Weight Watchers is a frumpy diet plan.
But for more than 40 years, it has slowly been doing the job of helping people lose weight.
Consumer Reports' magazine conducted a diet analysis that found Weight Watchers is tops among popular, well-known diet plans for helping people lose weight and keep it off.
What is the secret to their success?
Eat less, exercise more, participate in weekly support group meetings.
This edges out diet plans that exhort people to eat more and weigh less --- as long as you don't eat meat.
That's Dr. Dean Ornish's vegetarian plan, which had a low retention rate.
Plans with trendy names like the Zone, South Beach and Volumetrics also did not do as well.
This doesn't mean that dropping pounds is ever easy.
Successfully losing weight is a long-term endeavor.
It's not a matter of making a new year's resolution and never breaking it.
Rather, it's a continuous struggle for almost everybody.
If you struggle with your weight, don't beat yourself up over it.
Whether or not you use any specific plan, set goals, exercise more often and be disciplined when you eat.