http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/1999/11/22/BU63541.DTL

Weight Watchers Sheds Y2K Problems

Los Angeles Times Monday, November 22, 1999 Weight Watchers International has a unusual recipe for trimming down its potential Y2K problems: It's getting rid of its computers.

The Woodbury, N.Y., weight- control business today will begin eliminating all electronic registers at its centers and revert to a manual record-keeping system.

Employees at hundreds of company centers will adhere to a strict regimen of pen and paper by December 19. Client attendance at meetings, merchandise sales and points earned, for instance, will all be noted on company forms kept in folders.

Industry analysts expressed surprise at the company's seemingly Luddite approach to the year 2000. ``Really! Oh, goodness,'' said Stephanie Moore, director of Giga Information Group of Cambridge, Mass., specialists in aiding large companies become Y2K compliant.

But Moore also said the measure makes sense. Advisers recommend that companies identify a variety of alternatives to deal with potential Y2K problems, ``and one of those strategies is manual.''

In fact, Moore said, companies that are less automated, such as manufacturers who wrestle with frequent breakdowns of outdated equipment ``have really good manual processes because they are used to using them.''

In contrast, she said, many high-tech companies face the potential of being frozen for weeks in the event of, say, a power outage.

Not so at Weight Watchers. ``It's real easy. It's real basic,'' said Wendy Yellin, spokeswoman for the company's 272 centers in the western United States. ``We just want it all changed back to the way it had been for a really long time.''

Yellin said the privately held company no longer needed to keep computerized records when it stopped selling its frozen-food line at centers in 1997. But many centers kept using the devices to track activities.

``We are Y2K ready,'' she said, adding that the company wanted to ensure that all systems would be ``go'' after January 1. At one center in Los Angeles this week, dozens of members lined up at the counter as workers recorded fees paid on a keyboard of an antiquated computer with a cash drawer. A sign taped to the counter listed class dates and times for employee training in the old methods of record keeping.

Asked if computerized records wouldn't be more efficient than hand tallies, one worker, who declined to be identified, said, ``I suppose it would be. But what can I say? We go with the flow.''

One food industry analyst said Weight Watchers' cautious approach is crucial, since the company's busiest season picks up after the holiday feasts end.

``This is one company that cannot afford not to operate in January,'' said John M. McMillin of Prudential Securities in New York. ``January is to Weight Watchers what April is to H & R Block.''

Weight Watchers was sold September by H.J. Heinz Co. for $735 million to Artal Luxembourg, S.A., a European private investment company. )1999 San Francisco Chronicle Page B2

-- Uncle Bob (UNCLB0B@Tminus38&counting.down), November 23, 1999

Answers

WeightWatchers, huh? Will they have food? I never thought about it before, but joining WeightWatchers for the new year might be the free market's way of providing food rationing. They might actually be quite busy.

-- JIT (justintime@rightnow.net), November 23, 1999.

From: Y2K, ` la Carte by Dancr (pic), near Monterey, California

Weight Watchers' ...busiest season picks up after the holiday feasts end. Oh, people will be watching their weight, alright, especially if they have a scale that doesn't require batteries. They'll be watching how it goes down and down and down, seemingly without any stopper. Yeah, they'll be watching their weight, and they won't be needing any special overpriced foods to do it, either. I really don't think folks will be looking for support and sympathy in any efforts to lose even more weight.

-- Dancr (addy.available@my.webpage), November 23, 1999.

MMMM! Plump, juicy people! all those who failed to prepare for y2k will know where to wait should they need to replenish their own fat content, outside of Weight Watchers! This brings to mind the old t.v. ads showing a more than well fed Sally Struthers pleading for donations of money for starving children. Heck, cook her up and she'd feed a family of eight!

-- Rich (rubeliever@webtv.net), November 23, 1999.

RICH:

K - O - O - L! I've never found anyone else to pick up on that irony -- never watch the boob tube but happened on that commercial a ways back. Reminded me: NEVER WATCH THE TOOB!

Bill

-- William J. Schenker, MD (wjs@linkfast.net), November 23, 1999.