With the rising prevalence of lifestyle diseases, the need for constantly monitoring one’s diet becomes essential.Veer Ramlugonan, an avid fitness and healthy living advocate, is the founder and owner of the innovative WhatsApp-based human calorie counting service —The Food Analysts. This is supported by a team of nutrition experts that readily analyse every meal and are highly active on Whatsapp.
Ramlugonan shares on how this service will make customers experience a complete transformation of their bodies, without having to compromise on their health. Excerpts:
Q What was the inspiration behind The Food Analysts?
Believing in practicing what I preach, I’ve maintained a healthy lifestyle for several years, by regularly going to the gym and trying to eat healthy.
With a hectic work life, it is quite difficult to keep a track of your macros and calories, as it would require estimating portion sizes and breaking down each meal into its constituents, which is simply not possible most of the time.
This is precisely what led me to create The Food Analysts. Imagine how convenient it would be if there was someone tracking your food intake.
Q How does this service work?
This is an easy and personalised food coaching where the nutrition experts are available 24×7 on WhatsApp, ready to analyse every meal that a customer eats. This analysis is presented in the form of a report after calculating its nutritional content, and directly shared with the user, soon after they upload pictures of their meals.
You can sign up on the platform at www.thefoodanalysts.com, by providing basic details such as age, weight, height, food habits, and exercise routine. You can choose a monthly package or a yearly one. A registration fee of Rs 511 per month is charged for a year. Once you register, you can immediately get in touch with our nutritionists.
Q What makes The Food Analysts different from other fitness services?
Convenience, personalisation, and the human element are what make our service different from the rest. Unlike generic calorie counting apps or automated services, The Food Analysts grants user the ability to communicate with people on live chats who are qualified nutritionists, food coaches, and analysts who’ve been specifically trained to guide them towards accomplishing their goals, in a more sustainable way.
Based on your body profile, we provide you with your Unique Macro Requirements, and help you reach your daily target with constant monitoring and motivation.
Users always have a team ready to assist them, irrespective of their location or time. So be it your early morning breakfast or your midnight snack, we’re always ready, and equipped to guide you towards a healthy lifestyle.
Q Who is your target audience?
Being a global service provider, our target user base is made up of individuals from different walks of life. We have home-makers who require our services just to keep a track of their calories, as well as corporate professionals who are constantly working and need to keep a regular tab on their food options.
We also have professional bodybuilders, athletes, and sportspersons, for whom, having the right food at the appropriate time is the key to achieving their goals, along with constant training.
However, the majority of our users want to manage their weight and get as close as possible to the perfect figure. We believe that this can only be achieved by eating the right amount of calories at the appropriate time, along with a concise ratio of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins.
Q What were the difficulties you’ve faced in this venture?
The challenging business environment of emerging markets is one of the primary difficulties we’ve faced. With a plethora of generic and mediocre apps and services having crowded up the market already, it was a herculean task to tap the right target audience.
Additionally, the lack of knowledge and awareness about nutrition, along with misconceptions and myths about fitness formed as a result of misleading claims continued to plague our customers’ minds. Dispelling these unrealistic expectations was perhaps the hardest task of all.
Q How many nutritionists and professionals does the company currently employ to engage directly with users?
We currently have a team of 16 nutritionists and food analysts who come from their individually relevant fields of study, and are considered authorities in their respective areas of expertise.
Q What does the future hold for TFA?
TFA is currently focusing on expanding its footprint internationally. With technology and communication reaching unprecedented levels, we are rapidly emerging as pioneers in human-powered macro calorie counting, as well as food coaching.
We are slowly-but-surely growing to become an undisputed global
service for anyone looking to lose weight or gain muscle-mass, and are looking to expand our user base to over 1 lakh customers by the end of this year.