These included everything from: having to call to make an appointment, which is a pain; lack of near-term availability; no dental insurance; unknown costs, lack of price transparency; difficulty finding times after work or on the weekends, and so much more.

Dr. Tina realized there had to be a better way to deal with this. The traditional dental industry is largely broken for the younger generations because it depends on often expensive, and usually insurance-reimbursable restorative procedures that young people don’t really need.

The traditional model hasn’t met that consumer where they are—the customer experience is really outdated, as I think most of us are aware. So, Dr. Tina decided to build a dental practice that was directly focused on serving the needs of Millennials and Gen Zs and provide the type of consumer experience they’re looking for and expect to have in the other areas of their lives.

DSOPro: The structure seems to be more hygiene focused. Tell us how Dr. Tina developed this concept once she had the idea.

Ultimately, she studied what young people want and need from their dental care – a healthy, white, straight smile. We first began with a focus on healthy and white, which resulted from teeth cleaning and whitening, both of which can be provided by a hygienist under the general supervision of a dentist. 

She realized the unit economics are quite different for a practice purely focusing on cleaning, whitening, and preventive care. So, the labor model also had to be different to support that and focuses on hygienists, who are not as expensive to employ as dentists.

The hygienist experience is largely broken as well – so, she decided to make this a hygiene-led practice where we celebrate and elevate dental hygienists, make them a lead provider, and put them in a position to do the work that they love most, which is educating their patients on preventive dental care. And while we’re at it, give them the opportunity to do something that makes people happy, which is teeth whitening. Here, they have a much more positive guest interaction while providing services than teams do in the traditional dental office. There are no production targets, they don’t have to worry about being under pressure from a dentist, and we offer career tracks. We invest in continuing education, and we try to really be hygiene-centric in terms of the employee-employer value proposition for them. 

DSOPro: What kinds of different technologies are you using? Describe the “airflow cleanings” The Gleamery offers.

The Airflow Max is a technology developed by EMS. It fits under a discipline or methodology called “guided biofilm therapy.” 

Basically, the way it works is that the hygienist applies a disclosing agent to the guests’ teeth that will turn a different color depending upon the concentration and maturity of the plaque. That will then guide the treatment. The hygienist uses the handpiece, which is a highly pressurized erythritol and water/air solution, to remove the biofilm and reveal calculus. Pardon my crude analogy, but it’s like a pressure washer for your teeth. It blasts off the biofilm as guided by the disclosing agent.

There are studies and research that show it actually provides a better prophylaxis outcome. It’s also actually a much better guest experience because it cuts out the picking and the scraping of the hand scaling that a lot of people really don’t like. It is a much more comfortable teeth cleaning experience. When I first had it done while we were testing this out, I experienced what a lot of our guests told me—it was unlike any teeth cleaning I’d ever had before.

We also partner with a couple of established whitening providers—Opalescence Boost (Ultradent) and GLO Science (GLOScience). Both have been evaluated by Dr. Tina and our hygiene team, who were trying to find the best possible whitening results with minimal sensitivity. We also want to deliver whitening treatment to guests in the most efficient amount of time at a price point that’s achievable and attainable. These two systems put all that together.

DSOPro: You are referring to the office as a “studio” and are calling customers “guests” instead of patients. Could you talk about why and the impact it has on your guests? 

We apply a hospitality lens to everything we do. It goes back to the point that younger people aren’t going to the dentist enough. We wanted to make this a dental experience people actually look forward to. We also try to make it as convenient and modernized as possible. We asked ourselves, “Does anybody want to be a patient?” Not really! We welcome people into our studio as our guests versus as patients.

The first thing we do is invite them into our “brush bar” where they can brush their teeth at a premium, beautiful vanity. It turns out some people feel there is no need to brush their teeth before getting their teeth cleaned but others want to brush because they’re about to sit with their mouth open in front of another person. We give them a choice and create an experience around that. Then we show them into a treatment room. The studio has been intentionally designed to be as non-clinical as possible. It looks and feels more like a spa, med spa, or has a Soho House type of vibe.

Next, we offer them our comfort menu where they can choose from a set of totally complimentary options for different types of relaxation technology. We have compression boots, sound therapy, and massage goggles. When the hygienist comes in to initiate treatment, we hope guests will have a really great experience.

DSOPro: What other technologies do you use, or hospitality features do you offer?

