Episode 277: Gary Bird

The Reason General Dentistry Mathematically Doesn’t Make Sense in 2026

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If you’re running a pre-COVID model, the math doesn’t add up.

Here’s why it used to be easier pre-2020:

Fewer people were marketing.
Easier to drive new patients.
People had more money to spend on treatment.
Labor was a smaller percentage of the PNL.
Insurance reimbursed more; in-network actually worked.
Everything used to cost less. We’ve eaten about 29% of cumulative inflation since 2020.

Here’s what you have to do now:

Market aggressively; it’s way more competitive, and your dollar doesn’t go as far.
Build a real culture in your office. Your team will treat patients exactly as you do.
Go out of network in most cases, not everyone, but if you’re trying to make the math work, staying in-network on every plan won’t add up.
Present patient financing to every patient, every time.

Dr. Blake Hamblin walks through exactly how to present patient financing without it feeling salesy in his CE course on My Dental Playbook:

mydentalplaybook.com/courses/ce-series/patient-financing

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