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Weight-loss giant Weight Watchers is relaunching itself for the Ozempic era. Six months after completing a Chapter 11 restructuring, the company is rolling out a revamped app and digital platform, a reimagined digital coaching experience, and a new brand identity. Its even bringing back its old, two-word name, Weight Watchers. (The company had changed its name to WW in 2018 and later styled itself WeightWatchers.) Weight Watchers pitch: Any telehealth company can get you a GLP-1 prescriptionincluding Weight Watchers itselfbut Weight Watchers has unique programs to keep you healthy and on track. Those offerings include coaching, fitness classes, and a menopause-care program that launched in September with Queen Latifah as its spokesperson. Weight Watchers has also created a new digital experience that will start rolling out globally on December 26. It includes an AI body scanning feature and what the company calls a Weight Health Score to help members reach a health goal beyond just shedding pounds. It’s always been obvious to us that we needed to show up differently as Weight Watchers in this next chapter, and that’s how we look, how we feel, how we speak, but also what we offer, says Tara Comonte, who took over as CEO in September 2024. Comonte, her senior leadership team, and the branding agency which created its new identity tell Fast Company exclusively: How new AI technology lets users focus on more than “a number on the scale” What chief experience officer Julie Rice brought with her from SoulCycle that’s reimagining Weight Watchers’ coaching product Why the cofounders of the creative agency Mrs&Mr sought inspiration from Weight Watchers founder Jean Nidetch What Comonte hopes the rebrand achieves across the company’s product offerings [Image: Weight Watchers] A new era for Weight Watchers Weight Watchers has had a tumultuous couple of years. As GLP-1s began upending the weight loss industry, former CEO Sima Sistani pivoted the company into telehealth and began offering GLP-1 prescriptions. Tara Comonte [Image: Weight Watchers] Following its acquisition of digital health platform Sequence, Weight Watchers launched a service offering virtual access to physicians who can prescribe GLP-1s. Sistani also apologized for the companys role in toxic diet culture. But Weight Watchers struggled to find its footing in a crowded telehealth market. With the stock trading at less than $1 a share last fall, Comonte was tapped to right the ship. (After serving as interim chief, she was appointed CEO in February 2025.) Comonte, who previously served as CEO of fertility tech company TMRW Life Sciences, oversaw Weight Watchers restructuring. The company filed for Chapter 11 protection in May in a prepackaged deal with lenders that helped it reduce its $1.5 billion debt load by more than 70%. Weight Watchers ended the third quarter of this year with 124,000 clinical subscribers, up 60% year over year. Clinical revenue grew 35% to $26 million. At the same time, the company recorded a 20% drop in subscribers to its traditional behavioral and coaching programs, from 3.6 million to 2.9 million people. Revenue for those programs dropped 16% to $145 million. Julie Rice [Image: Weight Watchers] Alongside SoulCycle cofounder Julie Rice, who joined as Weight Watchers chief experience officer in August, Comonte is on mission to drive behavioral subscriptions by communicating Weight Watchers larger suite of solutions to consumers who are being bombarded with ads for weight loss medication. Comonte wants to help members piece together a more personalized health journey and persuade GLP-1 users that theres value in Weight Watchers expansive offerings. Its been a siloed experience for members, which is often the case when companies make acquisitions. Things kind of get bolted on, says Comonte. She describes the new member experience as a very integrated one, where members can access the best of the tools and programming that Weight Watchers offers, whether it’s on medication, off medication, thinking about medication, perimenopausal, or menopausal. AI body scans and Weight Health Scores Under the rebrand, the companys dedicated GLP-1 medical progam, formerly known as WeightWatchers Clinic, is now called Weight Watchers Med+ and comes with a built-in lifestyle program, GLP-1 Success. The program provides access to coaches and virtual community groups. Members receive nutrition advice, strategies for managing the side effects of medication, and fitness plans to help build muscle even as they shed weight. (GLP-1 Success is also available as a standalone option.) Kim Boyd [Image: Weight Watchers] Under the direction of Chief Medical Officer Kim Boyd, who joined the company in June, Weight Watchers is adding an AI-powered body scanning function to track changes in fat and muscle. We’ve partnered with a vendor that has really cool new technology that lets us not just look at the number on the scale, but get a much more robust picture, Boyd says. [Were] thinking about body composition, lean muscle mass retention, which is really important in any weight loss journey, but especially when people are on GLP-1 medications. In addition, Weight Watchers is introducing something it calls Weight Health Score, which draws on body composition as well as things like nutrition, activity, and sleep, using data from connected fitness devices and health apps. (The company has expanded the devices and apps its software can connect with.) This will give members a sense of their progress towards their health goals, along with actionable advice, like getting more sleep or eating certain foods during