Acai Diet Scams

Dieting is a huge market year round but we’re now moving into the time when the market is flooded with new diet products.  Summer is right around the corner and people are concerned about looking good with less clothing.

It’s also a time when the scams are in full bloom (scam is not a flower) and I want to let you in on one of the new ones.

 

 

 

 

Tapping Into Your Feelings

Dieting is such an emotional issue, that when it can be linked to a popular buzzword it makes it so easy to market.

Right now Acai is that word and the market is being flooded with expensive ineffective products using Acai as the launching pad.

This is how marketing works.  You take a word that has high recognition and tie it into a product and people feel comfortable with it.

It’s kind of like using a celebrity you don’t have to pay.

Ginseng is used that way.  It’s in numerous energy drinks because it’s an herb that people have heard of.  The formula may stink and there probably isn’t any active ingredient in it but it sells.

It’s Called Advertising

Now we have Acai, a new fruit from the rainforest. Acai is the new kid on the block for antioxidants and it does have a lot of them.

Its ORAC value, the system by which antioxidants are judged, is really high and I’m sure it’s good for you.  High ORAC is a good thing but not necessarily always the way to judge a product.  For instance Acai may have a much higher ORAC value than Vitamin E per dose.

The difference is that if you never have Vitamin E in your system you’ll die and if you never have Acai you’ll probably live a normal life.

See the difference?

I’m not saying Acai isn’t a great food but it belongs to a class of antioxidants that come from fruit and can be replaced by numerous other things in your diet.

In fact there’s nothing in it that can’t be found elsewhere.  It’s a good thing though and if you like it then continue using it.  The problem comes from companies who promise you amazing benefits from consuming one single nutrient.  There is no reason to spend your whole nutritional budget on one nutrient when you should be looking for something that supplies you with a whole variety of nutrients.  Acai  is an amazing product, but you shouldn’t have to spend you whole budget on it.

There are just better ways to spend that money on a nutritional program that includes Acai. But it’s a real stretch to use it as a diet supplement.

Taking the Plunge

I decided to try one of those products to see what it actually is.

This is the first problem.  You can’t actually see what your buying until you receive it in the mail.  I don’t need a diet product but I had to order it to investigate.

Never buy a nutritional product unless you can read the label or you’re going to write about it on your website.

I bought the ACAI NONI Slimming Blend.  I chose that one because it used Dr. Perricone as part of the marketing.  He is a Yale medical doctor and author so I thought maybe it was slightly legit.  This doesn’t mean he actually endorsed it because it could have been written in a way to feed off his name.

If he is involved then he should be ashamed.

So Here’s How It Works

The offer is for a free bottle for $1.95 to cover shipping.  The regular price is $79.95 per bottle, a 1-month supply.  If you read the fine print it says you have 12 days to call and cancel the product or you will be billed $79.95 each month until you cancel.

That’s not 12 days after you get it but 12 days from the moment you order it. This is really the brilliant part of the scheme.

It took me 5 days to get the product.  So let’s say on the morning of the sixth day I would be trying it.  That means I really only have 5 days to see if it works before I’m billed for another one. That really isn’t enough time to judge a diet program and so you’ll probably let them ship you another bottle.

Now you’ve spent another $79.95 and you still don’t know if it’s going to work.

Now if you cancel after buying 1 bottle at full price your only in for $79.95 +shipping.  This is probably the average expenditure of people who buy this product.  It doesn’t matter if you missed the cancellation date or decided to try it for a month.  This is really the basis for the whole plan.

You see if 100,000 people do this sales are $7,995,000. These sale numbers for a company using known medical doctors and famous authors are not a fantasy but are probably low estimates.

It gets better though because I haven’t told you about the actual ingredients.

What’s Really In It?

You see I wanted to read the label.  That’s how I understand things.  This product has only 300mg of Acai, 20mg or Resveratrol, 200mg of Noni, 200mg of Green Tea Extract (EGCG).

Nice ingredients if it sold for $19.95 or $29.95 and it worked. I know the only thing that makes it work is the Green Tea caffeine.

Being a product formulator I know the Acai in this product cost less than 40 cents for the whole bottle.  If this product cost more than $1.75 for the whole bottle I’d be shocked.  I’m talking about ingredients, bottle and label.

So the cost of goods for almost 8 million dollars in sales is around $175,000. Wow!!!!!!Wow!!! (It really deserves 2 wows)

This isn’t a product designed to help people, it’s just designed to make money.

I wouldn’t be surprised if they sell a million bottles of this stuff.  Internet marketing is huge and the turnover of customers is an awesome thing to behold.  Plus they are dealing with customers who are buying more with their emotions than needs.

I’m sure they know the life of this product is probably 1 year before it fizzles and they hand it off to someone else or it ends up in WalMart for $19.95. It’s all in the business plan.

We All Suffer

I’m not opposed to this product being on the market because it’s all free enterprise. Even at $79.95 it wouldn’t be so bad if it worked. I just don’t think it will and even if a few do lose weight it’s probably related to other factors—this is not a great weight loss product.

In fact the Green Tea does actually help you lose weight but the Acai is the name that pulls you in.  I wouldn’t be surprised if this product sells close to 80 million dollars before it disappears.

What I really hate is that thousands of people will think that herbs and nutrients don’t work,  they’ll think that the nutrition industry is all fake and it gives the FDA ammunition to blast away at the Natural Products Industry.

Just so you know I canceled mine around day 9 so hopefully I won’t be charged the full price. Of course there’s no guarantee that I won’t end up in a battle to get it off my card.

This is another good lesson in buying from companies you know and trust. The products are usually good and if you need help there’s always someone available.

If you want some good Acai to add to your shakes or to make juice check this out.  It might not shrink your waistline but your wallet won’t lose much weight either.

Certified Organic Acai Powder

Make sure you use my personal Coupon Code:  ZAC041 – If you are a first time customer you will get $5.00 off your order. Feel free to use my personal coupon code with anything you order from iHerb.

 

Blessings,

Roger

 

Next Up: TO SOY OR NOT TO SOY—IS THAT THE QUESTION?