What Are Herbalife Nutrition Clubs & How Do They Work?

Herbalife Nutrition is a well-known health and wellness company focused on creating a healthier population worldwide. Its nutritional supplements provide people with vitamins, nutrients, and energy to help them complete their exercise and nutritional goals, as well as providing their bodies with important nutrients.

Although the company is known for its shakes, supplements, and other food offerings, Herbalife has branched out in recent years. It offers skincare products, CBD products, and more – all focused on creating holistic, positive change for its members. The company also has a massive connection to its community, thanks to the help of Herbalife Nutrition Clubs.

Herbalife Nutrition Clubs are integral to the message of Herbalife Nutrition. Thousands of clubs exist around the globe, run by Herbalife independent distributors, bringing people in the community together towards a healthy, active lifestyle. However, Nutrition Clubs have not been around since the company’s start. Their creation and popularity go to show that Herbalife Nutrition’s independent distributors and customers are a vital part of the success of Herbalife, as well as the health of community members.

Herbalife Nutrition Clubs: Where They Began

Herbalife Nutrition Clubs have a multifold purpose. At their core, they are a way for Herbalife independent distributors to help their communities live healthy active lifestyles through coaching and science-backed nutritious products. Membership at Nutrition Clubs gives people the opportunity to meet others interested in improving their health, gives them access to individual portions of Herbalife products, and a place to work on their personal wellness goals. Nutrition Clubs often provide coaching sessions, weight loss challenges, community events, and more to nourish people physically, mentally, and spiritually. They reflect the company’s need to adapt to changes in healthy living.

Herbalife is no stranger to change. It has evolved its product offerings to fit with customer needs. Today, exercise and health goals often revolve around the community, but for several decades it was considered a personal pursuit. The first Herbalife Nutrition Club was started in 2004 in Mexico in response to a common issue faced by Herbalife Nutrition consumers. When the company was started back in the 1980s, it initially only offered full containers of its drinks and nutritional supplements. This came with the intent that consumers would utilize these bulk products and replenish their supply when they were out. What two independent distributors in Mexico found out, however, was that many of their initial customers could not afford this upfront expense.

So, the two team members created a registered spot where Herbalife customers could get individual servings of Herbalife products. To the pleasant surprise of the company, Nutrition Clubs took off successfully and allowed the company to reach more potential customers. The idea of Nutrition Clubs spread from Mexico globally. There are over 6,500 registered Herbalife Nutrition Clubs in the United States and even more worldwide. Independent distributors are integral to the successes of Herbalife Nutrition, and Nutrition Clubs wouldn’t have come to fruition without the help of independent distributors.

The Connection Between Nutrition & Wealth

Herbalife relies on its independent distributors to develop personalized programs for its customers. The company understands that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to health and wellness, and encourages their distributors to work with new customers on nutrition and exercise goals that work for them. The creation of Nutrition Clubs was a response to a community need, that being the need to make healthy nutrition options monetarily accessible to all in the community. The fact that access to healthy meal options is sometimes limited based on income is something that might have been missed by executive-level team members early in Herbalife’s infancy. Additionally, those in lower-income brackets may need the most help with nutrition due to demanding lifestyles and proximity to food deserts. Therefore, the solution Nutrition Clubs offered was in a large part in thanks to community-level members of Herbalife noticing problems and offering solutions.

It’s no surprise that affording healthy food can be difficult for those in lower-income brackets. Unfortunately, lower-income brackets suffer the most because of this. Many minimum wage jobs – like telemarketing—require long periods of sitting. For those minimum-wage jobs that do not require sitting, workers may not be inclined to take the time after hard shifts to do things like meal plan healthy meals. The combination of work-oriented lifestyles and limited access to fresh, healthy food can take a toll on lower-income communities. On top of this, leading a healthy lifestyle can be even more stressful when a person lives in a food desert.