We have a lot of team-oriented technology. We try to make the team experience as tech forward as possible. We use a platform called Denti.AI Scribe (Denti.AI), an AI-based periodontal charting tool that allows hygienists to just call out the probing results, so they can work independently and don’t need an assistant. We also use an AI-based chart notes tool called Kiroku (Kiroku) that makes it really easy and streamlined for the hygiene team and the dentist team to implement their chart notes in a quick, structured, and consistent way. 

We’re also talking to some AI concierge-type services about online booking systems, but we haven’t yet chosen one.

DSOPro: Tell us about your transparency policy and having treatment pricing online.

We put ourselves in the shoes of our target customers. Let’s say he is in his mid-20s, maybe just moved to LA or another new city. He doesn’t have an established dental relationship and maybe no dental insurance, but knows he needs to get x-rays and have his teeth cleaned. He starts searching online and a bunch of different dental offices pop up, some with good reviews. He goes to their websites and there’s no way to book online or maybe there is, but the booking experience is a total pain. It’s just not a customer-centric experience at all.

Transparent pricing is key. Most of the time people must call a dental office and if they want to know the cost in advance, it’s impossible to find out. The truth is that young people today don’t want to call on the phone. They just want to see the information online and make the decision for themselves. If it’s the right fit, they want to then book an appointment directly online. 

Another thing we know our guests love about us is “what you see is what you get” because we have a focused service offering. You’re not going to hear that you have three cavities and get pressured to book a restorative appointment. If you have cavities, we will tell you, encourage you to have them taken care of, and provide a referral. But at the end of the day, you’re not going to walk out with a bill that is any more than you expected to pay.

DSOPro: Tell us about your “influencer” partners. 

Many of our guests are on social media just like a lot of us are. We know that influencers—especially in the health and wellness and beauty spaces—are an important source of information, advice, and recommendations, especially for younger people. So, we are intentional about bringing in great influencer partners. I think we are uniquely suited for influencer marketing because our model is such a unique experience. The studio design and the hospitality approach, plus the teeth whitening piece, is really attractive to influencers. 

We don’t pay influencers, we invite them to try a complimentary treatment, and we ask that they share their experience with their followers. Many influencers ask us if they can come in, but we’re selective. We make sure they’re highly credible and have the right following to be a good fit for our audience.

DSOPro: Tell us more about Dr. Tina. Is she still practicing endodontics and how many facilities do you have?

We have one location right now in West Hollywood. Dr. Tina is based in Portland. Our first location was in Beaverton in the Portland area. And long story short, a car drove into the storefront. Fortunately, no one was hurt, but it was going to be a 5-month rebuild process, we had to cancel thousands of customer appointments, and there was no way we could have kept our team on through that period. It would basically have been the equivalent of starting from scratch. At the same time, our West Hollywood location had been open for about 3 months and was doing amazingly well across all our key operating metrics. So, we decided if we’re going to build from scratch, let’s do it here, and we’re in the process of getting our second location up and running in Santa Monica.

Although she is still practicing endodontics in Portland, Dr. Tina is licensed in California and is very involved in overseeing our clinical excellence. And she is part of the interview and onboarding process for all the team members we bring on. She decided we should look into the airflow technology, made the decision on the whitening technologies we use, and she’s helped set our hygiene philosophy and developed a flow chart for how to handle different kinds of patient situations. She’s very much the clinical excellence leader for us as a business.

DSOPro: How did you get involved in this dental journey and what is your background?

I started my career in consulting working at Bain & Company here in LA. I did that for about 7 years with a couple of stints elsewhere. I worked on Mitt Romney’s campaign leading debate prep in 2012 and then went to business school at Stanford. I always knew I wanted to be an operator though. In 2020, right after the pandemic hit, I left Bain to run a premium culinary e-commerce business called Hedley & Bennet as the business took its first VC capital. We had a great run there. We grew the top line significantly and brought the business to profitability. Frankly, I wasn’t looking to leave there but I met Dr. Tina, and the opportunity really resonated with me personally because everybody’s got their challenges in life and mine happened to be dental related.

I was born with a cleft lip and had a bunch of dental work done growing up associated with that. Then, I was hit in the face with a baseball when I was 15 years old, which triggered a 10-year tooth resorption process. In my mid-20s my front incisor had to be extracted and bonded to the two neighboring teeth. That necessitated a bunch of procedures to get the bone to grow back, the implant placed, and all that stuff. 

All that to say, I viscerally understand the pain points with traditional dental from a consumer standpoint. So, the opportunity to make preventive dental care and building smile confidence for people in a way that is really compelling, and a great experience, was too good an opportunity for me to pass up.

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