Writer's Block: Hocus pocus
Dec. 4th, 2009 10:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Ah, here's a chance for me to share my experiences using and endorsing Body Solutions for weight loss while I was on the air in Dallas.
Most jobs in radio have really low pay...but you get a lot of freebies! Businesses that advertise on the station will often provide samples (free food brought to the station, one advertiser gave the whole morning show laser whitening), certificates, discounts, and such (I miss walking into Fat Mo's and Mo or Shiva giving me a free roast beef sandwich or burger). Then there is the payday of landing a "live spot" for a product. Not only do you get the product for free, you also get paid to do the spots. In Dallas, I was the only person on the morning show that needed to lose weight, so when the folks at Body Solutions was looking to advertise on KLIF, I was the lucky guy.
At the time, Body Solutions was saturating radio with ads and DJ/host endorsements. Only loser stations in a market didn't have a deal with Body Solutions. When the company's marketing head had his first conversation with me, he stated that I was to take the products and wait until I had lost at least 8 pounds before going on the air to talk about it. While he insisted on waiting until I lost 8 pounds, he contacted me every few days to see if I had lost the weight yet.
Here is what the Body Solutions package included:
* The core element - the Body Solutions bedtime potion was to be taken right before going to bed. However, before taking that solution, you were to cut off eating food and drink (other than water) for 2 hours before bed.
* Powder for making some "vanilla" or "chocolate" shakes. This included a pamphlet that provided ways to use Gatorade with the vanilla for a orange sherbert flavor, among other ideas.
* cheap pedometer
* Instructions to drink, at least, 6 glasses of water a day
It took me a little over 2 weeks to lose the 8 pounds and to start doing my on-air ads. After a couple of months, I had plateaued at around a 15-17 pound loss. But as my weightloss slowed, the marketing guy from Body Solutions kept suggesting ways to alter my pitch: where I had previously focused on the pounds lost, I now switched to focusing on inches lost; after a few weeks of that, he told me to talk about how I felt about the weight loss or what others had told me; but he was always persistent about air-checking the ads and trying to get the most out of his ads. This obsessiveness started to rub Darrell.
As I was losing weight, I knew that much of my initial loss of weight was due to the fasting for two hours before bed and my dramatic change from drinking juices/Gatorade to drinking mostly water. The shakes, while not the tastiest shakes, were a nice supplement that did a great job of keeping me away from solid food. The big question and what I started to feel more and more was the crucial part of if I was ethically okay with the endorsement was the effectiveness of the nightly solution. When I hit the plateau, I figured that most of the weight loss had to do with my lifestyle changes. I started to lose confidence in the product and the Body Solutions marketing guy was coming across more and more like a used car salesman.
Finally, the shit started hitting the fan for Body Solutions. The company was having financial problems AND they were under siege from a deluge of lawsuits and consumer complaints. When they dropped their advertising, I was relieved. When we received a call about our endorsement of Body Solutions, Darrell and I discussed the situation on the air. I talked about how I did, in fact lose weight. We discussed what was happening behind the scenes with the marketing guy. Then we wrapped things up by stating that none of us had any desire to do ads for a product like that again. Did I lose weight while I was doing the Body Solutions program (product + lifestyle change)? Yes. Was I certain how much of that could be attributable to the Body Solution product as opposed to the lifestyle changes? As time went on, I was less convinced the product was key. However, doing the Body Solutions program helped me to make a lifestyle change I had long contemplated but procrastinated on. Was the product and program worth the price? I no longer thought so.
BUT, when Body Solutions stopped advertising, I did go to the sales person that dealt with them and took a couple of her spare bottles of the Body Solutions nighttime potion and some vanilla shake powders.
Ah, here's a chance for me to share my experiences using and endorsing Body Solutions for weight loss while I was on the air in Dallas.
Most jobs in radio have really low pay...but you get a lot of freebies! Businesses that advertise on the station will often provide samples (free food brought to the station, one advertiser gave the whole morning show laser whitening), certificates, discounts, and such (I miss walking into Fat Mo's and Mo or Shiva giving me a free roast beef sandwich or burger). Then there is the payday of landing a "live spot" for a product. Not only do you get the product for free, you also get paid to do the spots. In Dallas, I was the only person on the morning show that needed to lose weight, so when the folks at Body Solutions was looking to advertise on KLIF, I was the lucky guy.
At the time, Body Solutions was saturating radio with ads and DJ/host endorsements. Only loser stations in a market didn't have a deal with Body Solutions. When the company's marketing head had his first conversation with me, he stated that I was to take the products and wait until I had lost at least 8 pounds before going on the air to talk about it. While he insisted on waiting until I lost 8 pounds, he contacted me every few days to see if I had lost the weight yet.
Here is what the Body Solutions package included:
* The core element - the Body Solutions bedtime potion was to be taken right before going to bed. However, before taking that solution, you were to cut off eating food and drink (other than water) for 2 hours before bed.
* Powder for making some "vanilla" or "chocolate" shakes. This included a pamphlet that provided ways to use Gatorade with the vanilla for a orange sherbert flavor, among other ideas.
* cheap pedometer
* Instructions to drink, at least, 6 glasses of water a day
It took me a little over 2 weeks to lose the 8 pounds and to start doing my on-air ads. After a couple of months, I had plateaued at around a 15-17 pound loss. But as my weightloss slowed, the marketing guy from Body Solutions kept suggesting ways to alter my pitch: where I had previously focused on the pounds lost, I now switched to focusing on inches lost; after a few weeks of that, he told me to talk about how I felt about the weight loss or what others had told me; but he was always persistent about air-checking the ads and trying to get the most out of his ads. This obsessiveness started to rub Darrell.
As I was losing weight, I knew that much of my initial loss of weight was due to the fasting for two hours before bed and my dramatic change from drinking juices/Gatorade to drinking mostly water. The shakes, while not the tastiest shakes, were a nice supplement that did a great job of keeping me away from solid food. The big question and what I started to feel more and more was the crucial part of if I was ethically okay with the endorsement was the effectiveness of the nightly solution. When I hit the plateau, I figured that most of the weight loss had to do with my lifestyle changes. I started to lose confidence in the product and the Body Solutions marketing guy was coming across more and more like a used car salesman.
Finally, the shit started hitting the fan for Body Solutions. The company was having financial problems AND they were under siege from a deluge of lawsuits and consumer complaints. When they dropped their advertising, I was relieved. When we received a call about our endorsement of Body Solutions, Darrell and I discussed the situation on the air. I talked about how I did, in fact lose weight. We discussed what was happening behind the scenes with the marketing guy. Then we wrapped things up by stating that none of us had any desire to do ads for a product like that again. Did I lose weight while I was doing the Body Solutions program (product + lifestyle change)? Yes. Was I certain how much of that could be attributable to the Body Solution product as opposed to the lifestyle changes? As time went on, I was less convinced the product was key. However, doing the Body Solutions program helped me to make a lifestyle change I had long contemplated but procrastinated on. Was the product and program worth the price? I no longer thought so.
BUT, when Body Solutions stopped advertising, I did go to the sales person that dealt with them and took a couple of her spare bottles of the Body Solutions nighttime potion and some vanilla shake powders.