parts of the menstrual cycle. With the Weight Health Score, we’re pulling in all of this data from their wearables, from their tracking patterns, from their food choices, and putting it into one metric that lets people know how they are doing with the actions that they take, Boyd says. Members will also have access to virtual fitness classes through partnerships with Pvolve, a low-impact strength-training company, and the Lifted Method, a program that combines strength training and mindfulness practices. On the digital platform, members will be able to select from three pathways. One, called All-In Mode, is designed to help members lose weight quickly. Lose Mode is most similar to Weight Watchers classic program and helps members develop habits that lead to consistent weight loss. Maintain Mode, helps veterans of the first two programs maintain their results and stay connected to other members and their coach. [Image: Weight Watchers] Introducing the Coach Creator Comonte says Weight Watchers is still committed to in-person meetings, which represent the majority of the 20,000 meetings a month that it runs. But the company is expanding its roster of digital programs and coaches. In many ways, the digital experience can be even more intimate, says Rice, who oversees the companys new community offerings. Taking inspiration from her experience scouting instructors at SoulCycle, Rice has identified younger, fresher, social media-savvy personalities to become what she terms Coach Creators for Weight Watchers. Rice joined the company after Weight Watchers acquired Peoplehood, the community wellness platform that she cofounded with Elizabeth Cutler, her SoulCycle cofounder. Peoplehood launched in 2023 with the goal of providing group therapy sessions to help attendees get better at relationships, but soon pivoted to become a support group for users of GLP-1s. [Image: Weight Watchers] Under Rice, Weight Watchers new coach-creators lead meetings, as well as offer tips, webinars, and lessons that users can access a la carte. They are also encouraged to post relatable content on social media. One example of a coach-creator is Olivia Ward, who won the 11th season of The Biggest Loser reality TV series in 2011. Ward had been a Weight Watchers member on and off in the ’90s before going on the show. (Growing up, she had also watched her mother attend Weight Watchers meetings.) The Atlanta-based Ward became a SoulCycle instructor before operating her own weight-loss coaching service with her sister. When Rice joined Weight Watchers, she brought both Ward and her sister on. Ward, who has been taking GLP-1 medication for the past three years, regularly shares posts about her life, outfits, and meal prep to her 28,000 followers on Instagram. [Image: Weight Watchers] Ward says shes ready to bring members into her life. I don’t ever want a weigh-in in the bathroom, because that feels cliché to me. So I’m going to do grop weigh-ins in my closet, she says. People are going to see my messy closet, all my stuff hanging out, and we’re going to take a moment to ground ourselves, get on the scale together, and then go into a group discussion. The content that I’m hoping to create is something that feels useful, tangible, relatable, and honest, Ward says. [Image: Weight Watchers] A joyful rebrand To refresh its visual identity, Weight Watchers tapped Kate and Daniel Wadia, cofounders of creative agency Mrs&Mr. They leaned into Weight Watchers traditional blue color in a bid to appeal to legacy members who may have felt whiplash from the recent series of rebrands. The agency also drew inspiration from the books and marketing materials published by Jean Nidetch, the Queens housewife who founded Weight Watchers in 1963. She was just a powerhouse, Daniel Wadia says. [Image: Weight Watchers] One of Mrs&Mrs big changes was reverting back to an upper-case font for the company. Weight Watchers had migrated to a lower case font, over the years, says Daniel. We love the fact that the origins were in this really proud, slender, tall, unifying upper case font. The simplicity of it just really spoke to us. Central to the rebrand are campaigns focused on the success stories of existing membersa different approach from hiring a celebrity spokesperson like Oprah to sell memberships. The Wadias worked with photographer Cameron McNee to shoot existing members for its latest campaign. The art direction is very editorial. It’s clean, it’s pared-back. We wanted to remove any distractions and place full focus on the members, so they could just shine, Daniel says. The campaign also features stories of members on GLP-1s to reduce the stigma around taking medication. The brand feels joyful. I hope that people begin to feel more comfortable to say that they are on different types of weight loss journeys, because people are getting healthier and they should feel proud of it, Daniel says. [Image: Weight Watchers] Beyond prescriptions Getting clinical members to take advantage of the companys community and coaching offerings is one of the main goals of the rebrand, says Comonte. While we have people cross-pollinating across all different parts of the [Weight Watchers] ecosystem, its not a huge number today. Were looking to build it up, she says. Conveying the scope of this ecosystem is crucial to getting Med+ members to stick with Weight Watchers beyond prescriptionsand key to distinguishing the company from other telehealth providers, like Ro and Hims & Hers. Weight Watchers has spent six-plus decades building unified programming and a unified platform that is wildly differentiated, says Comonte. This is not just another telehealth business, far from it.
