Balance by bistroMD
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10 Months and Still a Customer
First and foremost, Balance by BistroMD works. I’ve lost 10 pounds in the last month. And the food is pretty good. That should give them 5 stars. Second, everyone you will deal with at the company is extremely pleasant. That should result in those 5 stars being carved in stone. BUT… Their inventory management is terrible. They update what is available on Mondays but there are times when I order late because I am sure they haven’t updated yet. Last week, for example, there were 81 lunches/dinners available. This week there were 66. Plenty of entrees had sold out but not a single one was added (although a few snacks were.) I have diabetes which dropped the number I could choose from to 38. As a result, I have to spend much too much time every week trying to find enough items I’d like to order. (This is what brings it down to 4 stars.) As I said, the food is pretty good. Out of the 38 entrees I have ordered so far, 12 (32%) have been excellent and I order them every week they are available. 15 (39%) were good enough to reorder, some frequently. While I would rate the remainder as “edible” I know they might well be someone else’s favorite. Not everyone likes the same things. I do have a problem with lack of variety in the side dishes. I know any diet plan will include lots of broccoli and cauliflower and maybe the large number of dishes with okra is a result of the company being based in the South. But I know there are squashes, delicious ones, other than zucchini. (The menu also includes plenty of green beans, carrot and potatoes.) Edit: I wrote the above in April. I had been using Balance (the a la carte version) for a couple of months. It's now December. I order from Silver Cuisine by bistroMD now (the same food but the program has an AARP tie-in). My one major complaint was the inventory management and that got fixed a few months ago (I waited to make sure it wasn't a fluke). The food is still excellent and the selection is plentiful. (I'm talking about the lunch/dinner menu. There are quite a few breakfasts I like but I'm relying on them less. The only snacks I love are the cheesecakes.) There are cheaper programs elsewhere and I've tried several of them. The food is, by and large, edible but that's not good enough after a couple of months. I never lasted this long using any of them. And I've lost over 50 pounds.