ATKINS RUNNING SCARED

Well, not Dr. Atkins himself, of course - he's no longer running anywhere after *cough* slipping on that ice. But the company that bears his name, knowing that the jig is up and that the recognizble name is all it has going for it, is holding onto that precious name while changing the basis of the diet itself. As this widely reproduced article puts it, Atkins Nutritionals, which championed a dieting craze that made millions of Americans shun bread and other carbohydrates, wants a do-over. Lots of good lay-it-on-the-table quotes in this latest saga: food analysts "say the bloom is off the rose for low-carb names like Atkins, as consumers have dismissed it as a fad that got rid of weight at first, but was unsustainable." And Bob Goldin of the food industry research firm Technomic notes that "What Atkins is saying is that this is the new way of doing things, which is the same as saying the old way wasn't that good." And in this piece on the company's embarrassing liquidation of its British subsidiary ("following poor sales"), Sian Harrington of the food trade magazine the Grocer sums up the elemental story: "Once they started trying to flog their own products, consumers asked whether it was a money-making machine rather than a proper diet." Gee, ya think?

UPDATE: I guess it's official now: "Ding dong, the craze is dead."