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E-Commerce
President Trump just signed an executive order attempting to block states from regulating AI an unprecedented step that would strip states of the ability to protect their residents at a moment of extraordinary technological volatility. This move is overwhelmingly unpopular (polling has found that Americans oppose AI moratoriums by a 3-1 margin), and certain to be litigated in the courts. But it is also likely to achieve the exact opposite of its stated goalsdeepening mistrust and slowing AI adoption at a time when America wants to win the global AI race. We know because weve been here before. America has seeded many technological revolutions over the years, from electricity to automation to the internet. And in each of them we see a clear pattern: State-led regulation doesnt slow growth. It spurs it. If President Trump sincerely wants America to lead in the AI race, he should look to our nations past. Technologies that defined American leadership became safer, more trusted, and more widely adopted because states helped set guardrailsnot because Washington preempted them. Regulation paves the way When Henry Ford introduced the Model T in 1908, carmakers prioritized speed and sales over safety. Predictably, fatalities soaredover 33 deaths per 10,000 vehicles in 1913, compared to just 1.6 per 10,000 today. But then commonsense regulation met the moment: California launched its DMV, which became the mechanism for identifying and tracking both cars and drivers (1915), Massachusetts required auto insurance (1927), and by the mid-1930s, 24 states mandated drivers licenses. These rules did not deter innovation; they made it safer and more sustainable. Innovations like seat belts (1949) and airbags (standardized in the late 1980s), and taillights (by the 1930s, two taillights became standard in the United States) dramatically reduced fatalities, catalyzing safer, more trusted, and universally-used automotive technology. And in fact, the American auto industry flourished. By 1950, U.S. automakers produced more than three-quarters of all cars in the world, and General Motors remained the worlds largest automaker from 1931 to 2008. Safe, reliable cars didnt just replace existing modes of transportation, they made new things possible: lower-cost interstate trucking, suburbs, mobile economies, and a booming manufacturing revolution. Clear rules of the road applied to anyone who sold a car in the U.S., whether made at home or in Europe, Asia, or elsewhere. In short, automakers dominated from Detroit to overseas markets because regulation provided predictability for investors, confidence for consumers, and pressure for safer, smarter innovation. Now, the frontier is digital Weve experienced over 50 years of disruption and advancement in digital technology, yet foundational guardrails remain almost entirely absent. In this vacuum, tech companies have optimized for max engagement, not ethicsfueling a youth mental health crisis and dramatically eroding our information ecosystem by prioritizing conflict over truth. Startups, wary of reputational and legal risks, and deep-pocketed incumbents like Meta, are retreating into safer B2B offerings instead of consumer-facing breakthroughs. Investors are navigating uncertainty, making bets on products that could be banned or devalued dramatically overnight at the mercy of an individual judges ruling who may know little about technology. As we accelerate into the AI era at warp speed, we are doing so with a set of digital-era guardrails that are outdated, piecemeal, and in most cases, nonexistent by design. Where were going, we still need roads Just as automobile regulations guided innovation toward safety and scale, AI needs a parallel set of protections. Cars have mandatory seat belts and airbags; AI systems should have safety standards and harm-mitigation features. Cars have child car seat tethers and safety locks; AI should include comparable safeguards for vulnerable users. Just as vehicles must undergo crash tests, major AI models should be subject to basic auditing before deployment. And just as cars require insurance to manage and price risk, AI liability should be clarified, distributed, and broadly understood. Just as critical, state-level leadership should be welcomed and followed. Local experimentation builds the practical frameworks that federal law can later scale, and is as essential now as it was in the 1920s. And the market itself is already signaling the need for this transparency. As Anthropic president Daneila Amodei recently put it, No one says, We want a less safe product. He likened the companys disclosure of model failures to an automaker releasing footage of a crash-test dummy flying through a windshield. The visual is jarringbut when the result is better airbags and stronger frames, consumers trust the car more, not less. That dynamic builds markets and confidence and it makes innovation self-reinforcing. The choice is not between growth and guardrails. Its whether America will lead on AI and govern with the predictability and clarity that fuels investment, trust, and adoptionor whether we will gamble on laissez-faire promises that history tells us never deliver. If our goal is truly pro-growth AI, then state-led, commonsense regulation is not a roadblock. Its the on-ramp.
