259- Product Procurement and Pricing with Dr. Steven Brown

Welcome to the Evidence Based Chiropractor where each week we deliver the latest chiropractic research and marketing strategies all in the time it takes to get to your office. Now here's your host, Dr. Jeff Langmaid. Hello and welcome to the Evidence Based Chiropractor. I AM your host, Dr. Jeff Langmaid. On today's episode, I have an awesome interview with Dr. Stephen Brown. He's a practicing doc, but he's also has an entrepreneurial streak and he runs a company called the Castle. If you do anything with back braces, stim units, carpal tunnel braces, you name it, this is an episode you're going to want to pay attention to. Not only does his company provide those supplies at like bargain basement prices they have next day shipping, but him and I also talk about the clinical application of these tools, how to think about them in the context of your practice. The there's a lot of great takeaways and if you want to jump right to see what he has to offer, you can head over to www.Supersecretsales.com ebc. I'll also drop that in the episode show notes. But without further ado, here's my interview with Dr. Steven Brown. Hey everybody, what's going on? As promised, I am here with a fantastic chiropractor and entrepreneur and somebody that I've gotten to know more and more over the last year, Dr. C. Steven Brown. Steven, thanks for taking the time to come on and chat today.

Hey, thanks for having me, Jeff.

You got it. So you're an interesting case. When I met you, I was like, I'm trying to figure this guy out because you are not only you still practice, you're still seeing patients, but you have a pretty entrepreneurial streak in you. And one of the endeavors that you are involved in is called SHIELD And I think it's a really, really interesting business. And I think additionally it can provide a ton of value for docs out there as they learn more about what's available to them. So I guess can you explain what is SHIELD In a nutshell?

Sure. So really I guess we began as a company where we kind of did some group purchasing. You know, I guess I can take a step back. It even began way back when I was still doing my clinicals and I was shadowing doctors while I was still in school and you know, here in or in Florida when I was doing my clinicals and then here in Pennsylvania and I tended to notice there was always, there were always these products that always seemed really overpriced. I mean, things from ice packs, you know, costing 10, $15 to tens, units costing a couple hundred dollars, massage guns costing hundreds of dollars, you know, braces costing 40, 50, $60. And I remember hearing that, and I was thinking, these things can't really cost that much. Right. So I started to do some research, and I thought, this is something worth looking into because my wife actually has a side business, a company of her own, some brands, so she was already sourcing from factories. And so I started looking into some of these products, and lo and behold, we could get them at a fraction of the price of what these other companies were offering them to these offices. So, you know, we started out just by contacting doctors and, you know, placing an order together. And then, you know, Jeff, does it make much sense for you to buy 100 back braces, 200 rolls of K tape?

Sounds like a lot of inventory. Sounds like a lot of inventory to me.

Yeah. Yeah. Where are you going to keep this stuff? And, you know, furthermore, you had to wait months while it was being made and shipped. So it wasn't a very good situation. And, you know, we ran to some problems along the way. Obviously, some pushback from doctors. You know, why would I need this many? It's going to take me a whole year to sell all this stuff. So, you know, my brother's a doctor of physical therapy, so I was actually able to contact, you know, get in touch with some of his contacts. And, you know, we came up with a group of products that we all tend to use on a regular basis. And the great thing now is that we have this stuff ordered. We have it in stock. You don't have to place an order ahead of time. You don't have to buy a hundred units.

That's such a key aspect of it is because I know there's so many docs out there. It's like, you know, it's the. It's the graveyard of products, right? You know, they buy something, they buy so much inventory, and then they're, you know, it's. It just loses top of mind, and they end up with just a ton of essentially, you know, money sitting around the practice, as opposed to sort of as you've described to me and what I've seen, which is really, you can pace yourself and you don't have to have all that inventory. So not only does it open up the physical space in your practice, but there's also something to that cadence. I think that's really important in really being able to serve the needs of your patients dynamically. And you kind of are alluding to some of your favorite products. I'll put you on the spot here and ask sort of what are some of your favorite clinical products and where have you seen, what products have you seen? Docs really be like, oh man, I am so glad that you have this.

