On the Move

You can’t yet take a pill to reap the benefits of a daily exercise regimen. But recent studies by the Mayo Clinic have shown that it does seem possible to lose weight and improve your health simply by moving around a bit more than you usually do. The reason, researchers say, is NEAT—non-exercise activity thermogenesis—in layperson’s terms, the way people burn calories doing everyday things like walking or even fidgeting. If you want to burn calories and lose fat, you’ve got to increase NEAT. To help people do that, Mayo has partnered with Minneapolis-based Muve, Inc., to create the Gruve Solution.

The device, about the size of two postage stamps, is the first weight management system of many that Muve plans to test and deliver in the coming years. The technology, patents, software development, and the medical research on NEAT that led to the Gruve Solution were all done at Mayo. Muve licenses the system and handles its commercial development.

Worn on a belt or clipped outside or inside clothing, the device tracks a person’s movements throughout each day. Users upload their data to the Gruve Web site to see how many calories they’ve burned and check their progress toward fitness goals like reducing body mass index or blood pressure. Coaches, called “Muvologists,” are available to offer support. The idea is that once users know how many calories they burn via daily activities, they will be encouraged to burn more.

Launched in 2007, Muve has been testing the product for months with the help of more than 200 employees at 12 local corporations, including Best Buy, the Mall of America, Medtronic, and U.S. Bank. In March, Muve began selling the Gruve system through the company’s Web site (muveinc.com). The cost is $300 for a one-year program, which includes online access and coaching, and $460 for two years.

The Gruve Solution is not being sold through retailers. “I felt it was going to be unaffordable for us to go direct-to-consumer with this,” Muve CEO Tom Hudson explains. “So I chose to go the business-to-business-to-consumer market instead.”

Feedback from the pilot program has been overwhelmingly positive, says Hudson, who wears the device on his belt and credits it with helping him lose a few pounds. Sue Amundson, human resources director for the Mall of America, agrees. She’s one of several mall employees who’ve been wearing the device since August.