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E-Commerce
In recent years, organizations have launched neurodiversity and mental health initiatives with the best of intentions: to raise awareness, launch employee resource groups, and create a culture where team members embrace diverse neurotypes and learn to coexist in an ecosystem. Yet, neurodivergent employees still tell me the same thing: they feel misunderstood as they navigate masking, burnout, and eventually leave organizations that genuinely believe theyve done their best. So, whats missing? The gap isnt in policy or processits in our understanding of the emotional landscape inside the neurodivergent experience. Leaders may recognize ADHD or autism as concepts, but not the human realities beneath those labels. Yes, we need workplace adjustments. But emotional accessibility, understanding how neurodivergents make sense of themselves, their late diagnoses, and their internal worlds, is what creates psychological safety. True retention requires leadership that can speak the emotional language neurodivergents actually use. But what does that sound like when you put it into action? Were working in an identity economy Work is no longer just where we earn a living. Its where we look for meaning, compatibility, and emotional belonging. With rising adult ADHD and autism diagnoses, especially in among women aged 2349, many are reassessing who they are and where they fit. Neurodivergents are gaining a more accurate understanding of how their brains and nervous systems work, what supports their well-being, and how their backgrounds shape their behavior and stress responses. And their lived experiences are shaped by unique intersections of neurotype, culture, gender conditioning, trauma history, sensory thresholds, communication style, and current life demands. As neurodivergents gain emotional literacy about their inner world, they are also more sensitive to misattunement, and leaders who lack the nuance of neurodiverse experiences struggle to fully relate or to bring out their team members strengths. Emotional literacy is the missing link in neurodiversity strategy Many assume emotional literacy means naming emotions or staying calm. For neurodivergent people, its far more complex. Emotions often show up physically first: a tight chest during sensory overload, a blank mind when asked, What do you think? frustration triggered by emotionally charged discussions, shutdown after too many back-to-back meetings, or restlessness mistaken for anxiety. These are emotional cues that can inform, but in workplaces that havent learned to recognize them, they may be missed. Neurodivergent responses are tied to the nervous system. A fight response may be interpreted as a strong reaction, combative, or defensiveness. Flight shows up as withdrawing from contribution or needing space. Freeze tends to show up as going quiet or not being able to name thoughts or emotions. And fawn appears as people-pleasing, not necessarily agreement. Without emotional literacy, these cues get misinterpreted. When leaders understand these adaptive responses, they can support and connect, instead of correct. The double empathy problem still drives workplace conflict Misunderstandings between neurodivergent and neurotypical colleagues rarely stem from a lack of empathy. They may come from different ways of communicating, interpreting tone, or sensing threat. A manager for instance, may read directness or lack of eye contact as rudeness, when in reality its a neurodivergent colleague unmasking so they can think clearly. A neurodivergent employee might interpret vague feedback as rejection, while the manager hasnt given it much thought. A leader may perceive intensity as aggression, when the employee is simply overwhelmed. And, in an open-plan office, a colleague raising their voice at another colleague, not out of hostility but because theyre reaching meltdown, which is then followed by shame later. Emotional literacy bridges these gaps before they escalate into conflict or disciplinary action, which, if were honest, is so condescending when applied to a fully grown adult. Cultural intelligence (CQ) matters more than ever Emotional literacy without cultural literacy is incomplete. Our stress responses, boundary styles, and communication rhythms are shaped by culture as much as neurotype. A British-Asian woman may internalize distress, because it was normalized in her culture to tolerate and keep going. A Black autistic colleague may mask to avoid stereotype threat that theyve been preconditioned to expect. The future of leadership requires the ability to read across identities and not treat neurodiversity as a single story. So, what does emotional accessibility look like in practice? Here are shifts that transform workplaces more than any awareness campaign: 1. Respond to nervous systems, not behaviorWhen we can see a stress response, what information can we derive from this, and how can we best support a neurodivergent employee? 2. Reduce cognitive loadProvide agendas early, enable longer processing time, and avoid rapid changeover to give the brain time to switch gear. 3. Normalize setting boundariesSo others feel safe to do the same, model phrases like:Lets slow this downI need a momentIll come back to you on this 4. Respect sensory needsNoise, lighting, heat, pace, and unpredictability all shape neurodivergent employees well-being and performance. 5. Read early signs of burnoutNotice when team members withdraw, go quiet, are slower with their responses, or increase masking, as these are signs of misalignment, long before they collapse. 6. Make emotional literacy a core leadership skillUnderstanding the emotional language of the nervous system is the prerequisite to building safe relationships. This isnt soft, it is aligned with the reality of todays workforce. The real future of inclusion is relational To support neurodivergent employees, organizations must move beyond awareness toward something deeper and more human: the ability to read, respect, and respond to the emotional and sensory realities of the people they lead. Emotional literacy creates teams where neurodivergent employees dont have to pretend to feel safe, they genuinely experience it. It creates workplaces where difference becomes a source of insight, because prioritising emotional accessibility benefits every mind. Thats the shift that liberates people and transforms cultures.
Category:
E-Commerce
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