Dr. Jonathan Levine – Redefining the Business of Dentistry

Welcome back to the Casey Adams Show. Today I am joined by Dr. Jonathan Levine, the founder of Glo Science. Jonathan, thank you so much for coming the show today.

Thank you, Casey. Great to be here.

Absolutely. So I know we were just jamming before, but I gotta say, I'm so inspired by not only your story, but you are involved in so many different aspects of dentistry from, you know, the inventing and technological aspect to the business element. And I know that also your son is also involved in, you know, this industry as well, which I truly do love to see it. And you know, before we dive in today, I just wanted to say once again, I really appreciate your time for, for coming on the show today and excited to talk about all things dentistry and, you know, your background overall.

Yeah, no, I'm, I'm excited to talk about it. You know, I got into this industry and it needed reinvention from day one, the minute I stepped into it, because I really didn't know what it was all about. So it really started when I first got out of dental school and started realizing what was kind of the institutional knowledge here, what was it really like. And very quickly you understand that you got to kind of build new capabilities if you're going to help to change and reinvent a bit of an industry that's been around for a long time.

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I know you've been involved in this industry, dentistry for over 35 years. I believe you have over, you know, 27 plus patents in terms of aesthetics and therapeutic, you know, technology, devices. Take us back. You know, when did this journey and path for dentistry come about in your life? Because it's not only something that, you know, it's, it's transformed so much over the years as I've been doing my research. But you've been truly a pioneer it of this industry for the time that you've been involved. So take us back to, like, what initially led you to wanting to pursue a career in dentistry.

Yeah, you know, it's such a, it's such an interesting question because it makes you go back and look back and how did it all start? And I think for young people, it's, it becomes very instructive because, you know, where we are today, it's kind of everything before helps us get to that spot. Right. I was at Cornell. I was a lacrosse player. We were talking about lacrosse before. We ended up after, you know, Southcourt junior, senior year, senior, found ourselves undefeated, found ourselves winning a national championship with a great group of guys that we, you know, what it's like on a team. You love each other, you grow together. We had an amazing coach, a legendary coach, really. The John Wooden of lacrosse was Richie Moran. And I was so lucky to have this kind of band of brothers playing together. And when I got, you know, kind of the idea that. And I was kind of a bit misinformed. I didn't think I liked dentistry. I didn't think I liked business. Business was kind of the dinner table talk when I was growing up. And my father was in one of the oldest businesses in the United States, which is called the fur business. And there was always this conversation about conflict and this guy owes this person money. I go, oh my God, this is a crazy business. As a young person, you imagine you're listening to this, and I started to really lean more towards the science. And I was a microbiology immunology major at Cornell. But I didn't think I liked. Well, I knew I didn't like hospitals because I ended up visiting grandparents that unfortunately passed away. And so I liked working with my hands. I liked science. I was thinking of staying at Cornell and getting a PhD and then I ended up realizing that, you know what, dentistry might be interesting. So I tippy toed in. I went to a fantastic dental school, which was a specialty dental school that you were in medical school for the first two years. So that was Boston University, Goldman School. And then I get into the profession. And when I got into this profession, it was such a solo sport, the opposite of having a team approach. And I just said, we got to change this, we got to reinvent it. And it almost happened very organically, where I started thinking about how do we create newness? The business model doesn't make sense. One makes sense, one dentist, one assistant, one hygienist. And I start building teams within the dentistry. So I would put teams together. We're not just a dentist, but a specialist all together. And not sending your work to an outside lab where the quality is questionable. Let's have our technicians underneath the whole umbrella. So, you know, overnight success in 25, 30 years is what I like to say, because it takes time. And at the same time, I found myself inventing and taking those inventions and starting commercializing them and starting companies. But the only way I was able to do any of this successfully is to build teams in each place. And it happened. It did happen very organically over the decades.

Wow, it's so great to hear. And I think too, on one end, it's the technical trade and the approach of being an expert. And then the Other the business lane and of course, the products that you create and invent. Just the authenticity that is there when it comes to, like, what you see needs to be in the market. I'd be curious, like, when it comes to the early days of invention and the new technologies, of course that's not something you had to go do. Right. Like, you were there. You could have just gone and done the traditional thing, as many dentists may do. But you said, no, I want to go get all these patent patents and commercialize things and really focus on the. Also the business element of it. What was that? I don't want to say transition, like, but was that, like a natural thing for you when getting into this, or when. When did that start to really come into your practice of how you want to go build your business overall?