So, you know, there's some that definitely kind of spark interest with patients. So we have a touchscreen tens EMS unit. So it does E stim and its touchscreen has backlights, I mean, all the bells and whistles, you know, independent outputs on it. So you can do two different areas at once at different intensities, like 24 different modes. And you know, that's really effective for those really acute pain patients. You know, those ones that are, you know, they're debating if they need to run to the er, right, for like muscle relaxers, steroids and get those things. So, you know, this gives them a good healthy option that's not going to throw off their body chemistry, you know, not going to, you know, affect things too much that way. So we use those 10Z STEM units for either our acute patients or even some of the more chronic ones that just get some relief from some of those muscular issues along the way. Some of the other products we carry, obviously that we use pretty frequently are kinesiology tape. We kind of transferred from using rock tape to using this current brand that we got direct from the factory. And from acute injuries to more dynamic instability issues for patients, you can find a reason to pretty much K tape just about anyone. Yeah, so we use those pretty frequently, back braces, you know, once again for, you know, those, those acute patients that are in more manual labor jobs that they want to keep working or maybe they have to keep working to provide for their families. And those back braces give them a way to, you know, during those six, eight hours, you know, they can put that on and still function.

Yeah, and I think that those, all of what you mentioned is so, so important. I remember utilizing especially in the multidisciplinary practice that I was in, we did a lot with E stim. Obviously tape, I think has exploded over the last 5 to 10 years and it seems to only be continuing to ramp up in terms of our understanding of it, it's clinical application and use. And as you said, it really is ever expanding how it can be utilized and the potential benefits. And definitely from a bracing perspective, I agree with you 100%. Those acute patients that just need to keep moving, it's not the long term solution, but it's something that enables Them to get the care that they need. Super, super important. Some docs listening and watching might be thinking themselves cool. These products, they either use them in their practice, maybe they've thought about them and they haven't yet. Where does SHIELD Come into play, in other words? I know we were talking pre recording about shipping and things like this, but you have a doc that's thinking, I want to order it, but I don't know where I'm going to choose to order this stuff yet from. What are some of the advantages that you've been able to sort of build into SHIELD and that you can extend to docs?

Yeah, so absolutely. So rather than placing these orders months ahead of time, it'd be great if they ship the next business day. Right. So that's where we're at. We carry all of our most used products so that you can just order as needed. You could order monthly. You could have your staff just order, order whenever you run low on something. So here, I guess, are my promises for you. I want to offer factory pricing. We really want to give you a competitive price, and probably most importantly, we want you to be able to compete with Amazon, Walmart. Wouldn't that be great if you could compete with those large retailers and make a profit? Short story here. Something that just happened last month. I had a new patient come into the office. He previously went to a different chiropractor in town, and he had purchased a massage gun from that chiropractor. And he bought it for over $300. And, you know, he bought it because he was in pain, he needed it, but he found out the real price of that product, you know, over time, you know how cheap he really could have got it. And so he decided he wasn't going back to that doctor's office. And I don't want any of the doctors listening to, you know, sell someone a product and then find out, you know, I could have got this at, you know, fourth of the price. And then, you know, you end up losing a patient over a product. So we want to give you factory pricing. I actually looked up that massage gun and we could get it for 30 bucks. Oh, gosh, over 300. So that maybe that's something we source in the future. Well, you know, if there's a. There's a need there. So my first promise is factory pricing. And my second promise is no minimum order quantities. You can order one, you can order 100. I realize some doc, I'm in a two doctor office, some may be in a big practice, they can order a Bunch. Some may be solo doctors. I'm sure a lot of you guys are. So order what you need. There's no minimum order. And then my third promise is quality products. So we really kind of live in this area of cheap products. You know, you can go online and find something, but you never know what you're gonna get. I remember this conversation with someone, they thought they were ordering like this little end table and it was a really good price and whenever they got it, it was like a little model end table or like a toy set. So, you know, help your patients out by having these products that are gonna most benefit them right at your office. And you know, you know you have quality and then, you know they can respect that as well. You know, that way you can confidently recommend those products.

