The Ravages of Fitness

Spotted in the window of GNC:

 

Buff, ripped, and … ravaged?

 

Serious question: Does “ravage” have a positive meaning known only to bodybuilders (and unknown to me)? I mean, I get that sports-nutrition branding favors aggressive metaphors, but Ravage doesn’t say “power”; it says “grievous damage.”

Here are the other products in GNC’s Beyond RAW lineup:

 

 

Re-Feed, Re-Grow, Re-Power. Not pictured: Re-Forge, Rebuilt, Refine.

And Ravage.

Which of these names doesn’t belong?

(On an unrelated note, how cute is it that these products come in flavors like Fruit Punch, Chocolate Brownie, and Vanilla Cake Batter?)

Maybe I’m overthinking it. Maybe you’re just supposed to relish the growling, roaring sound of “Ravage.” Certainly the product copy—larded with ballistic language—promises a superheroic outcome:

Within minutes of taking Ravage, you’ll experience the blitz of ingredients designed specifically to create blazing energy as you strive to achieve bare-knuckle intensity, chiseled vascularity, muscle hardness and sustained strength. … To stimulate mental focus and intensity, Ravage adds a cascade of metabolic intensifiers that ignite calorie burning and fatty acid metabolism to intensify your neural drive, so you can shatter records and punch through sticking points.* The results? Ferocious workouts, superior muscularity, and dominating athletic performance.*

As much as I love me some chiseled vascularity, I doubt that I’m in the target market for Ravage. Still, I can’t help wondering whether the product might be better served by a name that didn’t evoke rack and ruin. Maybe “Revenge”—as in “living well is the best”—would have been more, um, fit.

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* “These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration.”

Comments

[rootlesscosmo]

I have a gloomy hunch the copywriter originally wrote "ravish" but was dissuaded by someone from Legal.

[CGHill]

All of a sudden, I need a can of Brawndo. (It's got electrolytes!)

[Q. Pheevr]

My first impression was that the name and the package design made it look like a weed killer, or perhaps an insecticide---in any case, definitely not anything anyone would want to ingest. Then I did a Google image search on Roundup, and I realized that actual weed-killer packaging has a much softer and friendlier look to it.

[Nick]

Yes! I also thought they looked like products to be used on lawns after an alien weed invasion.

[heydave]

My bet is that it was supposed to read "Savage" but that would suggest someone was dreaming of cookie batter and cupcakes.