Texas fitness influencer will stand trial next month for sending anorexics $300 weight loss plans

A Texas influencer who sent customers with anorexia $300 weight loss plans as part of a fitness program that also allegedly misled women about ‘personalized’ diet plans is set to stand trial next month.

Brittany Dawn Davis had promised to help thousands of women with fitness packages priced from $92 to $300 offering personalized health plans, coaching services, exercise and nutrition tips.

But a lawsuit filed in early 2022 claims the personalized plans and tips never happened and that the program violated consumer protection laws, misled people with eating disorders, and used deceptive practices to get clients.

Davis, who has amassed more than 474,000 followers on Instagram, abandoned her fitness gig years ago after customers began complaining about her questionable business practices. She is set to stand trial on March 6 in Dallas County, Texas.

At least 14 women with eating disorders turned to Davis for help in their recovery, but claimed she instead made their conditions worse with low-calorie diet regimens that would only be suitable for those looking to shed pounds, according to the Texas Attorney General’s lawsuit.

In one instance, a former customer who weighed 80 pounds at the time signed up for Davis’ program because she advertised herself as an ‘eating disorder soldier.’

That customer nearly passed out due to poor nutrition, The Dallas Morning News reported. 

The lawsuit also claims that Davis charged clients a shipping fee for emailed diet and nutrition plans that were supposed to be individualized to meet customers’ specific needs but were instead generic.

Prosecutors said the influencer, who ran a company called Brittany Dawn Fitness LLC, began selling online fitness packages to thousands of customers in 2014, promising each one they’d receive ‘personalized’ nutritional guidance and coaching.

Plans ranged in price from $92 for a one-time consultation to $300 for three months of nutritional advice, training and coaching.

‘However, the online nutrition and fitness plans delivered to consumers were not individualized,’ the lawsuit said. ‘Defendants also failed to provide the promised coaching and check-ins.’

Davis began facing heat from customers in 2019 after a growing number of women came forward saying that she sold them ‘generic’ workout plans and then deleted their complaints on social media.

She ignored customer complaints until 2019, when a public outcry over her services led her to address the complaints on YouTube.

‘I made a mistake,’ she said. ‘I’ve taken full responsibility for it, I made things right, and I did whatever it took to make things right. As a business owner, as an influencer, I’ve learned from it and I’m a prime example of what can happen when you have a platform and you mess up.’

After the complaints began emerging, Davis took down the website where she sold diet and fitness plans.

But many of her disappointed customers said they did not receive refunds for the phony plans. In a private Facebook group dedicated to complaints about Davis, more than 5,000 women gathered to share their horror stories.

One customer who purchased a 90-day plan received just one email from Davis. Another customer who purchased a similar plan said Davis cut off contact within two weeks.

Others said that when they would reach out to Davis with a query or specific question, they’d received impersonal responses such as ‘THAT’S MY GIRL! You’re killing it!’ or ‘you’ve got this babe!’

Davis referred her customers to a ‘Team Brittany Dawn’ Facebook group for support, but the forum backfired when customers realized they were given identical plans, the court document said.

‘One consumer commented that “I thought at first you had created this workout plan based on my needs and wants…. until I referred 2 friends to you and their plans were the same,’ the legal filing said.

The lawsuit also claimed she misled consumers with eating disorders, luring them in with a YouTube video in which she claimed to have overcome her own eating disorder through exercise and a healthy diet.

She promoted her fitness plans in the social media posts, the court filing said, leading potential customers to believe that she had special training to address eating disorders.

‘One consumer noted that “the main reason I chose her [Ms. Davis] out of all the coaches out there was specifically that she advertised herself as an “eating disorder soldier.”

‘It was incredibly important to me that the person I chose to coach me had an idea of what it was like to deal with an eating disorder.’

More than a dozen eating disorder sufferers who subscribed to Davis’s plans said they were given ‘low-calorie macronutrient suggestions that would only be suitable for someone who needed to lose weight, not put it on.’