Jenny Craig, Inc., often known simply as Jenny Craig, is an American

weight loss Weight loss, in the context of medicine, health, or physical fitness, refers to a reduction of the total body mass, by a mean loss of fluid, body fat (adipose tissue), or lean mass (namely bone mineral deposits, muscle, tendon, and other conn ...

, weight management, and nutrition company. At its peak, the company had more than 700 weight management centers in Australia, the United States, Canada, and New Zealand. The program combined individual weight management counseling with a menu of frozen meals and other foods which were distributed through its centers or shipped directly to clients. Founded as an independent company, the business was purchased by

Nestlé Nestlé S.A. ( ) is a Swiss multinational food and drink processing conglomerate corporation headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland. It has been the largest publicly held food company in the world, measured by revenue and other metrics, since 20 ...

in 2006 for approximately $600 million. However, the business declined, and on 4 May 2023, the company announced that it was going out of business after 40 years. It was revived as an e-commerce store by Wellful (the parent company of

Nutrisystem Nutrisystem is a commercial provider of weight loss products and services headquartered in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania. Company history Nutrisystem's initial product in 1972 was a liquid protein diet, but the company changed its offering a ...

) sometime after this announcement in fall 2023.

History

Jenny Craig Jenny Craig, Inc., often known simply as Jenny Craig, is an American weight loss, weight management, and nutrition company. At its peak, the company had more than 700 weight management centers in Australia, the United States, Canada, and New Ze ...

and her husband,

Sidney Craig Sidney Harvey Craig (March 22, 1932 – July 21, 2008) was an American businessman who was the business partner and husband of businesswoman Jenny Craig (entrepreneur), Jenny Craig. Together, they founded the weight-management company Jenny Cra ...

, founded Jenny Craig, Inc. on 21 March 1983 in

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

and began operations in the United States in 1985. The company expanded rapidly after entering the U.S., opening 46 locations by 1987 as well as 114 in other countries. In 1991, the company underwent an

IPO An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...

, generating $73.5 million in funding. By 1998 Jenny Craig was operating in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Puerto Rico and US. The revenues had fallen from $401 million in 1996 to $352 million. Throughout the 1990s, the company's share price declined as it ran into a series of financial troubles involving weight loss drugs, employee training, and costly leases before eventually being delisted from the New York Stock Exchange in August 2001. Jenny Craig stock then traded over the counter. In 2002, Jenny Craig, Inc., was acquired by

MidOcean Partners MidOcean Partners is a New York City , New York based alternative asset management firm that specializes in mid-sized private equity and alternative leveraged investments. The firm, founded in February 2003, is based in Midtown Manhattan. MidOc ...

, a New York and London-based

private equity Private equity (PE) is stock in a private company that does not offer stock to the general public; instead it is offered to specialized investment funds and limited partnerships that take an active role in the management and structuring of the co ...

investment firm, and ACI Capital, a New York–based private investment firm. On 19 June 2006, they announced the signing of a definitive agreement to sell the company to

in a transaction valued at approximately $600 million. The company was operated as part of Nestlé Nutrition. On 19 November 2013, Jenny Craig Inc. was purchased by North Castle Partners for an undisclosed amount. In April 2019, H.I.G. Capital acquired the Jenny Craig weight management business from North Castle Partners. In 2008,

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

personality

Shane Dawson Shane Lee Yaw (born July 19, 1988), known online as Shane Dawson, is an American YouTuber, actor, filmmaker, writer, and musician. Dawson was one of the first people to rise to fame on YouTube after he began making videos in 2008 at the age of ...

and approximately six other Jenny Craig employeesincluding his mother and brotherwere fired from their jobs for uploading a sketch to his YouTube channel. In 2013, Dawson wrote a comedy pilot about his experiences there and sold the script to

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

. In March 2018, the company reportedly pulled its advertisements from ''The Ingraham Angle'' as a result of host

Laura Ingraham Laura Anne Ingraham (; born June 19, 1963) is an American conservative television presenter. Gale Biography In Context. She has been the host of '' The Ingraham Angle'' on Fox News Channel since October 2017, and is the editor-in-chief of Li ...

's portrayal of

David Hogg David Miles Hogg (born April 12, 2000) is an American gun violence in the United States, gun control activist who served as a co-vice chair of the Democratic National Committee from February to June 2025. He rose to prominence during the 2018 ...

. In 2019,

H.I.G. Capital H.I.G. Capital, LLC is a global alternative investment firm with $69 billion of capital under management. Headquartered in Miami, Florida, H.I.G. specializes in providing both debt capital, debt and equity capital to middle-market company, middle ...

, a global private equity firm, acquired Jenny Craig for an undisclosed amount. In October 2019,

Walgreens Walgreens is an American pharmacy store chain. It is the second largest in the United States, behind CVS Pharmacy. As of March 2025, the company operated more than 8,700 stores in the U.S. Walgreens has been the subject of a number of lawsuit ...

announced that it would begin offering Jenny Craig weight loss services at approximately 100 locations beginning in January 2020. On 2 May 2023, Jenny Craig announced to employees via email that the company will wind down operations, lay off all employees, and possibly switch to an e-commerce model. The company had been pursuing a sale for some time. Two days later, on 4 May, the company announced via its official

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

page that it was going out of business. On 5 May, Jenny Craig filed for

Chapter 7 bankruptcy Chapter 7 of Title 11 U.S. Code is the bankruptcy code that governs the process of liquidation under the bankruptcy laws of the United States. This is in contrast to bankruptcy under Chapter 11 and Chapter 13, which govern the process of ''re ...

. On 9 May, its Australian and New Zealand operations were placed into

voluntary administration As a legal concept, administration is a procedure under the insolvency laws of a number of common law jurisdictions, similar to bankruptcy in the United States. It functions as a rescue mechanism for insolvent entities and allows them to carry on ...

. On 7 June 2023, it ceased all operations in both countries after failing to find a buyer, selling its online capacity to health startup Eucalyptus. The company's intellectual property was sold to Wellful, Inc. (the parent company of

), who relaunched Jenny Craig as an e-commerce store in fall 2023.

Diet program and effectiveness

According to a

systematic review A systematic review is a scholarly synthesis of the evidence on a clearly presented topic using critical methods to identify, define and assess research on the topic. A systematic review extracts and interprets data from published studies on ...

, overweight and obese adults enrolled in Jenny Craig after 12 months had 4.9% more weight loss than subjects in a control/education group (receiving no intervention, printed materials only, health education curriculum, or three sessions with a provider) or behavioral counseling group.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Companies based in Carlsbad, California Brand name diet products Weight loss companies Australian companies established in 1983 Companies that filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2023 Companies that have filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy 2002 mergers and acquisitions 2006 mergers and acquisitions 2013 mergers and acquisitions

History

Diet program and effectiveness

See also

References

External links