Food deserts exist globally and are one of the leading causes of poor nutrition, health issues, and death among low-income communities globally. Food deserts are areas where there is limited access to fresh food, primarily due to transportation and store availability. Rural food desert communities may not have a grocery store with fresh produce in it for more than ten miles. In urban areas, there is no access to grocery stores or fresh produce for over a mile. On top of these factors, individual access to transportation and mobility may further limit access to food. In areas with limited produce at places like gas stations, produce is often market up to an unaffordable rate for financially strained communities.

Combine the lack of good, nutritious food with a lack of consistent, healthy movement in low-income communities and it is easy to see how health issues more disproportionately impact those who make less money. It’s also easy to see how individuals in lower-income food deserts might not be able to afford full canisters of meal replacement shakes, nutritional supplements, and other offerings from Herbalife Nutrition.

Herbalife independent distributors are often members of food deserts themselves trying to find a solution to the problems within their community. They see the impacts of food deserts and wealth inequality firsthand every day. Because of this, independent distributors are integral in creating personalized Nutrition Clubs to meet community needs.

How Does Having a Social Community Help You Meet Your Goals?

As a result, Nutrition Clubs have positively impacted those communities struggling the hardest with health goals. Studies have shown that working out with another person leads to more consistent results. Friends and community groups provide positive peer pressure for pursuits like meal planning, meeting nutritional requirements, and more. Additionally, having a community to turn to can give people the encouragement they need to get started on a health goal and stick with it.

Herbalife Nutrition so fully believes in the power of the community to change health goals that it recently partnered with the Canadian Nutrition Society to host a symposium highlighting diabetes prevention and childhood obesity-related research. The study recognized that those who are overweight and obese struggle with sticking with a diet and exercise plan. The reasons for their struggles are nuanced and not as simple as laziness. Those who do not fit into standard sizes may feel isolated and alone in their struggle to change their eating and exercise habits, leading to feelings of hopelessness. They may be tired of crash dieting to get results faster. They also may feel as though they do not have the time or support to make it happen. Unfortunately, eating well and exercising are pivotal to preventing diabetes and childhood issues.

During this symposium, Dr. John Foreyt outlined the process for making diet and exercise plans stick simply – The Four S’s:

• Self-Monitoring: Taking note of what you eat on a typical day, what exercise behaviors you already have, and where you can improve. Additionally, reviewing these behaviors to find places to make a change.
• Stimulus Control: Acknowledging and compensating for your behavioral triggers, such as stress eating and lack of exercise.
• Stress Management: Managing the stress factors in your life and taking action to deal with stress symptoms, which can lower cortisol levels and make it easier to exercise and eat healthily.
• Social Support: Having people in your life you can turn to when you feel as though you might be slipping, as well as having people who make doing healthy behaviors like eating nutritiously and exercising.

In many cases, people with health problems related to poor eating and exercise do not have one or more of these factors backing up their health goals. To address the current health and exercise pandemic, finding tangible and helpful ways to make sure people can meet these goals is the only way to become sustainable. Herbalife Nutrition Clubs help with these.

How Do Herbalife Nutrition Clubs Help Meet Health Goals?

The two independent distributors initially started these clubs to help get nutritious meal options provided by Herbalife to more people who couldn’t afford full-sized products. However, Nutrition Clubs have evolved into so much more than just an opportunity to eat and drink Herbalife products. They are a place where community members can come together and work on goals together in a safe space among people they know. Some of the other health perks that come from Herbalife Nutrition Clubs include:

• Nutritional resources and guidance provided by the company’s team of registered dietitians, physicians, and scientists.
• Weekly exercise activities and classes, which vary from club to club to meet the needs of the community
• Access to meal replacement shakes, nutritious drinks, sports nutrition and dietary supplements, and other products designed to support weight loss, wellness, or fitness programs
• Monthly challenges which help community members make it past plateaus and motivation issues

An essential part of Nutrition Clubs is their supportive nature. Real support, like the kind offered by Nutrition Clubs, makes a long-term difference in meeting health goals. Products like Herbalife’s Formula 1 Meal Replacement Shake can only solve one part of the health equation. To fulfill long-term health goals, groups like Herbalife Nutrition Clubs are a necessary and fun part of getting and staying healthy.