Instagrammer Sends Amazing Response To Harassing 'Choco Diet' Emails

Instagram influencers are no strangers to thoughtless marketing from diet companies. But this time, Charlotte Rollin, the bold, fashion-loving, recovery-oriented blogger called @_charlottesweb on Instagram, snapped back with an absolutely genius response.

She was approached by a diet company called "The Choco Diet." The company claims to sell miracle weight-loss products called "Hot Choco" and "Choco Shake" that replace meals. These products promote a really terrible diet plan for a number of reasons, but that's a rant for another day. Regardless, the company looked to Instagram to market the diet. They sent Rollin some emails asking her to become a brand ambassador.

But Rollin was not interested. They barked up the wrong tree — Rollin is an advocate for eating disorder recovery, and preaches food freedom on her blog all the time.

 

"It's so awful to miss out on eating birthday cake with your pals, and to miss out on meals out and to miss out on SO MUCH because of that little voice in your head," she preaches in one of her recent posts. "It's seems impossible to challenge it ... [but] you are good enough and you can do it."

So after the third email arrived in her inbox, Rollin decided to take a stand. She refused to sit back and let this company upset her.

 

"It is quite apparent to me that you have not taken the time to look at my previous social media posts or even have an idea of the type of the content I create," Rollin wrote to the marketer, "as if you had, you would most likely be aware that I in fact have suffered with anorexia for the past 5 years.

"I therefore would, under no circumstances, even consider promoting a diet or detox drink on my social channels, which many follow as they also suffer from mental health issues and use as a reassurance that they are not alone in these struggles.

"I find the nature of your product to be damaging, and I know for a fact that these shakes are not a healthy way to lose weight, even for those that have a genuine, non-disordered desire to do so.

"Moreover, it is very suspicious to me that you have over 10,000 followers, yet most of your Instagram posts have less than 20 likes. This is a clear indicator to me that your business and following is not a legitimate one."

The Choco Diet's posts include revealing images of thin bodies and teasers for their upcoming product.

 

Let's all just take a moment to appreciate the thought and power behind her rebuttal — whether The Choco Diet representative bothered to respond remains to be seen, but Rollin's message was heard.

Rollin's tweet detailing the message went viral and generated a wave of support. These diet companies need to stop marketing thoughtlessly and, frankly, need to stop selling their BS products altogether.

Rollin isn't the only one who's felt disturbed by these marketing emails and messages. As an Instagram influencer myself, I know what it's like to get harassed by diet companies. The diet industry is real, it's growing, and it is way too lucrative. Scam diet companies use their money to reach out to Instagram influencers as an advertising strategy, and they typically have a disturbing amount of success.

I'll receive emails from diet companies asking if I want to participate, ignore them, and then see their products all over my feed for the next couple of weeks. Other influencers who didn't ignore the email go on to promote the product as if their support were spontaneous and authentic, failing to announce that they're part of an ambassador program or that they're getting paid to talk people into buying a product that doesn't help anyone.

But what the companies and influencers both fail to take responsibility for is how damaging their content is to the community. Not only are these advertisements promoting an unhealthy and unsustainable diet plan, they're also disrupting the recovery of countless followers from participating in dieting in general.

Diets of any kind, sustainable or not, are almost never effective. In the few cases where diets are effective in delivering sustainable weight loss (which, for reference, is only around 3 percent of all diets), they often come with physical and psychological consequences such as metabolic disruption, digestion disorders, mental health problems, and a disordered relationship with food and exercise.

When products like this prioritize weight loss over health, it's problematic, because it makes viewers feel worse about their bodies and increases the likelihood of eating disorders and other forms of disordered eating, like dieting.

When I choose not to respond to their emails, I'm as disgusted as Rollin — but sometimes I'm honestly too exhausted by the hugeness of diet culture to bite back. Today, I'm feeling inspired and thankful for influencers like Rollin for reminding the diet industry how horrible they really are.

On a lighter note, it's kind of laughable that they're promoting their shakes as "chocolate" when they're actually just a blended mess of proteins and artificial junk. The Choco Diet's products probably stack up with some of the grossest diet foods in history.

Holly Van Hare is the Healthy Eating Editor at The Daily Meal with a passion for podcasting and peanut butter. You can listen to her podcast Nut Butter Radio on iTunes and follower her health food Instagram @eating_peanut_better.