Whole30 Approved: What it means, and why you’ll see more of it in 2018

Chances are, you know someone who has done a Whole30, the wildly popular 30-day elimination diet that excludes grains, dairy, legumes, alcohol and sweeteners. Since 2009, millions of people have completed the program (this editor included), which was developed not as a weight loss plan but as a “short-term nutrition reset” to help individuals identify problematic foods and end unhealthy cravings.

“It’s hard for me to track how many people have done the program,” said Melissa Hartwig, co-creator of the Whole30 and author of four New York Times best-selling books. “We’ve sold over a million copies of the Whole30 book, we have on average 2 million unique visitors to the Whole30 web site each month, and we have a combined social media fan and following of more than 2.5 million people.”

Applegate earlier this year launched a Whole30 compliant sugar-free bacon.

Several food manufacturers have reformulated products to meet Whole30 standards, Ms. Hartwig told Food Business News. One is Applegate, a subsidiary of Hormel Foods Corp., which earlier this year launched a Whole30 compliant sugar-free bacon.

“They have other changes in the works that I’m not at liberty to discuss, but they’ll be reformulating products in the new year … and we’ll be rolling them out as a partner in the next couple weeks,” Ms. Hartwig said.

About 70 companies have become Whole30 Approved partners, a designation indicating some or all of a brand’s products meet the rigorous standards of the Whole30 program and may feature a Whole30 Approved label on the packaging.