Yeah, I think for me, it's. It starts with mindset. And my experience in college made me realize that everything is possible. That kind of thinking, like, let's just go after. It's kind of the athlete on the field, you know. Yeah, you're playing a sport. You're not saying to yourself, oh, my God. Well, maybe sometimes you say, wow, look how big those guys are. Oh, my God, take us apart. You know, we're the bunch of optimists. We're going to go have fun and we're going to go win this game, you know, kind of attitude. And I think that applies to business because business is such a team sport. Life's a team sport, I like to say, and so is everything we try to do. And so with that, with that mindset, when you look at things that are in an industry, you say, okay, how do I improve them? And that happened for me as a business model, to reinvent the business model of one dentist, one hygienist, one assistant, versus building teams. And really much different approach. And happened to me in even the things that we do. So, for example, you know, teeth whitening, there was a light that caused zingers because it sat outside the mouth and everything got too hot in the mouth. So it created this pain inside the tooth. We call it intrapulpal pressure. And then there were these guards that were made. You put the gel in, the gel goes all over the place. It's a mess. The gums get inflamed from it, and you get a lot of sensitivity. And I took the best of both worlds where I built light and heat into a closed system and applicated. That didn't allow the gel to go on the gums and stayed on the Teeth. And this, actually, this is a billion dollar business of the light in mouthpiece devices. If you see the mouthpieces that light up. And we have about 24 patents. Of course, we have companies that kind of knocked us off and they built their other companies that way. But still we, we have a very, very good wall of intellectual property at our GLOW Science company. And so that's just an example that you say, all right, we can fix this. And to be, to be honest with you, I was riding a bike and I got off the bike and I said, oh my God, let's take lighting. And I drew it on a napkin of this picture of a mouthpiece. And, you know, it's kind of noodling it because I just took the best of both worlds. So, you know, I just think we're all creatives and we're problem solving and I'm a big cyclist. So I always think that, you know, those types of things, running cycling, where you almost have, you know, kind of this catharsis, that you're relaxed and you could be thinking about things and all of a sudden the brain starts thinking about these creative things that could really almost start a whole new aspect of an industry. And. And that was the genesis for my Glouce company.

Yeah, that's very, very cool to hear. Especially the, you know, that. The true napkin idea. Right. You pause on the bike, you write it down. It's. That's really cool to hear. When it comes to, you know, the different verticals where you spend time. Jonathan, you know, with Glo Science, I know you also have the Glo Good foundation, the J.B. young, all the different projects and companies and initiatives that you were a part of. I would love to hear from you, like where you spend your time and how all these other, you know, the foundation, how those came about throughout the years. So organically, with just how you approach, you know, the work that you do.

Yeah. You know, the dots kind of connect. I call it my personal ecosystem. Right.

Yeah.

I. I'm an academic, and that's kind of fundamentally a scientist and an academic. And. And from that, that helped me both in my clinician, as a clinician for my patients, numero uno. I've always had my practice, always built a team. By having a team, it freed me up, it allowed me to do other things. So I used to run a program at nyu. I'm still full professor, advanced aesthetics. I'm a prosthodontist. I ended up, after dental school, going to three more years, becoming a specialist prosthodontics is aesthetic, structure, function, biology. We're kind of the architects for the health of the mouth and also the aesthetics. So we work with all the other specialties. And so, you know, as a specialist and then teaching and then inventing, I had enough time, barely had enough time to try to start these other things. So in my second company, we had a company called Go Smile that we built first, the first whitening product, we sold that in 2008. And that was all about brand building. And the idea, the creative idea that my wife came up with, and Stacy's always been my co founder, she's actually a secret sauce and she should be on this show, not me. But Stacy's amazing and she came up with the idea that we had to put oral care out of the drugstore and bring it to Prestige Beauty. So Sephora, Saks, Nordstrom, 2002-2008, we built the whole category of the Smile within Prestige Beauty. Had a very interesting private equity partner that I decided to exit early. And when I say interesting, I mean really interesting. So I would have built that brand much longer. But you know how that story goes. But it was, it was really an amazing experience of brand building and, and kind of doing something different and thinking creatively of how we can create kind of a new channel for a product. And that was unique. Literally 18 months later, I came up with that idea on the bicycle and the napkin. And then we launched the Glo Science company. But throughout these companies, when we did Gloscience, we said, we have to have a soul of the company. And that I learned from my company before. And so I find that our journeys, it's all these stepping stones and how people can influence our lives. I had an amazing friend who started this amazing coffee company, this big coffee company, and he would tell me great things and he would, he would tell me, look, if you're going to build a great company, you got to have the fundamentals in place. He says, growth can kill you. And, you know, you learn all these things from people who become fantastic mentors for you. And he also. I learned from him and his wife how important it is for a company to have a soul. And so Stacey and I, when we visited Rwanda with our friends, we had our first mission of the glowgood foundation, and we worked with the Starbucks team and Foundation Rwanda. And we had this amazing experience helping these people, bringing a team over there. I get back to my practice and a patient of mine who became a dear friend, Lenny Kravitz, corners me and he says, johnny, I heard you came back from Rwanda, you got to help my people. I go, lenny, you're half Jewish and half Bahamian, where do you want me to go? And he says, I want you to go to Eleuthera. And where's Eleuthera? And anyway, the people have no access to care. They walk around in pain in their mouth. They think it's normal, modern diet, sugary drinks, no real farming, no access to care. A dental desert and a medical desert. We go in there 10 years ago and 10 years later we have a 14 chair clinic. I go in with medical professionals, dental. And you see what happens when dentistry and medicine are integrated together. All the specialties, because they all have hypertension, cardiovascular disease, diabetes or the adults, the people have lost teeth, they need extractions. And we go in, we 3D print, dentures, prosthesis. We have amazing technology there. So it's been an amazing experience doing that. And it's interesting. In the ecosystem, everything reinforces each other. What the foundation does is it gives us our purpose. Like Simon Sinek would say, we know our why. My professionals I bring There, we take 75 people each mission. Three four day missions and to a person it's like we love this so much and we're all together like back to my old college days, a band of, you know, great pals. We learn from each other and we help the people and we serve the people and then we serve the people who are doing the serving because we have a leadership group also. And I bring in CEO coaches that help the professional be better at what they do. So this has evolved over time, you know, things we learn. It's just, I think the most important thing for young people who are listening is just to be open minded and that use that creativity that God has given us and keep our mind open for growth and open for opportunity and luck will come our way. We will find the luck and we will do the things we need to do. Know that we'll all. You always hit headwinds. We always hit the head.

