The new battle of the bulge

Published on Thursday 15 January 2004 00:00

It’s tough at the top and, as anyone who’s ever ascended the greasy pole knows, difficult to remain there.

This is a mantra more commonly applied to footballers, film stars and politicians, but it would seem that it is also followed by the diet industry.

The weight loss programme of Dr Atkins, who died in April aged 77 after a fall, became nothing less than a cultural phenomenon last year, with a reported one in ten people slavishly following its instructions.

However, a backlash of sorts and competition from the latest Hollywood slimming guidebook, The South Beach Diet, has resulted in an Atkins advertising campaign.

Full page colour adverts have been placed in several national newspapers to reinforce the Atkins message. With the strapline - "There’s nothing to eat on Atkins except..." the company hits back at criticism that the diet plan is too meat-heavy, by featuring a dozen pictures of fruit and vegetables which are all acceptable for consumption by devotees of the diet regime.

Not content to rest on its laurels as 2003’s book of year, the Atkins revolution also has new products to push for 2004. Despite selling 826,000 copies of the original book, Dr Atkins: The diet revolution, the Atkins conglomerate has already published a new volume this year.

Atkins Made Easy went straight to number three in the bestseller lists when it was released on 5 January, and a range of muesli bars and milkshakes have also been introduced. Shunning carbs was the road to gorgeousness last year with the likes of Jenifer Aniston, Rene Zellweger and Robbie Williams admitting they had used Atkins, but just as it seemed that no other diet plan would do, the Atkins backlash began.

Doctors claimed that the diet was nutrient-deficient and far too high in fat. Alternative eating plans which incorporated the low carbohydrate philosophy but moderated the protein demands of Atkins - including the Zone diet - began to receive the media coverage, previously reserved for Dr Atkins.

This was combined with high profile criticism - the former Brookside actress Claire Sweeney blamed Atkins for contributing to her collapse from a kidney infection, and Catherine Zeta-Jones threatened to sue over newspaper stories linking her to the diet.

It might take more than a few adverts to keep Atkins at the top of the best-seller lists this year.