Smoothies: Kings of Sugar Masquerading As Healthy Food Choice

I have had a vague interaction with smoothies in the past, but after a recent jam session with my bassist daughter and drummer son, my daughter enthusiastically recommended we get a smoothie. “Smoothie” was entered into the Apple map app and a remarkable number of establishments serving this concoction popped up.
Smoothie sales have taken off in the last decade as consumers are apparently seeking healthier alternatives to carbonated beverages.
This was my first experience with Smoothie King which is the biggest and oldest chain of smoothie purveyors. According to their web site:

Since Steve Kuhnau created the first Smoothie Bar in 1973, Smoothie King has grown to over 650 locations across three continents. From the US to the Republic of Korea, Singapore and the Cayman Islands, our purpose continues to impact millions of lives around the globe.
Our quest is simple: Make living a healthier more active lifestyle delicious and nutritious. Whether you’re trying to lose a few pounds, have a little more energy at the end of the day or simply feel better about your diet, each and every Smoothie we make is blended for a specific purpose. Which is why we call them “Smoothies With A Purpose.”

This sounds spectacularly good: who wouldn’t want to lose a few pounds, have more energy at the end of the day and feel better about their diet.
The Smoothie King store was disturbingly sterile with an intense corporate feeling and had a bewildering array of choices. I could choose from Fitness Blends, Energy Blends, Slim Blends, Wellness Blends or Take a Break Blends.
 
There are 17 “Slim Blends” to choose from. The Angel Food  (“treat your body like an angel”(I have no idea what that means)) Slim Blend contains 350 calories, 84 grams of carbohydrates, 75 grams of sugar, 4 grams of protein, and 6 grams of fiber. This comes from strawberries (I saw no real strawberries behind the counter),bananas, non-fat milk (when I asked about getting whole milk the girl behind the counter told me that they didn’t even use real non-fat milk just a powder), vanilla, turbinado (fancy and deceptive word for brown sugar) and soy protein.
What’s wrong with this? A smoothie from SmoothieKing marketed as a Slim Blend contains 75 grams of sugar, the equivalent of 19 cubes of sugar. There only 39 grams of sugar in a 12 ounce coca-cola thus the small 20 oz “Slim Blend” contains the equivalent of two cans of coca-cola in sugar. There may be some useful nutrients in this monstrosity but predominantly you are getting loads of sugar in a highly concentrated form.
As I’ve pointed out here and here, there is reason to believe that sugar contributes more to obesity and heart disease than fat. Its hard to understand how this Slim Blend would contribute to weight loss in any way. It is just another stealth dessert similar to what Starbucks promotes as I’ve discussed here. What the food industry has done to smoothies is eerily similar to what happened to yogurt which I call the no fat  yogurt scam.
Most people have figured out for good weight control and health they should avoid sodas and sugar-sweetened beverages (even my 19 year old daughter has) but smoothies are masquerading as healthy choices for slimming, for fitness or wellness when they are (in the case of ones from SmoothieKing and presumably most similar chains) an absolutely horrible dietary choice.
What we have here is the classic food industry approach to marketing: Take real food ingredients like fruits, which are healthy choices when consumed in their original state, process  them, industrialize them, add sugar and promote them as healthier dietary choices.
Add in the veneer of promoting fitness or weight loss or wellness by adding magically powerful elixirs or powders and  the duped public will line up and sales will skyrocket. Unfortunately, despite claims of health benefits, consumers will end up less healthy.