Yeah.

You got to surround ourselves with, you know, great people. Friend of mine always says we are the company we keep and it's very true. You know, it's all about, you know, the people we surround ourselves with.

Absolutely. And I love how you say the, you know, the, the ecosystem approach and something that you brought up that I wanted to point out that is just speaks to like the family dynamic and ecosystem that you've created, which is you said your wife has been always been like a co founder and true, like the great Visionary behind a lot of the companies. And then I know that your son Cody is a founder of Twice, which is an incredible brand in this space. And it seems that the ecosystem approach from the company and the foundation to your core family and the ecosystem that they've created in and have been able to contribute to this space, it seems almost that it feels effortless the way that it's been culminated throughout the years. And I would love to talk about the, like the family dynamic more because I know again, your son building a brand in this space and you saying working with your wife, would love to dive in there a little bit more and kind of understand where this all began and you know, from your son work and you know, wanting to build in this space to then working with your wife. I always love the conversation of working with your spouse. I just to give you some context, Jonathan, I'm getting married in 60 days now and my fiance and I, we built our, my last company in the software space together. And you know, working with my partner, girlfriend, then fiance at the time, it was very, you know, I think to peers of mine, like, controversial. How do you do that? Why do you do that? But we made it work and we love it. And whenever I hear founders talk about working with their partner, I love diving down that rabbit hole to really understand how you've made it work and know why you chose to do that in, you know, in the early days.

Yeah, well, congratulations. That's, that's amazing. And, and working with someone you love dearly, you know, is, is very special. But like marriage and like building a business together, it's, it's all about building that, that culture, that understanding like headwinds. In business you're always going to have issues in life you're always going to face. And it's, we like to say in my family, it's not the problems we face, but it's how we face them. What's our mindset like? Are we getting a reactive knee jerk response or are we going to really sit back, stop and think and kind of discuss it? And you know, we're human and you always have that, those moments. But in business and like in marriage, you know, it's alignment of value system. So you raise your boys. Stacy and I have very similar values. We've been very fortunate. We have two amazing sons and you know, they, we're all very close. And I think the way we think about, when we look back, raising the boys, it wasn't about ordering the kids around. This is a bit more about culture. Right. Do it, because I said do it like command and control leadership that you would talk about in business. But, but it's more about how do you inspire the people around you, whether it's someone you're working with or somebody in your family. How do I make them understand that if they decide to do that? Well, think about these might be the repercussions. So it's, it's a bit of that kind of approach and I've been tremendously fortunate. Where I went to Cornell. They went to Cornell. I played lacrosse. They played lacrosse. They had one year, then I figured somebody's going into healthcare, right? They went the opposite way and they went into business. But when we were on our second mission in the foundation and Julian was an analyst for M and A and then private equity and he also worked big bank, Cody was doing branding and marketing. They came to me at the end of the day and they said, dad, we can't believe what your team does. People walk in in pain and no teeth. They walk out with a beautiful smile. They're hugging you guys. We want a startup company all about the power, the smile. And I looked at him, I go, wait a minute, you went to Cornell? I went to Cornell. We played lacrosse. You played lacrosse. I went to dentistry. And now you want to go into the family business without seven extra years of school. That was my big joke. I go, you guys are geniuses. But I was so excited what they wanted to do. And our go small company had elements of what twice was, but twice was this new, improved, great version and they put their own thoughts into it. And you know, we were very tired. Of course, what my, my expertise is the innovation behind those products and the ingredients. And so, you know, it was a bit of a family affair. And now pivoting back, we're opening up what we're thinking of as a reinvention of the dental practice and taking everything that I've learned in the past from a product business to also my practice and building an expansive dental practice on multi specialty levels. We're all specialists under one roof. We're doing that in a new space in Tribeca. The boys are the branding experts. And we have a name called Smile House by JBL and our uptown practice called JBL nyc. And we're. I'm loving the whole concept. We're almost ready to open in about four weeks. Wow.

