The Shredz Scam

In this blog I will talk about the supplement company Shredz that has been talked about quite a lot lately. If you want to learn about what they did well and also, where they failed, press play below. I've also included a transcript of the audio for ease. You can find this further down.

Hi it’s Chris Lynton here from Tribefit.co and today I wanted to talk about a very hot topic in the category in the market at the moment and that is the business called Shredz. Most of you probably heard of Shredz and those of you who haven’t, you’ve probably been living under a rock for the last 1, 2, 3 years. Shredz is a supplement company for those who aren’t aware. A supplement company that was kind of the forefront of utilising social media, ambassadors, influencers to market their products, their pills, powders, potions etcetera, etcetera. They then went on to doing programs to obviously help support those supplements and all that sort of stuff as well. 

The reason why it’s such big news at the moment is there’s so much going around about how scammy Shredz are and all of the dodgy stuff they’ve done behind the scenes and I guess they’re being found out for the truth of what is really behind the business, the business mentality etcetera, etcetera. 

And today I just wanted to do a quick blog about Shredz and I guess the learnings you can take from a business like Shredz. 

So I’m going to look at it from two point of views. First and foremost from a nutritional point of view. Myself, obviously having a Master’s Degree in Sports Nutrition and a Bachelor of Science in Nutrition as well. From a nutrition perspective, I feel it’s something I have a fair amount of knowledge and able to be talked about.

Supplements hands down are NOT the number one solution to any problem in the health and fitness space. As we all know, supplements, some of them can be great. Most of them can be scammy and dodgy anyway and promise the world and obviously not be able to deliver on that. From a nutritional standpoint, if you don’t have the right knowledge information and if you’re not doing the right things we talk about you know, eating, nutrition, and exercise and also mindset are really the 3 pillars to success. 

Supplements, if taken right, and if it’s a good supplement, you’re really looking at a 2 to 5% improvement in anything. So those people who believe in the hypey, scammy claims that you’ll take this pill or powder and put on 10 kilos of lean muscle or lose, you know, 10 kilos of body fat in a day or whatever it might be. Hands down they don’t work. Don’t believe in what they say. You know, they do have their abilities or helpful points in some areas like for example like convenience. 

Myself, even though I’m saying supplements aren’t the best route, I take vitamins. I have a whey shake every now and then but it’s more about convenience and ease. It’s not about using that as a crutch and hoping that that’d bring everything. So full stop, supplement companies that go on about huge results and not having to do anything like Shredz obviously first and foremost it shows you how trustworthy the business is. 

Second, from a marketing point of view. First and foremost like I said they were really the forefront leaders of social media influencers and really discovering that people believe, have trust in these influencers and really you know tackle that market head on and as a result was able to build something pretty big, pretty well-known pretty quick. So I can’t fault them in that.

But I guess what it shows is you can have fast success. If you’re not really true to yourself, if you’re not selling value, if you’re not giving people value for their money and trying to really solve people’s problems or issues, you can have success in the short term but you’re always going to get burned when people find out the real truth behind it.

So first and foremost in learning to take from Shredz is, it is not worth being a success story for a year or two and then getting sued and then having all bad publicity, refunds etcetera and then losing all of that money because you’re really just scamming people. 

If you give people great value and you really help them and you really care about your customers you’ll be successful long term and you’ll be able to help lots of people around the world and in return those people will be happy to give you re-numeration for the value that you’re giving people. And that’s truly I guess the success story of all businesses and what businesses need to do. Live up to your word. It pays to be true. And if you’re offering you know, prize money, make sure you pay it. If you’ve got testimonials, don’t use fake ones etcetera, etcetera. 

So... Long term business is the key. You have to give value and it needs to be a win/win. Otherwise, you will always get called out. So that’s one good lesson to learn from Shredz. Like I said, you can’t fault them for what they’ve been able to achieve in a short period, but long term success is the key. That’s also obviously the second learning. 

The other part of it is being really true to who you are and giving good information. As we know fitness, if you’re trying to sell supplements it’s only going to be short-lived. Give great information. Give great knowledge. You’re an expert. You’re an expert in the space. Who can you help with the information and knowledge that you have? That’s what you want, and to try to teach people to be able to, I guess, change their lives and then utilise the knowledge and power that you can distill upon them in the long term and those people will be with you for life. They’ll trust you. They’ll believe you and they’ll recommend friends on to you as well. So that’s really I guess, the case. 

So first as I mentioned, lots to be learned from businesses like this. Shredz, you know, they are quite scammy but you can’t fault them because, you know, if the people that get caught by those scams, every other business in that space… I won’t say every other business but a lot of the businesses are doing the same thing. If you rewind back many, many years Bill Phillips Body for Life, there was that many rumours going around that the people that won all of his competitions were friends, ex-bodybuilders, people using steroids and fake testimonials once again. 

It just keeps happening again and again. So what does that mean? If you’re a true expert in the health and fitness space you will stand out long term. Don’t flip to selling affiliate supplement and products. Build your own brand. Build the tribe and community around you. Build your credibility and don’t think, ‘Ah, you know, I can get some followers and try and flog some dodgy supplements on the side.’ Because it’s only going to come back to bite you in the ass.

So like I mentioned, lots to learn from Shredz. I don’t know if they’re going to be around for too much longer and they’re probably like I said you know, had some successes but they’re probably going to lose it all plus some. But take the good and the bad from that business and think about how that can help you in the future and the learnings you can take in terms of growing a big business for yourself. 

Hope that helps and I’ll be speaking to you real soon. Bye for now.