Metrecal
Metrecal was a brand of low-calorie, powdered diet foods (to be mixed with water as a beverage) "containing the essential nutrients of protein, carbohydrate, fat, vitamins and minerals" introduced in the early 1960s by the
History
Founding
Mead Johnson had a long history of creating nutritional supplements for infants (Enfamil) and invalids, and Metrecal was seen as a logical progression into weight loss for the general public. Genster was the group director for nutritional specialties at Mead Johnson, which launched the product in September 1959, though it was unclear who conceived the original concept.[2] Food innovator Sylvia Schur's company provided consulting work on the product's development.[3] The name for the product was generated by an IBM syllable-scrambling program, that when "meter" and "calories" were entered, referring to the measured caloric intake of the diet, the name "Metrecal" was created.
Popular phase
Originally the product came as a powder (containing powdered
Many of those trying to subsist on 900 calories per day experienced
Forbes noted how "Metrecal moved out of the medicine cabinet toward the kitchen, the patio, the pool", while an article in a November 1960 article in Time magazine reported that it was being purchased by "growing hordes of Schmoo-shaped addicts who were insisting on guzzling their way to the vanishing point" who were joined by the royalty of Greece and Saudi Arabia.[5] In her 1963 book The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan lamented how women "ate a chalk called Metrecal, instead of food, to shrink to the size of thin young models".[6]
Decline
The fad started fading in the mid-1960s, when Peter Wyden, author of the 1965 book The Overweight Society, noted that "even reasonably steadfast dieters simply grew tired" of the monotony of drinking the shakes day after day, as well as copycat products, such as
References
- Newspapers.com. "Two new Mead Johnson and Company products will go on the market Monday — one of them a 'painless' weight control product, the other a low protein duplication of mother's milk."
- ^ a b c Martin, Douglas. "C. Joseph Genster, Marketer of Metrecal, Dies at 92", The New York Times, August 26, 2010. Accessed August 27, 2010.
- ^ Staff. "Corrections", The New York Times, October 28, 2009. Accessed October 30, 2023.
- ^ Owen, June. "Food News: Latest Rage For Dieters", The New York Times, September 20, 1960. Accessed October 30, 2023.
- ^ a b Staff. "Americana: The Theory of Weightlessness", Time (magazine), November 21, 1960. Accessed August 31, 2010.
- ISBN 0-7425-2236-9. Accessed August 31, 2010.
- ^ Wedemeyer, Dee. "Metrecal: A Shadow of What It Was", The New York Times, March 9, 1977. Accessed August 31, 2010.
- ^ Lyons, Richard D. "F.D.A. Warns Dieters About Liquid Protein; Commissioner, Citing 16 Deaths, Calls Potential Danger High", The New York Times, November 10, 1977. Accessed August 31, 2010.
- ^ Kleinfeld, N. R. "The Ever-Fatter Business Of Thinness", The New York Times, September 7, 1986. Accessed August 31, 2010.