Anthony Almada, B.Sc.03.01.07
Spirited Guide to Industry
The tug of war continues between faith, reality and dietary supplements.
ByAnthony Almada, B.Sc., M.Sc.
“How would you describe the industry?” she asked. “She” was a recent entrant into the nutraceuticals industry via an on ramp from the natural cosmetics toll road. She was a veteran of fashion marketing and brand architecture. She was at the same conference as I, both asked to offer our perspectives on the industrial world around us, from our respective vistas. She was in an industrial infant and I happened to be—for that moment, for her—an industrial sage. “The industry is built upon the sale of…[offer something memorable and pithy here, Anthony. Don’t play the worn tape that you have played to its magnetic limits]…evangelical goods.” Where did that come from? I have used the phrase “nutritional evangelists” since 1991. But evangelical goods? A smile of acknowledgement moved across her face as if she had just tasted a perfect glass of wine, after sampling several others that did not align with her palate. “That’s a great phrase. I understand,” she said.
The evangelists of the nutraceuticals industry abound—it is very difficult to avoid being infected by the viral capsule of faith-based claims. One of the archetypal evangelists several years ago was marketing a suite of products that were claimed to enhance female breast size. Oh, did the faithful arise and present themselves. But what was most interesting was the evangelical infection of the retailers, many of them women, who weakened and then finally yielded to the demands of the believers. Over a period of a few years, this product was given exalted treatment, altars and shrines being built for it in many stores. And the collection plate runneth over. And then a national broadcast television inquiry—and a failed clinical trial that was never to be revealed—led to its swift, but not swift enough, burial. “It was a pagan god—it wore robes of falsehoods!” cried many after its demise. But some of these same stone throwers were once believers—in the divinity of greed.
See and ye shall believe. In other words, see the before and after pictures and ye shall be healed. See and hear the beckoning, the words of wisdom, of divine inspiration on television and ye shall be transformed.
Weight Loss: the First Stop for Evangelists
The recent judgments against a quartet of weight loss marketers—including a pharma giant, and the spiritual womb of one of nature’s stepchild drugs, aspirin—reveal much about the separation of church and state, and the future state of evangelical goods. The state is ramping up its inquisition and the evangelists and their goods need be wary. Yes, the collection plate and coffers may enjoy a surfeit of offerings, and the believers may emerge, shape shifting into disciples and even zealots, but the finger of the “supreme being” will touch thee and strike thee down.
Which path doth the consumer take to heaven? More and more evangelical goods are being wrapped in ostensible layers of fact…and proof. “We are beginning a clinical trial on ‘product X’ in May, with results expected by October.” And all too often those results are never revealed, and remain buried in a crypt.
In the very early 1990s I recall an “evangelical goods zealot” offering to me a faith card on his special ingredient, comparing it to the standard form of this nutrient. “We have a high priestess at a prestigious university doing a clinical trial on our holy offering,” he said. A year had elapsed and this zealot received my faith call. “What happened to the clinical trial—the sacred ceremony where your product was being compared to the original deity?” He uttered a silent, weighted pause and then proclaimed, “The high priestess turned out to be unworthy.” The evangelism continued, unabated. Two years later the clinical trial was published in a nutrition journal of repute, its printing silent as the wind over a tombstone amidst the din of marketing and advertising claims. In its several pages were revealed the scriptures of truth. The evangelical good was proven to be somewhat inferior and unworthy of adulation, and at least, ungodly.
So I ask, who is building the stairway to heaven that endures? For now, no one.NW