There's No Evidence Power Balance Works -- and None Is Needed
Power Balance, makers of a rubber "hologram" bracelet "designed to work with your body's natural energy field" has issued two contradictory statements in response to an Australian ad commission finding that -- of course! -- there's no scientific evidence that the things work. The confusing, competing statements seem to be an attempt by the Florida company to parse the difference between claiming there's actual science as to why someone would have better balance while wearing a wristband and the observable fact that some people perform differently after putting one on.
It's the official birth of an important new trend: Placebo marketing. The business model is dead simple. Companies sell a completely useless product that nonetheless has the desired effect on many of its users purely because they believe it will.
The most prominent examples of placebo marketing are the Enzyte and ExtenZe "male enhancement" products. Following legal action, the two companies that make these products are no longer able to make any specific claims about what the pills do. But they're still in business. Now, they just make vague hints about "going big" and "performance." Men and their, uh, "egos" are notoriously suggestible. It is not surprising that some of them notice a difference after taking the products -- and that's enough to base a business on.
Reebok (RBK) just got called on an essentially identical issue by U.S. ad watchdog NAD with its EasyTone shoes, which it claims will "tone" your legs even though the "evidence" for this consists of a study of just five people.
The Power Band case study is a compelling one. Dozens of famous professional athletes now wear the bands, and are convinced it makes them faster, stronger and balance-ier. The company has 29 professional endorsers, including Drew Brees of the New Orleans Saints, the L.A. Lakers' Lamar Odom and Shaquille O'Neal of the Boston Celtics.
You've probably seen the company's ads, in which a Power Balance rep easily knocks over ordinary folk with one hand -- until they don the Power Balance bracelet. Then they become human oaks, rooted to the floorboards by the holographic power of mylar:
Unlike the U.S., Australia has an aggressive quasi-governmental body that polices false ad claims. In December it ruled that Power Balance customers should be able to demand their money back, because the product is bunkum:
Power Balance has admitted that there is no credible scientific basis for the claims and therefore no reasonable grounds for making representations about the benefits of the product. Power Balance has acknowledged that its conduct may have contravened the misleading and deceptive conduct section of the Trade Practices Act 1974.Power Balance agreed:
We admit that there is no credible scientific evidence that supports our claims and therefore we engaged in misleading conduct in breach of s52 of the Trade Practices Act 1974.But on Jan. 4 -- with press coverage gathering steam -- the company put out a second statement:
Power Balance products work. The existing reports out there are fundamentally incorrect. Power Balance did not make any claims that our product does not perform.At first glance, it appears that PB has developed a split personality. But in fact both statements are technically accurate: The first one confessed there was no randomized, double-blind scientific studies of the product, the second one continues to assert that the product "works" in the sense that people who put them on experience an effect.
Whether PB can stay in business is an open question: The cat is out of the bag. If it continues to make such plainly bogus statements such as "The hologram in Power Balance is designed to resonate with and respond to the natural energy field of the body," then it will likely lose every single lawsuit filed against it.
On the other hand, if it tones down its claims and makes them vague enough to be non-actionable, then we could be seeing basketball players wearing these things for decades to come.
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