To drop the "freshman 15," many college students have, at some point, jumped on the diet bandwagon.
Atkins was the rage in 2004, as students tried to cut carbohydrates to drop pounds. Just a year later, however, the diet has fallen out of fashion, and Atkins Nutritionals, Inc. has filed for bankruptcy.
When the low-carb trend was peaking, Tufts incorporated low-carb breads and wraps into the dining halls.
There was also a significant decrease in bread and baked goods consumption on-campus, Dining Services Nutrition and Marketing Specialist Julie Lampie said. "We estimated at least a ten percent decline," she said.
Even as the University added foods to accommodate dieters, Lampie was skeptical about whether the trend would last. "Since I did believe, and correctly so, that the Atkins and similar diets would be short-lived, we did not make any changes in our menus," she said.
Bread consumption this year has returned to previous levels. Lampie said this mirrors consumption nationwide.
Now that the low-carb diet has gone the way of the cabbage, low-fat and other diet trends of the past, experts are weighing in on why it failed.
Some said it was too restrictive to follow long-term. "People tire very quickly of being told what they can and can't do, like being told you can't have bread, pasta and pizza," Marcia Mogelonsky, a senior marketing analyst at Mintel International, told the Monterey Herald.
Tufts Economics Professor Lynne Pepall has another theory on the downward spiral of the Atkins brand. "This industry has a lot of misleading and misinforming tactics which makes it difficult to have a brand with any credibility," said Pepall, who has studied branding. She cited a recent lawsuit against Kentucky Fried Chicken for marketing their products as "low-carb" as an example.
The primary reason for Atkins' trouble, Pepall said, is competition. "Other companies can produce a cheaper product and there is no way to protect [Atkins] - anyone can come up with a version of Atkins," she said.
The Atkins Nutritionals Corporation filed for bankruptcy this past July, owing lenders an estimated $300 million dollars. The diet was created in 1981, but found its recent widespread popularity after Dr. Atkins published a second edition, "The New Diet Revolution."
Alice Lichtenstein, senior scientist at Tufts' Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging, said that the popularity of Atkins was a result of the idea that people could eat as much "low-carb" food as they wanted.
"It sounded great! People could eat all the forbidden foods and lose weight," said Lichtenstein. The Atkins Diet allowed substantial meat portions. Lichtenstein said the diet was based on the idea that lowering carbohydrate levels would force the body to burn fat.
For many students who attempted to adhere to low-carb diets during the trend's popularity, cutting out entire food categories proved to be difficult in the long run.
"For the first two weeks, I was moody and hungry," said junior Amy Helms, who followed the South Beach Diet, a low-carb diet similar to Atkins. "I did it for three months until I basically decided it wasn't worth it."
A typical day in the life of Helms' diet plan looked like this: breakfast was eggs with vegetables and Canadian bacon. A mid-morning snack followed, which usually consisted of celery and low-fat Laughing Cow cheese. Lunch was often a lettuce wrap filled with tomato, cheese and dipping sauces. Apples and peanut butter were common afternoon snacks, and a chicken breast or pork chop with vegetables was a usual dinner.
The downside to this diet regime, according to Helms, was portion size. "I was always hungry," she said.
Lichtenstein, co-author of "Strong Women, Strong Hearts," along with Director of Tufts' John Hancock Center on Physical Activity and Aging Miriam Nelson, said the true secret to weight loss is cutting calories. "There is no magic formula or combination," she said. "People need to make fundamental changes - they don't have to be drastic."
But Lichtenstein said the desire to believe in easy fixes is strong. "The public got snookered again," she said. "And they will wait for the next easy fix to come."
