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July 1, 2008

I Think I Can, I Think I Can

Note: The following was written by Dr. Kevin Winters, who graduated from the University of Missouri-Kansas City in 1989. After completing a GPR at the University of Louisville-Humana Hospital, he opened a general practice in Claremore, Okla. After developing a successful general practice and being awarded the Young Dentist of the Year Award in 1995, Dr. Winters transitioned his general practice into one that concentrates on esthetics and reconstruction. He is one of the original clinical instructors at the Las Vegas Institute. He also lectures and conducts seminars across the nation.

Dr. Winters can be reached at (918) 341-4403 or by e-mail at smilmkr95@aol.com.

By Dr. Kevin Winters

This should be fun. I'm not really sure what I'm getting into and the exciting thing is that you are going to share it with me as I go. It will be almost like a live experiment happening in real time with no one knowing the outcome until we get there.

So, if I have intrigued your interest, let me share with you what it is I am talking about. For about the last six years I have been trying to sell my practice in a small rural town in Oklahoma. I have been able to establish the type of practice that most people say could not be done in a small town. I emphasize cosmetics and restorative dentistry with much higher than average fees for the area. I do quite a bit of marketing trying to attract people from Tulsa, Okla., to my small town of Claremore, about 30 minutes away.

Through the years I have been quite successful but reached a point where I felt my growth potential had leveled off at this location. Locally, I am known as "the high-priced cosmetic guy" and in the region, although I have good name recognition, many people feel that driving 30 minutes from Tulsa is just too far out of the way. It is funny about the mentality people have for health care. If you are in a smaller town, you must go to the "big city" for quality health care. If you are in a big city already, why would you ever consider going to a small town for quality health care?

In spite of this, through the years I have been able to do very well in this practice. We have done a lot of dentistry and made many people very happy. It has provided a great living for myself and my family.

However, I don't know if it is just me or what, but I knew if given the opportunity to be in a more desirable area, one where the kind of dentistry I want to do might fit in a little better, I could take my practice to a new level.

So, about six years ago, I put my practice up for sale. Knowing the process would be slow, I expected it might take 18 to 24 months before anything happened. What I did not realize was that, after two different brokers and my own efforts to sell the practice, I would not have a single offer to purchase the practice. That's right, not a single offer for six years.

I did have one glimmer of hope about three years ago. I had an associate come in to the practice for about three months with the goal of then making a purchase at that point. The way it turned out was gut-wrenching at the time. After getting all excited and preparing for the new possibilities just around the corner, this doctor pulled the rug from under my feet. He decided he was not ready to own a practice and left to go work for a corporate dental office. Man! Talk about dejected. It was as if all my dreams were thrown right back at me and stuffed in the trash. The only thing to do was to keep on keeping on. I put the practice back on the market and kept working hard in the practice.

As 2006 and 2007 progressed, I resigned myself to the fact that the practice was just not going to sell. At the same time, I knew I did not want to stay where I was. I felt somewhat trapped because I really did not want to get into the whole "bring in an associate and manage two practices" lifestyle. After all, I am a dentist and I wanted to do dentistry. If I had wanted to run businesses, I would have got a different degree.

Well, we all know reality is not always what we may desire. We are all businessmen and businesswomen. The reality is that we probably spend more time running our business than we do in improving our dental skills. So my new philosophy in 2008 was to figure out a way to get an associate in to my existing practice and start a new one, from scratch, in Tulsa. I started looking at land and buildings in areas that I considered good demographic matches. I readjusted my own mindset to follow this new path but, at the same time, I never abandoned my mantra of "my practice will sell this year." It was something I told myself on a daily basis. It was this power of positive thinking that I think ultimately led me to where I am now, working with a dentist to buy my practice and building a new one.

That's right. Six years later, no offers, one prospect and not much hope of seeing things change other than what I envisioned in my own mind, I am waiting on bank financing for the purchaser, working out the contract with lawyers, working with architects and dreaming of my new office that may be only four to five months away from opening.

This series of articles is going to log my trials and tribulations along the way. I am going to discuss with you the why's, what's, and who's of starting a new office. Hopefully through this process you will be able to learn from the mistakes I'm sure I will make and also benefit from the things I do and experiences I have. I encourage feedback to share with other readers here in Dental Economics and hopefully we can all learn from each other.

I think this is a perfect example of how although our plans may not always fit perfectly in to our timelines, keeping the faith and continuing on down the path toward your dreams will ultimately get you where you want to be.

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