Coming soon.

Yeah, coming soon. But it has a very strong dental medical integration, which means what happens in hygiene with some of the new technologies of salivary diagnostics, airway sleep, CAT scan, For the jaws, you can diagnose things that potentially are issues downstream later in people's lives. So help prevent these systemic inflammatory diseases. Big connection of the mouth and the body, as you know. You know, we call it oral systemic health. So that's it. The boys came full circle in the family business.

That is. I mean, first of all, I. Every time I go to New York, I stay in Tribeca, and I have tons of friends there, so I can't.

Wait for your sharing, Casey.

I will be sharing this with them. And so just to dive into Smile House a bit more. So this. This opens up in four weeks. And I know on the site, if I go there, it says, you know, your destination for dental health and longevity. Um, maybe speak to me a little bit more about when you talk about longevity and, like, the combination there of, like, dental health mixed with the longevity purposes. I'm. I'm fascinated by this whole concept, and I think it's like, when you talk about, like, the modern, like, reinvention of, like, what that means as a practice. Yeah, this is exciting for me, and I'm definitely. Would love to dive in a bit more. And, you know, when this opens up, like, what can people expect when they're coming into Smile House is different than a regular, you know, practice?

Overall, it's very different. You know, as I constructed this with my sons and Stacy's very involved, it's a complete family affair, which is so magical for a death. And, you know, we all amazingly get along well, and we all have kind of different skill sets, but, you know, you gotta. You gotta go back a little bit. Dentistry and medicine has always been separate in the United States and has everything to do with. It's called the grand rebuke. But when these doctors who were practicing dentistry literally in the first medical school knocked on the door and said, we have to open up a dental division, they got rebuked and they said, no, open up your own dental, your own school, your own school. And they opened down the street in Baltimore, Maryland, for the first dental school. As they went back to New York, raised money, and that's how dentistry and medicine was separate. Where in Europe, you became an MD first, then you went into dental. Well, there's only one school in the country does medical and dental together, and that's Harvard. And so everything's separate, and it's separate in practice. There's like a disconnect. Like, the mouth isn't connected to the body. 54. Systemic inflammatory disease. Name any of them. Diabetes, cardiovascular disease, pancreatic cancer, Alzheimer's, cognitive function, low birth weight, baby, I can go down the list. Are all connected, causally related from all the research today, 20 years of this, of great research that when you have inflammation of the mouth, those bacteria can show up in the arteries of cardiovascular pancreatics. Pancreas and pancreatic cancer tied directly to rheumatoid arthritis. Periodontal disease goes up. Rheumatoid arthritis goes up.

Wow.

