Post Published on December 3, 2013.
Last Updated on April 29, 2016 by davemackey.
I’ve been using Shakeology on an (almost) daily basis since November 8th. By the 11th I had experienced relief from an annoying health problem that had plagued me for two years, but I waited till the 13th to share this – worried that the effect might wear off. As of the 3rd of December (today) I can report that the issue has remained absent.
That said, I have skipped a few days of Shakeology b/c I simply couldn’t stomach another strawberry shake. Sure, I could have added in different ingredients to change the flavor – but that is getting beyond my desired complexity. I called Shakeology today and had them change my order from Strawberry to Vanilla. From what I have seen across the web – chocolate is the best flavor, vanilla second, and strawberry a distant third. I figured I’d start with the least favored first.
I don’t think it was the taste per say that got to me – but rather the same flavor over and over. I remember Rob Rhinehart (Soylent) talking somewhere about the need for a certain taste neutrality in these sort of meal replacements – so that the body doesn’t grow sick of it. I’m hoping the vanilla will provide this – b/c otherwise, I’m going to get sick of the taste!
So, I’m still all for Shakeology, it fills me up, helps with at least one health problems, seems extremely nutritious, and so on – but all that won’t do a hill of beans if I can’t stomach it. So, here’s hoping on vanilla. 🙂 (I’m not a big fan of chocolate, though I’ll probably give it a try if vanilla doesn’t work out).
One other minor annoyance. I called in to Shakeology this past Saturday (I’m not sure if they are open on Saturdays) to change my order to vanilla and was told by the auto attendant that I had about a five minute wait time. I waited for ten minutes and when no one answered, gave up. Either their wait times are incorrect or they don’t change their auto attendant to reflect that they are closed on the weekends – either is bad, the latter is worse.
I called again today (Tuesday) and was told I had a three minute wait. I was then dropped into some sort of hellish queue in which the same two “announcements” where made over and over in quick succession. When I was about to go crazy after 8 minutes of this craziness, I hung up.
I tried again a minute later but chose a different option (I think it may have been the option which dropped me into auto attendant hell – yes, it is a real place – Verizon once dropped me there for thirty or forty-five minutes, then abruptly said, “We’re sorry, we can’t take your call right now” and hung up on me!!) and this time I was able to get through to a real person. The estimated wait time was wrong again – one minute and I probably waited four…which isn’t horrible – I wouldn’t have even noticed if I hadn’t been placed in permanent hold twice before.
When I did finally reach a customer service rep they had trouble looking up my record b/c I gave my name as “Dave” instead of “David” (which is what the record said). This isn’t a big deal either, but whatever software they are using should have the simple fuzzy logic to check for variations of spelling in names to overcome this problem.
In the end they did find my record and I did get my order switched, and the customer service rep was polite and helpful. The call lasted less than ten minutes including hold time – which really isn’t bad….these are just a few minor annoyances I hope Shakeology will take the time to iron out. 🙂