You will start to see them zipping around restaurants, eateries and grocery stores near you: customers sprinting, cycling, jump-roping, dancing and dribbling up and down sidewalks and across parking lots – earning their food.
Move over, Pokémon GO. There is a new app that is hungry to dominate the globe. It is the best thing since sliced bread – because it actually lets you eat sliced bread.
We are excited at The Big Yogi to unveil our first app: Earn $hit.
This mouthwatering masterpiece links your meals, movements and money to create nutritional accountability. It lets you eat whatever you want. You just have to earn it first.
First, the app’s fat-ometer calculates how many calories your fast food, sugary snacks and bulky beverages will tack onto your body. Then, the trainer customizes a workout to burn these calories before you consume them. Finally, the accountant freezes your finances until you have completed the workout to unlock your fantasy feast.
At last, you can return to McDonald’s without shame and self-judgment and exit the golden arches in triumph. You just have to run there … and back … twice.
How It Works:
1) Link your bank accounts, debit cards and credit cards to your Earn $hit account. Agree to let the app lock your finances at all food establishments within a 100-kilometer radius.
2) Punch in what you want to eat: Big Mac Meal
3) Receive your calorie debt from the fat-ometer:
Big Mac: 540 kilocalories
World Famous Fries: 230 kilocalories
Coke: 170 kilocalories
Total Meal: 940 kilocalories or .27 pounds of fat!
4) Select the type of exercise and intensity level with which you want to pay off your calorie debt. The trainer multiplies metabolic equivalents by your body weight in kilograms to determine how many calories you uniquely burn per hour per exercise. Then, it divides the product into the number of calories that you want to consume to compute the duration of exercise required to earn your meal.
| Exercise | Intensity | METS per Hour | Calories Burned per Hour of Exercise (70-kilogram app user) |
Total Hours Needed to Earn Big Mac Meal (940 kilocalories) |
| Walking | Low | 3 | 210 | 4.48 |
| Cycling | Low | 3 | 210 | 4.48 |
| Aerobic Dancing | Low | 4 | 280 | 3.36 |
| Basketball | Medium | 8 | 560 | 1.68 |
| Jogging | Medium | 10 | 700 | 1.34 |
| Jump-rope | Medium | 10 | 700 | 1.34 |
| Boxing | High | 12 | 840 | 1.12 |
| Rowing | High | 13 | 910 | 1.03 |
| Sprinting | High | 16 | 1,120 | 0.84 |
5) Complete your workout.
6) Unlock your funds to purchase your food.
7) Enjoy.
8) Start striving for your next meal. It may take a few hours.
As you can see from the calculations above, you are going to have to start moving – a lot – in order to unlock your favorite meals!
We find that the most efficient way to earn your meals is to run to and from your dining destinations. The time and energy that it will take to motor yourself across town will catapult you closer to unlocking these foods faster than driving ever could.
If running on a full stomach makes you feel sick just by thinking about it, try cycling. Below are some meals for you to explore earning by bike. The calculations are for a 70-kilogram app user riding with medium intensity, which scores 7 METS per hour:
| Food | Calories | Hours of Cycling to Unlock |
| 12-inch Meatball Marinara Sandwich (Subway) | 960 | 1.96 |
| Baconator (Wendy’s) | 950 | 1.94 |
| Original Chicken Sandwich (Burger King) | 660 | 1.35 |
| Bean Burrito (Taco Bell) | 370 | 0.76 |
| Grande White Chocolate Mocha With Nonfat Milk (Starbucks) | 350 | 0.71 |
| 16-ounce Orange Juice | 224 | 0.46 |
| 20-ounce Gatorade | 130 | 0.27 |
Our favorite is the number of calories that you need to unlock Gatorade, a great sports drink. The irony just makes us smile. But if you want it, earn it!
Do not be shy about enjoying more and more calorically dense foods. You will be able to sweat and to salivate your way to them just as with the other options listed. It only takes more effort and energy.
Turn on the trainer’s voice to update you on your progress and so that you can savor just how expensive each bite is. If you realize mid-workout that you have bitten off more than you want to chew, you always can edit your meal to lessen your calorie debt.
But, there are perks for sticking with it. Unlock enough meals per month to earn a bonus: transportation boosts to ease your efforts. Our favorite is the golf cart: Zoom through the drive-thru in a golf cart and snag 2.5 bonus METS to count toward your exercise.
Are you ready to earn your food? Ready. Set. Go!
Hungry yet? Contact us today to receive a free download of the app and a free breakthrough session with one of our health coaches to train you how to use it! We are here to support you every step of the way to earn food freedom.
A Maur Unity collaboration, edited by Maura Bogue