Periodontal disease goes down. Rheumatoid arthritis goes down. Same thing, cardiovascular disease, same thing. Diabetes, causally related. These are diseases that are complicated, that have. We call it a constellation of risk factors like cardiovascular disease. Periodontal disease is one of the major risk factors. So I set that as a bedrock to say that the opportunity that we have in healthcare is to utilize dentistry as a tip of the spear of diagnostics because we can do things today because of the new innovation. And I'll explain that innovation where we could get ahead of people getting disease, these kind of systemic inflammatory Cardiovascular disease, number one killer in America. And it costs $1 billion a day to our healthcare system to take care of cardiovascular disease and stroke. 20% of our GDP is the healthcare system. 20%. So the math's easy. Trillions of dollars in healthcare alone. So what happens when we go to a wellness model? So you listen to, you know, the integrative medicine people and you listen to a Mark Hyman and you listen to Peter Attia and you know all these brilliant people who are making people understand now how all the systems are created. We talked about ecosystem, the body is this ecosystem. So we said, bam, let's connect the dots. And we're going to create a clinic where dentistry and medicine does have a connection, where the, all these, the specialties of dentistry, orthodontics, periodontist, prosthetics are all connected. And our diagnostics of now we do CAT scans for the jaw so we can see everything where you just take X rays, 8 second CAT scan from the bottom of the neck airway to the top of the nose. We can say see all kinds of nasal issues, nasal obstructions that cause people to mouth breathe that you can't get into deep sleep. I can go on and on with this stuff. But you can imagine with the new technology we can help people get upstream, get preventative, get more wellness and not develop these systemic inflammatory diseases. So that's what we're doing at smilehaus and we're joining that with a very strong hospitality approach. You walk in, it's the law of opposites. What you expect People behind the desk with phones. No way. It's like a boutique hotel you walk in. It's very engaging. It's very similar to Remedy Place, because I was just going to mention that Leery and. Yeah, and it's like that. It's feeling really, you know, very high energy. And it's a place where it's safe and people could change their opinion of a dental experience and actually look forward to it. What a concept. Look forward to a dental appointment. And we don't say dentistry, we say longevity. We say smile. You know, we say, we're going to bring your most beautiful smile to life. And that's our thinking, and we created a patient journey that is completely different than I think most people have ever experienced.

Wow, you're getting me excited to come back to New York here, Jonathan. Oh, I can't wait to see you. This is incredible.

Yeah.

And I was going to. I was going to bring up Remedy Place because I know, you know, our mutual friend recently, I had him on the show. And that experience of walking through the door and to experience Remedy and that taking and combining it with the. What people would think as the dental experience and completely reinventing that, that is so powerful. And I think it's something too where growing up, I was always the person where I never understood when people were afraid of the dentist. I always enjoyed going to the dentist. I always enjoyed having nice, clean teeth. And just. It was never something that I was, you know, like a lot of kids, like, oh, I don't want to go in there. But then you kind of reinvent it. I feel like this is something too when. And I want to talk about, like, the future of something related to Smile House. Like, do you envision this to have Smile House locations all over the US or where does this concept fit into major cities? Or, you know, I'm just curious about that when it comes to, like, the overall experience and the ability for people maybe outside of these larger cities to experience something like Smile House.

Yeah. I look at it this way and why I'm involved in education and, you know, doing podcasts and these types of things. I have a third book coming out on the connection of the mouth and the body, but it's. I think it's elevating the conversation. I think once we do this and we can prove out what we think we can do from a patient experience standpoint and an outcome of care to a higher level, it also has to be economically viable and sustainable business model. And I think once we can prove that out, other people will See, what we're doing for us to build scalability into the business model is what we're doing right from the beginning and figure out how we could kind of put this into other areas. And I'm working with a fantastic group. There's a company called Henry Schein. Henry Schein is our big supporter for our foundation, Henry Schein Cares. And they're not only a seller of products and services, but they're a very innovative company within dentistry and medicine. And I'm working with their top people there to think about how do we take dental and medical integration together and make it more pervasive for the profession. The American Dental association, in fact, has created a whole innovation side of the ada and they're also working closely together. So I think it's, you know, take taking people who are pushing the envelope a little bit in that thought leader world and just exposing it and raising the conversation.

Absolutely. No, that's beautifully well said. And I wanted to pivot the conversation a little bit and talk through something that I know you did very well on the Today show, which is talking about maximizing your dental visit. As someone that I believe, I go to the dentist personally three times a year, I think every four months. Three, four times a year. And this conversation of how to maximize it I found very intriguing and I'd love to hear your perspective because I believe people listening today, everyone, I'm sure, hopefully. Right. Goes to the dentist a handful of times a year. What is something or maybe some preconceived notions that people aren't thinking about or things they should be thinking about before going in for a visit?

Yeah, it's educating people of what's possible. Right. You're in la, you're in Miami, you're in New York, wherever. And let's say you're not even in a big city. What is possible for the dental profession to do is to be able to educate and also create an experience that people have a positive experience. A lot of it is educational. The human brain works best with visual. So what we're able to do now because of the digital workflow and digital diagnostics is we can take this CAT scan for the jaws. And now we see everything with structure and function, how things come together, all our structures and also biology. We also can design smiles from our digital workflow. So what does that mean? From the scan and from facial aesthetics, we can change the tooth position through orthodontics, we can do bonding ceramics to change and widen arches and lengthened teeth that have been worn down and improved Shades. So when we look at these four domains, and this is how we think of what we do at Smile House with what we call mouth mapping. These four domains of aesthetic, structure, function, biology, all happens in the hygiene room in literally one hour. This CAT scan takes nine seconds. The intraoral scans takes about four or five minutes. You're perio probing now.

