Weightwatchers, a 62-year-old healthcare and well-being company that has had to deal with fierce competition from new drugs and weight loss programs, applied for a bankruptcy on Tuesday in an attempt to reduce his debt with more than $ 1 billion, while it is expanding its telehealth activities.
In his heyday, weightwatchers formed how millions of people ate and exercised in the United States and beyond. Oprah Winfrey was once a spokeswoman and board member.
But the company has difficulty keeping its customers while people turn to weight loss medicines, fitness apps and influencers of social media.
Under a bankruptcy plan that has been submitted in Delaware, weightwatchers are taken over by a group of investors, according to the application. Existing shareholders will retain a 9 percent interest as soon as the process is completed within around 45 days and the company will continue to work.
The changes “will give us the flexibility to speed up innovation, to invest again in our members and to lead with authority in a rapidly evolving weight management landscape” rack.
Weightwatchers was founded in New York City Door Jean NidetchAn entrepreneur who had dropped 72 pounds by sticking to a strict diet with the support of her friends. She charged Dieters a fee to attend periodic meetings, where they were encouraged to keep track of what they ate and to motivate each other.
The company evolved by adding a training regime and a point system that has quantified the right food sections. Now it offers weights and fitness coaching on its mobile app and website.
In 2022, the company paid a fine of $ 1.5 million as part of a settlement after the federal trade committee said that the Weight loss app Because children had collected personal information from minors illegally. Pediatricians criticized the app and warned that weights programs for children can lead to eating disorders.
In recent years, the company has also opposed the rising demand for Ozempic” Wegovy” Zepbound And other medicines that help people partially lose weight by suppressing the appetite.
Weightwatchers in 2018 as WW International renamed an attempt to broaden his focus than weight loss. In 2023, the sequence, a subscription based TeleHealth platform, acquired and started offering medication with weight loss.
The last winning report from the company on Tuesday showed that his income from its clinical activities, including prescription medicines, had grown by 57 percent on an annual basis. But the income from the first quarter had fallen by 10 percent.
The Coronavirus Pandemie resulted in a significant decrease in people who attended personal weight watchers meetings, so that the company was asked for Reduce the number of meetings It offered.
Weightwatchers has also lost one of the most prominent spokes, Mrs. Winfrey.
She joined his plate in 2015 and attributed weightwatchers to help her lose 40 pounds. But last year, months after she announced That she used a weight loss medication, the company said she was leaves.
Months later, the shares of weight watchers, which had risen to around $ 100 in 2018, a Penny share. They closed on Tuesday at 79 cents.
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