the
behemoth that Weight Watchers came to be, Nidetch said,
“My little group became an industry. I really didn’t mean it
to—it was really just a club for me and my fat friends.” She
continued by commenting on something a lecturer once said:
“It’s a place where you walk in fat and hope nobody notices
you, and four or five months later you walk out thin and
hope that everyone sees you.” Nidetch believed that the love,
information, companionship, and commiseration of fellow overweight individuals were the key components in an
effective formula many people needed to succeed at weight
loss. This idea had been perpetuated at Weight Watchers and
had been translated into meeting leadership—all employees
C30 CASE 7 :: WEIGHT WATCHERS INTERNATIONAL INC.
who lead meetings were formerly overweight individuals
who were successful on the plan.11
What Weight Watchers evolved into was a globally
branded company providing weight-management services
worldwide. By 2013, approximately 1.3 million members
attended almost 45,000 Weight Watchers meetings around
the world each week. Expansion and the onset of the dotcom era had inevitably led to the creation of WeightWatchers
.com, an Internet-based version of the Weight Watchers
plan. Weight Watchers was selling a wide range of branded
products and services, including meetings conducted by
Weight Watchers International and its franchisees (and the
products sold at the meetings), Internet subscriptions to
WeightWatchers.com, licensed products sold by retailers,
magazine subscriptions, and other publications.12 In addition, the company had put its name and point values on a
variety of food products sold in supermarkets, such as Progresso soups,13 and it had created a separate Weight Watchers menu for Applebee’s restaurants, among other things.14
WeightWatchers.com
In 2013 WeightWatchers.com was not only the leading
subscription-based weight-loss site on the Internet but also
the official website for Weight Watchers International Inc.
It offered information on the Weight Watchers plan, provided several paid and free weight-loss tools, and housed
a series of fitness videos, blogs, and interesting links.
Weight Watchers eTools, Weight Watchers Mobile, Weight
Watchers At Work, and ActiveLink Activity Monitor, all of
which could be accessed through the site, offered a variety
of tools, including an integrated, multifeature food diary
with a database of over 31,000 foods, along with their corresponding point values, a recipe database, a restaurant
guide, and a personal weight tracker.
Industry and Competitive Environment
Weight Watchers International Inc. had experienced
stock price volatility in the past, as had the majority of
its competitors, because of rival weight management
options—such as the over-the-counter weight-loss drug
Alli, launched by GlaxoSmithKline in June 2006, and the
development of Allergan’s Lap-Band device. However,
there had yet to be a widely supported “magic pill” or surgical option to weight management. In the absence of a
safe and effective pharmaceutical or surgical alternative
for weight loss, Weight Watchers and its competitors had
faced a weight-management industry characterized by not
only competition but great opportunity as well. Along with
expanding waistlines had come an expanding market for
weight-management companies, and the time had come for
such companies to be creative and innovative in sustaining
and increasing market positions. Only Weight Watchers
had been able to consistently fare well for decades in an
industry plagued with fad diets and “the next best thing.”
Obesity was on the rise in the developed countries,
especially in North America, and Weight Watchers was
well positioned to help consumers as they began their
weight-loss battles. In 2011, weight loss, including the
health and fitness industry, constituted a $60 billion-a-year
industry in the United States alone,15 and projections in
2012 showed total healthcare spending would increase
to as much as 19.6 percent of gross domestic product by
2021.16 Of course, dieting was discretionary spending,
so there was no way to estimate how much of that business Weight Watchers would gain. However, the Boston
Medical Center estimated 45 million Americans were on
a diet each year.17 Particularly noteworthy was the rise of
U.S. baby boomers as a significant proportion of the dieting population as they came to be more health conscious
and proactive in their weight management than prior generations had been, and they were looking for new ways to
gain control of their weight.18 The obesity problem was
not confined to the United States, however, and this made
geographic expansion a possibility for weight-loss firms.
Worldwide, the World Health Organization predicted
2.3 billion people would be overweight by 2015 and more
than 700 million would be obese.19 Overall, the statistics
proved there were tremendous opportunities in the weightloss industry, and these opportunities led many companies
to compete for business in this area.
Weight Watchers was attempting to reinvent itself while
still paying close attention to the moves of its weight-loss
rivals. Competition for Weight Watchers International Inc.
included both price competition and competition from selfhelp, pharmaceutical, surgical, dietary supplement, and mealreplacement products, as well as other weight-management
brands, diets, programs, and products.20 The main competitors for Weight Watchers had traditionally included Jenny
Craig, Slim-Fast, NutriSystem (Nasdaq: NTRI), The Zone,
South Beach Diet, and Medifast, as well as programs from fitness gurus such as The Biggest Loser star Jillian Michaels.21
CEO Kirchhoff believed that most competitors were
essentially in a different business than Weight Watchers
was. He said, “Most of the companies that are out there
aggressively marketing are in the business of providing and
delivering meals. Weight Watchers is in the business of helping people change behavior. So in that sense, we’re teaching
people how to fish, and they are selling people fish.”22
Over the years, Weight Watchers had consistently earned
the highest overall rating, according to various surveys,
because of its nutritionally based diet, weekly meetings, and
weigh-ins for behavioral support. According to Consumer
Reports, Weight Watchers offered dieters the best staying
power. Consumer Reports liked the fact that the plan did not
exclude any food group and that its points system encouraged low-fat, high-fiber meals. In the 2013 survey, among
the commercial plans, Weight Watchers was rated the top
plan overall. Medifast came in second with its low-calorie
meal replacements, followed by Jenny Craig. Nutrisystem came in last. Comments by survey participants were
that almost 20 percent of them didn’t like the taste of the
prepared foods delivered by these three competitors, and
about one in five dieters said the cost was higher than they
had been led to believe. In terms of weight lost, those on
Weight Watchers lost more weight than those on any other
diet except Medifast.23 Going into 2013, diets currently in
people’s minds included the competitors listed in Exhibit 1.