Off.

Off of a microphone. Your AI is reading the X rays and reading whether there's decay or periodontal disease. Wow. Oral cancer salivary diagnostics, where we can see if there's any weird microbiology going on in the mouth. That microbiome of the mouth, by the way, then seeds the gut. And so that's important that the mouth doesn't have any chronic inflammation and all those other systemic inflammatory diseases we talked about. So in fairly short order, we can diagnose, and we do, of course, as a standard of care, oral cancer diagnosis, we can diagnose and help people stay healthy. And we put it all up on a screen like a dashboard, and they see things visually. So if you think about the dental experience of the past, which you only have to go back eight to 10 years now, what's possible because of technology and because of, you know, people who want to move the needle and raise the bar for people to have a great experience but also be educated and for us to diagnose, it's a completely different day for the profession. And, you know, folks like myself are looking to do this and help kind of nudge my profession forward and get and use this technology available to us. And always be thinking about, what is that patient journey like? What's that experience? And how do we provide an enhanced experience for people?

Absolutely. No, that's very, very cool to hear, and I appreciate you for sharing that. Something to dive into that I'm curious about is when you were growing up, Dr. Jonathan, what was your relationship to the dentist like as a kid?

Oh, God, not good. Okay, let's hear more.

Why not?

I, Casey, truth be told, I got a sweet tooth. And this is why I work out all the time. Every day I work out because, you know, I got to keep my weight down. I. I ride with guys 15, 20 years younger than me, and I like it that way. And they. They nudge me forward to be better. But, you know, it wasn't that. I. I was in love with the dentist. My. My people used to say to me, how'd you get into dentistry? Because, you know, I. I was an athlete. I used to act in the school plays. I liked all that stuff. But you know, I found myself at Cornell, you know, very focused on sports. I was doing research with an amazing professor, Virginia Utermolin in immunology. And I just felt that work with my hands and have being my own. I knew enough the profession, I'd kind of be my own business person, you know, control my destiny type of thing. So it was a bit of a process of elimination. But I know it wasn't like, oh, I wanted to go into dentistry, but it was more. But it also came down, you know, I had a mindset. You want to help people, you go into health care, people go into healthcare. You're not going into these professions because, you know, you, you're not trading stocks or you're not into finance where you're, you know, I think that the money becomes the big driver. But it's so interesting because 25, 30 years later, I've seen the evolution of an industry today. What's really interesting, I don't know how much you know about this, is dental practices and medical practices. Certain specialties that are private practices are being rolled up together into these organizations, right? In dentistry, it's called DSOs, dental service organizations, medical MSO. They're very, very valuable because you're taking these ma and pa type shops, as they would call it. You know, one dentist want a sister one of those, or just a single practice, put them together, but put a corporate infrastructure that modernizes the way they do things, try to get that organic growth, decrease your expenses from what they call economies of scale, and all of a sudden you got an interesting business. And all the private equity last 10, 15 years, the KKRS, the Blackrocks, all of them are in dentistry. The PEs are driving this whole valuation process. And it's, they're very valuable, these practices. So it shows when the money's coming in also. And in fact, you know, where I'm involved with startups and I advise a bunch of companies in the innovation space. Money's going into the innovation also in oral health. And you're really seeing a nascent industry really starting to grow up and to kind of get next to their medical bigger brother that's been, you know, kind of much better funded and much better organized because of the structure of hospitals and doctors working together.

Yeah, no, it's. I feel like this is a whole conversation we could talk about for hours that I'm so curious about and just to like, shed some light in context, like, I've, I've raised money for my last company, angel investors, couple VC funds, and you Know, in, in the world of like software or media, that's where my, I'm the most like familiar with and I, I love following these modern like roll up companies where, you know, whether that's like people buying car washes and rolling them up and buying hundreds across the country. I'll follow all these people online or listen to podcasts from these like, you know, these guys that are rolling up different businesses. Of course it's at a completely different level when you're talking about the blackrocks and the, the massive private equity companies that scale. But something I'm curious about that I'd love to have you shed some light on, Jonathan, is when it comes to like evaluating a dentist business and a practice, maybe shed some light on like how does that even work? Right? If someone's a young academic that wants to go to dental school, but they also are listening to maybe this podcast or other business podcast and they're thinking about the academic mixed with the business element. I think at times those are two very separate conversations. But I feel that you're the perfect person to ask this question to of how do you think about that when it comes to evaluating a practice or how do the private equity companies think about that? When you think about software, you can look at the typical valuations on software companies, you can look at the public markets and I'm very unfamiliar with this world of maybe how private equity thinks about this. So we'd love to dive into that a little bit if you, if you much so allow us to.