I think that that's great. When you think about what you're going to add in over time, what gets you excited? As we're heading into 20, 21, which seems wild to say, what are some of the products that you're sort of looking at? What gets you excited in this space? What's sort of on the horizon?

Yeah, yeah. So great question. As far as what we want to head to over time. I'd like to do some more, maybe even products you're only going to need to buy once. So some things like a grip strength dynamometer for those patients with carpal tunnel issues, we need to check and monitor their grip strength. But those things are extremely expensive. But if we order 500 of them at once, we can get a really good deal on them. And that's probably not something you're going to need to order again for 20, 30 years. So some products like that would be great. We're also looking into some, some products that would make good patient gifts. So maybe you have some patients you really like and they referred you patients and you want to kind of give them a special award, like a special surprise. So one thing we were thinking of, we use a scent in our office. It is white tea and fig. So we got these white ceramic car clip diffusers. And how cool would it be if we put that fragrance in this car clip diffuser and then give that to them as a gift? And then every time they get in their car, they're going to smell that fragrance.

Good branding. Good branding.

Yeah, yeah. So we want to be, we want to be smart about, you know, those gifts that we're giving. You know, it could just be branded items and, and some things like that. We've done some cell phone grip holders and some things like that. But yeah, so, you know, we want to do that. We want to expand our product line, obviously more than what we have. But the more doctors we have ordering, you know, the bigger, bigger stock we can keep because those things are going to continue to kind of come in and flow back out to you guys.

Yeah. With, with that being said, I know there's been so much said I see in, you know, in the entrepreneurial space, a lot of sort of, you know, the sourcing from overseas and, you know, gets even into dropshipping and things like that at times. And that's one of the things that I found so interesting about, you know, how you've been able to really just do it. Right. You know, some of it is like just, you know, taking those action steps to create SHIELD and then, you know, be able to offer that to other docs, I think is incredibly cool. Maybe what's a story or two of the challenge? I'm sure it hasn't all been super easy and streamlined when you're trying to find things over, you know, overseas. Maybe what's, what's a stumbling block that you've had or maybe just an anecdotal story.

Oh, my. Yeah, so whenever we were starting out, we started with a TENS unit. It was, you know, a little button TENS unit and whatnot. And my goodness, we were, it was, it was getting up to Christmas time and we were having our most, you know, amazing week. You know, these things were going out like crazy. And then all of a sudden we got a cease and desist letter. So it turns out the factory apparently used a copyrighted image as one of the little logos and this on everything.

That sounds like a super technicality.

Yeah, yeah. But right at the holiday season too. It was, it was a challenge. So, you know, everything we obviously have now is what it needs to be.

Yep. That's cool. And I noticed on, I noticed on your website as well, one of the things that I like is that you really showcase, you know, sort of what's, you know, what's the price. There's no, you know, there's no funny business as far as that's concerned. You should, you show the price and then you also have sort of suggested retail. So on the suggested retail side of things, maybe what's a tip or two that you would give a doc? When they're thinking about pricing a product, do they think about how much they, you know, paid for it? Do they think about how much it's selling for on a different platform? How do you, how should a doc think about Suggested pricing when they're having products in their practice?

Yeah, so that's a great question. So, you know, we want to price those so they're reasonable. I think generally patients might realize that at a doctor's office, they might cost a little bit more, and that's totally fine. Do I think charging 300% of the price of a product is fair? No, I don't. So, you know, you know, with that in mind, you are, you're. You're providing more than just that product. So let's say you have a pregnant woman come in, and she's in her third trimester, right? So things are coming along. She's getting a lot of SI pain. So you could actually have that patient in the office and you could tell them, hey, go up to Walmart and get an SI brace. Or, you know what? Go on Amazon once you get home, order an SI brace. I think that's really gonna help with your treatment and help out during these coming months. But that doesn't really create the best patient experience, does it?