Trends going into 2013 included a growing interest
in vegetarianism and raw food, such as the “Flextarian” and Mediterranean plant-based diets, and the new
“Paleolithic” diet that required cutting out all processed
foods, eliminating any food that was not eaten before
the industrial or agricultural revolution. Whatever the
fad, nutritionists suggested that a diet that is easy to follow might be better overall, since “the more tedious a
diet is and the more work it demands, the less likely you
are to stick to it.”24 In the U.S. News & World Report
survey, Weight Watchers was voted the easiest diet to
follow and one of the best diets overall. Other diets that
had followings in previous years included the Atkins,
South Beach, Glycemic Index, and Zone diets. More
recent research had failed to conclusively prove that
these diets were actually good for heart health and diabetes control.25
One important factor in all these diets is the extent to
which they are do-it-yourself efforts. Many of the successful diets, including the DASH and Mayo Clinic diets,
required consistent self-control without any external support system. Obviously, Weight Watchers was different
there, as were Jenny Craig and Nutrisystem.
Another differentiating factor was cost. The cost of
plans where you buy your own food would depend, of
course, on a person’s food choices. The cost of the commercial plans also varied widely. Weight Watchers’ cost
depended on whether you chose to attend weekly in-person
meetings or use the online tools only. A monthly pass
to unlimited in-person meetings was $42.95, which also
included access to eTools. Or you could pay per meeting;
meetings were $12 to $15 per week, with a one-time $20
registration fee. To follow online only, a 3-month plan was
$65. None of the costs included food. With Jenny Craig,
the initial registration fee could exceed $400, and a week’s
worth of Jenny’s Cuisine might cost at least $100. Nutrisystem, which had basically fallen off the survey charts due
to complaints about costs and the poor taste of the food,
had a 28-day Select Plan, which included 10 days of frozen meals and 18 days of pantry food, and generally cost
between $300 and $340. Packaged diets such as Slim-Fast
didn’t have a personal support system, but food supplements could be customized to achieve a “satisfied feeling”
that reduced regular food intake. A 24-pack of shakes cost
about $35 and 24 snack bars cost about $17. One major
advantage Weight Watchers had was the extent of research
done into its results. Two studies published in 2012 found
Weight Watchers was just as good as clinical weight-loss
programs under a physician’s control and that some Weight
Watchers participants lost more than twice as much weight
as those following clinical advice.26 A physician from the
CASE 7 :: WEIGHT WATCHERS INTERNATIONAL INC. C31
EXHIBIT 1 Competitors for Weight Watchers
Diet Plan
Diet Type
Good for
Ratings*
Price
Comments
Weight Watchers
Commercial diet
Weight loss,
heart health
First for weight loss;
tied for third as best
diet overall
Membership costs less
than $40/mo.; buy-ityourself food is extra
Rated easiest to
follow
Jenny Craig
Commercial diet
Weight loss
Second best at weight Membership and food
loss (tie)
can run as high as
$400/mo.
Biggest Loser Diet
Commercial diet
Weight loss,
diabetes
Second best at weight Need to buy the book, Six-week program of
loss (tie)
$22, plus buy-it-yourself self-directed food and
exercise
food
Slim-Fast Diet
Commercial diet
Weight loss
Fair rating
$35 for 24 shakes
Easy to follow
Nutrisystem
Commercial diet
Weight loss, not
heart healthy
Fair rating
Meals cost up to
$340/mo.
Taste isn’t as good as
Jenny Craig meals
Medifast
Commercial diet
Weight loss
Good to poor rating;
hard to stay on it
Meals cost up to
$315/mo.
Need to supplement
with your own food
Overall healthy
eating
Third best diet overall Buy-it-yourself food;
fresh produce, olive oil,
and nuts are expensive
Plant-based, do-ityourself, easy to
follow
The Mediterranean Developed by Harvard
Diet
School of Public Health
Customized meal plan
plus weekly one-onone counseling
The Ornish Diet
Dr. Ornish developed for Heart health,
overall nutrition
diabetes
Third for heart health
and diabetes control
Buy-it-yourself food
Plant-based, from
book by Dean Ornish
The TLC Diet
Developed by National
Institutes of Health
Heart health
One of the best do-ityourself diets overall
Buy-it-yourself food
Stands for
Therapeutic Lifestyle
Changes
The DASH Diet
Government-developed
suggested eating plan
Heart health,
diabetes
First for heart health & Buy-it-yourself food
diabetes con…
Purchase answer to see full
attachment