High-hype diet.

Byline: Edward Russo The Register-Guard

Hoping to lose weight, Ann Raney of Eugene has tried a string of diets in the past 10 years. The cabbage soup diet, Weight Watchers, you name it.

"At my age, you've tried everything," said Raney, 61.

Now, Raney is on yet another diet - the wildly popular high-protein, low-carbohydrate Atkins diet. In three week, she shed eight of the 20 pounds she wants to lose.

On other diets, "I was hungry all the time," Raney said. On Atkins, "I don't get hungry, which is the key to the whole thing."

In Eugene-Springfield and elsewhere, the diet of the late Dr. Robert Atkins is hugely in vogue, thanks in part to a pair of studies published last spring in the New England Journal of Medicine. And businesses - from retail behemoth Wal-Mart and manufacturing giant Anheuser Busch, to mom and pop entrepreneurs - are acting quickly to cash in. They're climbing on the bandwagon hoping to make money during the ride - however long as it lasts.

In Lane County, grocery and discount stores are adding pricey low-carb products. Restaurateurs are offering low-carb meals and substitutions. A major bakery has begun baking a low-carb bread. And recently, two specialty food stores geared for high-protein consumers have opened in Eugene.

All this, despite concerns by many experts that the diet really doesn't work in the long run.

The medical journal studies said Atkin's plan was twice as effective as traditional low-fat diets in cutting weight in the first six months. However, the studies said more research was needed to determine how Atkins affects long-term health, including kidney function.

Nutritionists continue to stress that eating fewer calories with a balanced diet, plus exercising, are the most effective ways to lose weight and keep it off.

"Americans will try anything when it comes to diets. We have a lot of diet fads and, as far as I am concerned, this (Atkins diet) is just another one," said Constance Georgiou, a licensed dietician and associate professor of nutrition at Oregon State University.

Yet such admonishments don't seem to bother the millions of Americans who recently embraced the Atkins diet and similar food plans, such as the South Beach diet.

Besides eating more meat and cheese while spurning bread and pasta, Americans are buying record amounts of high-protein shakes, snack bars and other specialty foods that are low in carbs and high in protein.

That's the market being targeted by Castus Low Carb Superstores, the franchise outlets recently opened in Eugene by father and son John and Dan Ries, along with their respective wives, Janet and Tracy Ries.

The stores, in the Delta Oaks shopping center and the Southtowne Shoppes, don't carry traditional high-protein, low-carb staples such as meats, eggs and cheeses. Instead, they sell low-carb versions of taboo foods, such as breads, cereals and desserts.

John Ries, a retired pediatrician who lives in Sisters, said he and his son, a Eugene resident, both lost weight on the Atkins diet. Dan Ries is a project manager at a marketing and printing firm. Last spring, the men noticed brisk business at a low-carb store in Redmond. They wondered how a similar store would fare in Eugene.

Their research led to Rick Schott, a San Francisco Bay area entrepreneur and co-founder of a low-carb store called Castus (Latin for clean or pure) that was selling franchises.

John Ries, 61, said eight people applied for the Eugene franchises, the first to be sold by Schott and his partner. Ries said his medical degree gave him and his 34-year-old son an edge.

It cost about $260,000 to open both stores, Ries said, including inventory and a $25,000 franchise fee for each outlet.

Doctor: It worked

Since opening, sales at the Delta Oaks store have more than covered expenses, including loan repayments, Ries said. The south Eugene store is off to a slower start, he said.

Ries, who practiced medicine in Coos Bay for 24 years, said he initially was skeptical of the Atkins diet. He knows that much of the medical profession remains unconvinced of the diet's merits.

But, Ries said, his medical experience treating obese and diabetic children makes him think that Atkins was right about the need to limit carbohydrates.

Ries said his blood pressure has dropped since he started the Atkins diet. Follow-up studies on the long term effects of the Atkins diet will show that it is not harmful to health, he said.

Consumers who want to adopt an Atkins-style diet by purchasing specially crafted low-carb foods had better be prepared to dig into their wallets. These specialty foods are much pricier than conventional foods.

For example, at Castus, loaves of bread range from $3.99 to $7.99; 9 ounces of granola costs $6.69; and a sugarfree cheesecake is $14.95.

Dieter Raney visited the Castus store at its grand opening and noted that some of the store's low-carb products are available at other merchants.

The likelihood that larger retail chains, including discount stores, will start selling more of those products may be the biggest threat to Castus and other similar outlets that have sprung up in Oregon and elsewhere.

"I'll go by price," Raney said. "If it's cheaper at Bi-Mart or wherever, I'll go there."

But Ries said he can give his store an edge by offering diet advice.

Two weeks ago, 132 people paid $20 apiece to hear Schott, the Castus co-founder, talk about the Atkins diet during a presentation at the Valley River Inn. (For the $20 they also got a Castus preferred customer card.)

Ries said he will conduct regular workshops, at $20 a head, in his stores. "We will provide a source of legitimacy for low-carb information," he said. "And I don't think that is something that Wal-Mart will ever do."

Just another fad?

The low-carb craze exasperates some nutritional professionals.

Georgiou, at OSU, said she doesn't recommend the Atkins diet because it limits certain fruits, vegetables and grains, and doesn't stress the importance of exercise.

"I recommend a diet that is well balanced in nutrition, that contains a variety of foods, and that has the same amount of energy that one uses," Georgiou said. "If you want to lose weight, you have to eat less energy than you use. And the Atkins diet and the other low-carb diets don't emphasize physical activity as much as they should."

The Atkins diet was first published in 1972, but Georgiou said she hasn't seen definitive studies showing that people on the diet can keep weight off for a long time.

"I don't understand why people want to limit what they eat to a smaller number of foods," she said.

Fad or not, other Lane County retailers don't want to be left out.

The Market of Choice at Delta Oaks, for example, has an Atkins products display, with half of one side of a grocery aisle devoted to other low-carb items.

"We continue to search for better tasting and nutritious options for the low-carb consumer," said Rick Wright, president of Market of Choice parent firm, Wright's Foodliner in Eugene. "There are many new items on the horizon that will increase our selection, but for now the demand is outweighing the supply."

Fred Meyer stores in April dedicated 4 feet to 8 feet of linear shelf space in virtually all of its 134 outlets in five states to low-carb products.

"It's a huge phenomenon," said Fred Meyer spokesman Rob Boley. "It's the biggest thing to hit the food industry in recent years."

Hodgepodge, two teriyaki-style fast food restaurants in Eugene, added five low-carb items to its menu several weeks ago because customers were demanding it, said co-owner Kono Wong.

"Customers would come in and have difficulty identifying if we had food that was low carb," he said.

Now customers can have a beef teriyaki burger with a salad instead of on a bun, or teriyaki chicken on a bed of lettuce instead of in a pita. Gone from these dishes are the restaurant's standard side dishes of macaroni salad, coleslaw and banana bread.

"It's been very positive," said Wong. "We should have done it months ago."

CAPTION(S):

Tracy and Dan Ries look at some of the products available in their Castus Low Carb Superstore in the Delta Oaks shopping center.