Right.

So, you know what we could do instead is we could say, you know, hey, Sarah, let's try on this SI brace. I know that SI joint still giving you trouble, you know, these days in between treatment, and you put that eye brace on her and say, you know, do that active straight leg raise. You know, do that leg extension. Do you notice how that pain isn't there anymore? So this is really going to help support, support that SI joint through these days. You know, when you're not in here getting treatment and, you know, when they see that, they can feel the difference. Right. It's not like you have to sell them something. They experience that and you can say, you know, just. Just pay Nancy on your way out front. You know, it's $20, and you can just keep it on. Yeah, you know, that's so much better of an experience.

I think that's fantastic. You know, it makes me think of, you know, the smart card writer. We talk about, teach, and invite consistently, and a lot of that is basically, you know, you're describing that in action, which I think is awesome. Which is exactly as you're saying, instead of just, you know, well, you know, search, you know, search online. Good luck to you. Here's how much you should pay. You can literally do the best patient experience, and you're being the best doctor when you're. You're showcasing them not only in the case of a brace, you can show them how it fits. You can show them how it's supposed to feel. And that's impactful really to their decision making process. And it's going to be more beneficial for their care when they actually know how to use it and you do as well. Because they could buy who knows what, how to. I know, you know, I've seen plenty of patients come with traction devices. I'm like, I don't even know how this thing works. I can't even help guide you. But if you have the braces, if you have tape, if you have the estim and you can show them how to do it right there. I agree. I think it's seamless, it's streamlined and it ultimately leads to, I'm gonna say, a better patient experience and a better result because they're really getting the best information on the specific apparatus or tool that they're, that you're recommending or right there and then from you, which I think is, I think is super awesome. So as docs go over to the page and they start to look through and they start to see some of the prices. Are the prices the same as if they order one thing or if they order 50, do the prices change? How do you, how do you work that?

So the prices are exactly the same whether you order one or you order 10, whether you order 100, those prices are going to be the same. And you know that you will see those prices change over time. For example, I know with our, our epicondylitis brace, you know, talked to some other doctors and they said, you know, you really don't need two different straps. You know, you could just get one strap and just loop it around. You know, that other strap just generally stays velcroed shut. So we're actually going to be able to get a better price on the next order. So you will see those prices typically come down. And as more doctors are ordering, we're going to order thousands more. So we're going to get better deals from these factories. We're going to be able to negotiate better prices for you.

That's awesome. Yeah, I love the fact of I can order one and I'm not penalized by ordering one, but I can really order whatever suits my practice, my patient population and really my ability to kind of utilize the products that you offer. So for those docs listening that are, they haven't checked it out yet, they're clicking clearly probably now, like, gosh, I gotta check this out. This sounds like it's right up my alley. Where can they go to learn more and place their first order?

Yeah, so just go over to supersecretsales.com ebc obviously for evidence based chiropractors. So supersecretsales.com eBC awesome.

I will also drop that link down in the show notes or in the description so everybody can easily click it there. That's super secret. Supersecretsales.com EBC Be sure to head over there. Check out what Stephen has going on. I love the hustle. I love the ability to take action. And I think what you're doing is something that's really, really impactful and that most stocks really have not been able to take advantage of yet. They go to sort of these major distributors which are great, but it doesn't necessarily give them the best pricing. It does not give them, as you've described, the, their ability to get things in the quantities that they need and they desire at the lowest prices possible. And it's a great opportunity to work, I'm going to say, with, with a colleague, with the, with the doc that you're, you are literally using these daily yourself. You understand what the market is, you understand where the quality resides. And I think that that is a testament to what you've been able to build with SHIELD So Stephen, I really appreciate you coming on and chatting things down today.

Awesome. Thanks for having me. Jeff.

Thank you for joining us on this episode of the Evidence Based Chiropractor. If you want to grow your practice, come back for next week's episode. If you want to grow faster, visit theevidencebasedchiropractor.com and join our MD Marketing membership today.