Acai berry extract is the new diet sensation that threatens to eclipse the popularity of previous weight loss promises. Some users swear by it, but others swear at it.
Either way, it has been pushed, promoted and pitched through an elaborate array of infomercials, pseudo-news and look-alike media reports and celebrity endorsements. Most of the information turns out to be false or exaggerated.
Acai has an undisputed shrinking effect, on peoples wallets. While federal regulators are investigating and stopping some of the advertising claims, the Better Business Bureau is receiving complaints about how customers where handled after registering for a free trial and they found out the trial was anything but free.
“You think you’re just going to get a sample, but when you’re filling out the information, they’re asking you for a credit card, they’re asking for all this information,” says President Claire Rosenzweig of the Better Business Bureau of Metropolitan New York. “Before you know it, what you might be signing up for may be a membership, which means that every month your credit card must be automatically charged and you’re getting these pills in the mail, whether you want them or not.”
Multiple sites are now taking it upon themselves to proclaim they have the only real free trial offer. Rosenzweig says the only way to avoid a schemer is to do one’s homework before and after the purchase.
“You should be getting a free trial. There might be a handling fee, but there shouldn’t be any membership that you’re being asked to join into,” says Rosenzweig. “Also check your credit card statements on a monthly basis, so if there is something going on that you didn’t authorize, you can nip it in the bud.”
The BBB is dealing strictly with acai consumer issues and leaving health and medical determinations to other authorities, but Rosenzweig has a hunch the products’ health claims might not be truthful.
“If there was a magic weight loss product out there, I think we’d all know about it,” she says.