Sure, absolutely. You know, if I go back, let's go back 10, 15 years on valuation for dental practices, where it was and when before the bigger dollars came in and a dental practice was, let's say bought by a younger dentist and maybe, you know, a bank is helping finance them, these dental practices sold about, for about 85% of, of trailing three years of revenue. Okay. And we know that if you had a certain revenue practice, let's say a million dollar practice, so for 700, 750, $800,000, it would sell for that. But a million dollar practice could have $100,000 of EBITDA profit or could have $500,000 of EBITDA. And if you had a multiple of EBITDA and you got a lot of enterprise value for that multiple, well, the whole industry is going to change, right? So when the money came in, whether it was VC or P E and could be smaller shops, not even the big guys, especially, you know, kind of 10, 15 years ago, the valuation started to go Higher and higher and higher as the value that these investors saw. Because dentistry, you know, even at the insurance level or even at the very high end level that I've always run my practice at, has that opportunity to, to be very predictable and very stable. Okay? So when you're looking at a stable business, like you're looking at, you know, a good consumer product company or a great brand or a great car wash, car washes that mean be rolled up, but there's a predictable cash flow, there's value. So yeah, what started out at about 3 to 4 times EBITDA is now up to 8 to 10 times EBITDA in the last five years. Only what started out at 3,4% of the whole industry owned by DSOs is now 22% and growing like this in the last seven years. And that's a convergence of trends of dentists getting out with a lot of debt out of dental school. And I mean a lot like anywhere from 350 to $500,000 for these young people and these organized dental practices now having a very strong business team that can offer a great growth opportunity for young dentists, especially the smart dsos. So if you think about that equation, when you run it at 8 to 10 times multiple, and let's just say you have 500,000 of EBITDA, you know, all of a sudden you can see those numbers, a million dollars of ebitda, all of a sudden you start seeing that these things are selling at much higher prices. So the industry has an opportunity to be modernized. But what's happening in the DSOs is they have to also focus on the quality of care. They can't be a company that's pushing dentists to produce. You have to still have a high level of ethics, a high level of standards and operational and clinical excellence. And so the DSOs that really understand that are the ones that I think will be the ones at the top. And so, you know, like anything else, whether it's a marriage or a business, it has a lot to do with the leadership, right. And setting the stage and really putting the right core values and right vision purpose out there for the, for the teams.

Yeah, very, very well said and I appreciate you so much for sharing that. Dr. Jonathan. Yeah, I think too, just when it comes to what you just said of the leadership around the quality of care, this is an industry that's such a high barriers to entry. I know you mentioned, you know, seven years extra of school and like these are, these are things where I view this and it's, it's so fascinating to think about how the innovation is transforming the industry. And something that I love talking about, like nearing the end of every show, is just what excites you the most as you think about the future of this industry. Of course, you know, you're really planting your flag in with Smile House, and I know we've touched on that here. But when you think about, you know, looking back the last two decades and then looking into the future, you know, you mentioned AI and all these like, new age innovations, what excites you the most when you think about this whole industry of dentistry into the future and beyond.

Yeah. If I had to put some goals out there, what would I would love to see even in the next three to five years, that dentistry and medicine get much tighter connected, where the dentist is known more as an oral physician, because that's what we are, not just dentists. There's an appreciation for these, this unique type of business model that produces a high level and a higher level of quality of care. And I do believe when there is a better integration that the patient outcomes are going to be improved. I truly believe that, that we can get these preventable diseases much earlier into a wellness model. And I would say that incredibly excited personally to have a family focus because, you know, with everything we do in life, we have to be very focused and a family focus on this together. And it's interesting watching my son's journey of where they got their kind of first seven years of working in their respective industries and then coming into the family business and now we're really focused on our family business together. Is exciting to do that together with them. It, for me, it's legacy. It means that, you know, dad is still relevant, they still need me on the phone calls and to be involved, you know, and to lead the charge with them. So very excited about that and really, you know, very excited about where dentistry is going today, you know, as a, as a personal thought leader with other friends of mine who want to kind of elevate the profession, that's something I'd like to see in a very big way in the next five years.

Yeah, that is, that is incredible to hear. And I think too, you know, when it comes to the information you share and you know, companies like Smile House, it's. I'm excited too, on the receiving end, like next time. How does that work before, as we're wrapping up here, Right. Like, I'm someone that, you know, when I look at Smile House, I get excited about it. I book an appointment. What if people are Listening and they are in New York. And Smile House, you know, is opening soon. Like what's the process there? I'm sure there's going to be a long waiting list here with the, you know, the industry experience and location where it is opening. So maybe talk to me about that because I'm sure that's a very exciting initiative coming out soon.

