STAMFORD, Conn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Walker Health Labs, designers of surprising commercial solutions that also make a difference for big social problems, over the holiday weekend launched foodtweeks, a free app that combines weight management with feeding the hungry.
Rather than relying on traditional calorie-counting, willpower-based strategy, foodtweeks supports a daily habit that is easy to do and is already shared by tens of millions of Americans.
“800 million times a day in America, weight-conscious individuals ‘tweek’ their food by making small changes that remove unwanted calories,” said foodtweeks founder Jay Walker. “For example, they ask for less mayo, drink diet soda, or buy a low-fat dressing. But they don’t weigh food portions or count calories when they do it.
“With foodtweeks, this approach is smarter, easier and more effective than ever,” said Walker.
Users simply tell the app what food they are thinking of buying, eating or preparing. The app instantly displays images of suggested “tweeks” that remove enough calories to make a positive difference – but not in a way that changes the taste or leaves users hungry.
foodtweeks maintains a crowdsourced picture database of more than 44,000 small changes that show users how to “tweek” everything from a particular brand of cheeseburger at a national restaurant chain, to grocery store purchases and homemade dishes of every kind.
“foodtweeks is not about telling you what to eat,” said Mr. Walker. “It’s about sensibly, and almost invisibly, removing unwanted calories from the foods you like...while doing good for people in your community at the same time.”
As an exciting extra benefit, every time a foodtweeks user tweeks her food, she helps feed the hungry. For every set of calories tweeked out of an item, foodtweeks makes a donation to a local food bank that provides the same number of nutritious calories to feed hungry families...at no cost to the foodtweeks user.
“For most people, just three tweeks a day is enough to make a positive impact on weight,” said Elisa Shannon, foodtweeks Executive Vice President of Partnership Development. “A couple of days of tweeking provides a full meal to a hungry family.” (Posting each tweek on Facebook or Twitter doubles the donation.)
foodtweeks is currently establishing working relationships with dozens of respected food banks from Connecticut to California, said Shannon, a former food bank executive.
foodtweeks is advertiser-supported. Users will be delighted to receive an ongoing series of free discount coupons for potential “tweeks” from restaurants, grocery stores, and packaged food manufacturers.
Advertisers will be excited about the opportunity to show off their lower-calorie choices at the precise moment of purchase – and a moment when many users are ready and willing to make a change to their core menu.
In addition, foodtweeks supplies invaluable data to advertisers by amassing a complete picture of what consumers buy, make and eat. This leads to unique consumer insights, ensuring that advertisers reach precisely the right audience at precisely the right time.
For the week following its launch (May 24th – May 30th), for each foodtweeks account created by a unique consumer, the company will donate two free meals to local food banks around the country.
“foodtweeks believes the reason most weight management efforts fail is because they work against human nature,” said foodtweeks founder Jay Walker. “foodtweeks is designed to work with people’s natural desires and behaviors. It’s fun to tweek your food -- and it’s even more rewarding when you know you’re feeding a hungry person every time you do.”
Mr. Walker, the inventor of foodtweeks, is also the chairman of Patent Properties and curator of TEDMED, the health and medicine edition of the famous TED conference. A noted entrepreneur, he has founded three companies that serve more than 50 million customers. He is best known as the creator of Priceline, which brought a new level of value to the travel industry.
www.foodtweeks.com
facebook.com/Foodtweeks
twitter.com/Foodtweeks
https://vimeo.com/55023578
