Mere dieting is for the poor. The rich, my friends, don't just diet - they book a $5,600 week stay at a luxurious weight loss retreat.
Christina Binkley of the Wall Street Journal recounts the horror - oh the horror - of a rich man's fat camp, The Ranch at Live Oak, Malibu:
The six-month-old Ranch isn't one of the drug-rehab centers that dot the Malibu hills. But it is rehab of sorts—a luxury boot camp that aims to detoxify up to 14 (mostly middle-age) guests a week from the daily routine of cellphones, email, Diet Cokes and steak dinners washed down with Cabernet. Located on a 120-acre ranch tucked into the Santa Monica Mountains, it caters to wealthy A-listers with Spartan but perfectly appointed private cottages, and niceties such as laundry service and a daily aphorism placed on pillows ("Lack of money is no obstacle. Lack of an idea is an obstacle"). Yet the Ranch doesn't kowtow to its heavy-hitting clientele: The exercise is mandatory—with a vengeance.