It is. That lives in my two sons domain, of course, but you know, being on all the calls with them. So we have a landing page now, websites launching in about a week. So you basically, you know, sign up from there. Smilehouse Co and they'll be able to book an appointment. You'll be able to book an appointment online. Right through the website. You'll learn all about our mouth mapping diagnostics, our team, our philosophy and we take a very unreasonable hospitality approach. Thank you. Matt Gudera, who wrote that amazing book Unreasonable Hospitality. But it's really bringing that to healthcare is a fantastic goal for Matt, an ex Cornellian, by the way. I just want to give a plug to Cornell and you know, they can come. I think when people experience what we're doing, they can go back, they tell their friends and then all of a sudden the profession starts moving in a very nice direction. You know, I'll never forget when I started in dentistry, I had a very good friend, she was a PR agent, Nancy Berman. Nancy Berman Communications. There's a plug finance. But I remember I was in Vogue or I was in one of those magazines and I had a friend of mine, an older faculty member, prosthodontist, yelled at me. He says, you're, you're, you're, you're ruining the profession because they talked about you in this magazine. And I said what you're talking about. And so, you know, it's this traditional thinking that holds people back. And I knew that when I got told and criticized for that, I knew I was onto something and I went full steam ahead like a Ferrari, like, let's go, I'm on it. And that's, I think that's the attitude for people who do things differently. You know, that kind of arrows in the back if you're a pioneer, that you're saying, let's go, think differently, let's break the rules. I tell my team, law of opposites, everything that's done in dentistry, we're doing the opposite. You walk in and you expect people on calls and not to look up and not have a hospitality approach. Opposite going to be a boutique hotel, beautiful desk just like you're walking into a spa. And the place is going to look like a boutique hotel. It is so beautiful. Cody and Stacy and the team and the architects and my very good friend you have to have on this, my very good friend is a guy named Vito Erico and him, him, Vito Lavinia and Danny started Equinox and he is seriously my owner's rep and he's driving everybody crazy, but he's so knowledgeable. Vito's amazing, every little detail. And so I'm so proud of, I think, how this thing is going to turn out because I want people to have just an amazing, amazing experience and totally change the game of the way they think about their smile and how to, how to be really healthy.

The excitement is, is felt across the country. Over here, Jonathan. So last question before we wrap up, because I find that you have not only so much experience when it comes to your industry, but you've transformed and pioneered so much. And I'd love to ask you, you know, what's your biggest piece of advice for young entrepreneurs or even young academics when it comes to thinking about their industry or their career overall?

Yeah, I think it's what I've learned and what I've learned from dear friends, which is the vision is the dream is to dream really, really, really big and then dream even bigger and then surround yourself with people that you want to be spending all your time with, you know, people you really love hanging with. And I learned that in college with my teammates. And sometimes it doesn't happen immediately, but when you have experiences together, like in a foxhole or like in a. On a basketball team, and you have these great experiences, you build these deep relationships, but that happens because you're similar mindset with these people. You have alignment with value system, so vision, the values that drives everything, almost like an operating system. And of course, you really do end up figuring out why you're doing what you're doing. And I think, you know, a lot of companies, when they think about starting a company, like Dan Sullivan from Strategic Coach would say it's who, it's who you're going to work with. Who are you going to get to do the operational execution? Let's say you're a visionary and you're more creative. It's who, not how. Don't worry about the how. Dan Sullivan says who, not how. He's a fantastic person who's coached many CEOs of the last 40 years. And it's very, very true. So I think if you take that together, you know, almost as a, as a good equation, thinking about those things I think could be very helpful in the early days.

I love that. Well, before we wrap up, Dr. Jonathan Levine, I just want to say thank you once again for taking the time to be on the show. And for those that have made it this far, where's the best place for everyone to follow you, to connect with you, to learn more about you? I know you mentioned your upcoming book as well and just everything you have going on in your ecosystems.

Yeah, easy enough at Dr. Jon Levine, Dr. John Levine is my Instagram. I'm on. I'm on LinkedIn. Of course, my practice, the Smile House, is going to be Smilehouse co. My other practice, Uptown, which has been around for 35 years with an amazing group of people that will also be working downtown, is jblnyc.com I love it.

Well, I will be sure to link all of that down below. And Jonathan, once again, thank you so much for taking the time. Today really means the world.

Thank you. Casey, loved being on your show and your questions were just made me do a lot of thinking. So I really appreciate that.

I'm glad.