WeightWatchers 2011 Annual Report Download - page 9

The global awareness of Weight
Watchers as a scientifi cally proven
solution to the obesity epidemic
continued to grow in 2011 with a
study published in The Lancet.
In order to maximize our appeal to men, we made
a version of Weight Watchers Online that was
customized to them. Through Weight Watchers
Online for Men, subscribers follow the PointsPlus
plan in a male-oriented online environment. They
can manage food intake, track their progress and
obtain meal suggestions as well as other information
– all tailored specifi cally for men. If they prefer
meetings, men can also use our male-oriented digital
resources through eTools and mobile applications in
addition to all of the benefi ts of group support that
meetings offer. In 2011, we began to market directly
to men. The Weight Watchers for Men campaign,
launched in the spring of 2011, communicated to
men that there was a way for them to lose weight
and that it is possible to eat real food in the real
world, yet still achieve a healthy lifestyle.
Following our successful pilot launch of our new,
modernized retail center strategy in Tampa, Florida
and St. Louis, Missouri, in early 2011, we began the
process of fully upgrading our entire North American
fi xed-retail center network. We expect to have much
of this upgrade completed by the end of 2012.
These better and more convenient retail locations,
combined with stronger center branding, will be
an important growth driver for us. We also believe
that it will create new service offering innovation
opportunities ranging from allowing weigh-ins during
non-meeting times to simple things like replacing fl ip
charts with fl at-screen TVs, further increasing the
appeal, modernity, and convenience of our meetings.
We are very proud of the progress we have made
in growing WeightWatchers.com with our various
technological innovations and customer facing
applications. These innovations are not only
helping us attract more members and subscribers
but also encouraging them to stay engaged with
our programs longer and achieve greater levels of
personal success. Meetings members are fi nding
that using our online tools on top of meetings
increase the effectiveness and enjoyment of the
program. We also see that our mobile applications
for iPad®, iPhone® and Android™ devices are
enabling members and subscribers to take Weight
Watchers with them everywhere. For example, we
now have a barcode scanning app, which easily and
quickly calculates PointsPlus values when you scan
a package’s barcode. Many members have told us
that grocery shopping has become tremendously
easier with this convenient mobile application.
And with the highly scalable nature of our
WeightWatchers.com platform, we are able to attract
to the brand a different segment of consumers by
having an offering with high convenience and a lower
price point that appeals to those consumers seeking
a less intensive form of help.
For many years, Weight Watchers has been a
program that was perceived to be primarily for
women. Yet we know that men suffer from the same
obesity-related health affl ictions as women. Given
this, we felt the opportunity to ensure that we were
the solution of choice for both genders by beginning
to more aggressively target the male demographic.