Ep. 31: 2026 Holiday Recap - Done In One In Review

Part 10:00

This is Beyond the Arches, where full-arch dentistry meets real talk. Let's get into it. Hello, welcome. Merry Christmas. Happy holidays. This is Beyond the Arches. I'm your host, Dr. Daniel Noorthoek. With us today, we have Lilia Blickle. Hello, happy holidays. Hello and welcome. Happy holidays. Merry Christmas. This is the episode that'll come out pretty much Christmas Eve, Christmas Day. So, you know, thought we would just have a nice little soft recap on maybe the year a little bit and the highlights a little bit from our Christmas party.

Yeah, a lot of fun. A lot of fun. It's honestly one of my favorites. They're all great. I say that every year, but that was really one of, I think, uplifting. It has increasingly been better and better for sure. Yeah, it's a good sign. And I don't know how it ended up being like the benchmark. Maybe because there's so many people that work behind the scenes, the lab, the marketing, the other offices, that they don't come together that often.

It's not like we are big enough to have our own symposium or, you know, conferences. So, we kind of treat it like our little conference of sorts. It feels like it. New office gets to come in for some training. Older offices still get to come and kind of see. So, it's been a little bit of a benchmark kind of year-end summary celebration pretty consistently. A lot of big things, I feel like, this year. A lot of big things.

The solidification, we'll say, of Tampa, which grew, compared to the numbers that we acquired it at, it was two and a half times. This year was two and a half times the revenue that it was when we went in. Yeah. So, that's amazing. Amazing. Then, we acquired a periodontist office and moved him into the other periodontist office. Yeah. So, that staff didn't quite double, but that staff increased. And then, we added, of course, Jacksonville. The big behemoth.

I was going to say the new baby, but it's like a big baby. It's a big baby. We adopted. It is a big office, right? We might have to add some photos into this in this moment. It is huge. Photo, video. Dream. Dream space. Dream office. Never seen so many bathrooms, so many offices, so many. Yeah. So, let's recap that. So, it's 5,000 square feet. Yes. 12 operatories. It is, how many bathrooms is there? Three bathrooms. Three full bathrooms.

Yeah. There was an existing staff of hygienists. It was a hygiene base. Yeah. And we're working currently to grow. We grow both the general dentistry, which is our Every Smile brand. And we're also working to build, obviously, Dun & One. Yeah. Which you and I have been a pretty intimate part of. Yeah. We've made three or four trips. Maybe four. I feel like four. Yeah. Four trips. The advantage to being a small group and the fun is that Lillian and I are part of the team that go up and do the training.

We do a lot of on-site training. Yeah. And so, typically, there will be a little bit of a smathering of people from our group going up. And part of the big fun of that is the enjoyment of hanging out with your coworkers, friends, all the way up and all the way back. Yeah. We always have a blast with it. The stories we've told in the van. We watch movies. We've played dice, cards, watched movies. Played dice. It's been a blast.

It's honestly really fun. Yeah. It's great. It's great team building. Yeah. Great fun. How many people work there now? Six? Seven? Staff of six or seven, I would guess. I think six. Six. It could be a person off, but. Two beautiful consult rooms. Oh, my gosh. In addition to the operatories. It's great. It's downtown. Yeah. Maybe we can include the drone footage and the commercial. Yeah. In this episode. I've never been to Jacksonville. This has been my first time.

This is my first time ever going and it's in a really cool location. Yeah. The downtown area when I started in Jacksonville was really kind of scary. Oh, really? Yup. And they've since gentrified it like crazy. Yeah. I still actually kind of am shocked every time I go by the Whole Foods by the river. Yeah. I wonder like what year this is because that is not the kind of Jacksonville that I remember downtown. Yeah. But it's been really.

It's got a really. It's got a really cool vibe, as the kids say. Yeah. Very cool. That's a shout out for Dr. Howard. He uses that word a lot. And. Yeah. The day of the days of old when I would go to Jacksonville when I was first starting, the office was like three and a half to three hours and forty five minutes away. The biggest acclimation has been how much more intensive it is to get into downtown.

Yeah. I mean, we're four and a half, almost five. Yeah. It adds a solid. It adds a solid extra bathroom break, which like total you're looking at like an hour. Yeah. You know, it's a five hour trip. It's pretty wild. Yeah. It's wild. The office is amazing. I feel like the team's amazing there. The doctors, the staff, everybody has been really. I feel like it's been easy to merge us all. ▶I feel like it's always we've been really lucky with the team that we have, but it's always it's been even easier just to merge with everybody that's working.

Yeah. And by merging, you're you're really.

Part 25:48

What you're really saying is culture building and culture for us is really important. And everyone says that, of course. And some people do. I mean, I showed you the text message. I have a good friend of mine who, you know, was I was telling him that I had to I was going to be holding down the fort for the surgeries to start with because I really it's important that the culture really starts to build exactly the way I want it to.

Yeah. And this particular person was like, cool. You have culture. You're like, no, you don't understand. Yeah. You don't get it. It's very important. It's everything to a company that's a small trying to to grow business. You know, I kind of feel bad that that's the mindset because I feel like when you have a good culture, not only is everyone in line with decision making, but the reason why everything is done that way is sort of aligned.

Yeah. You can fight through problems and get through things. And, you know, you can a little bit tolerate a mistake here and there between amongst each other because you have a friendship to get through that. Oh, yeah. I feel like we're I consider all of my coworkers good friends of mine. But I feel like you've before done in one, you worked at another clinic and I feel like you saw bad culture. I don't want to say bad culture, but you saw maybe not what you envisioned your office to be.

And now you see good culture. ▶You see friendships and us all getting along and good days, bad days. We're all laughing and making the best out of it. So I feel like you you know the difference and how important that is. So, yeah. And there's also I've also been in offices where the culture was supposedly good, but it was actually maybe it was good from a mindset standpoint and decision making standpoint. But it was really pretty toxic.

There was a lot of back end pushing. And weird stuff that we had to do was bizarre. So, you know, there's toxic and there's bad and there's good and there's too good, you know, too, too friendly. Yeah. But I think that we've struck like a nice balance for for our size. And that really comes out in the Christmas party. Yes. Christmas parties, like I said, have always been fun. We started when we our first ever Christmas party was at one of our favorite.

Bars called the Crazy Uncle Mike's. And I think there might have been seven people there right when we were first starting. And then the next year, I also think you were quite there. I know where it was at, though. Yep. Harvest. It was a harvest. Harvest has since gone out of business. But we had like, you know, we'll say the private room, maybe 12 people there that year. The next year was Drive Shack. Drive Shack was cool, but way too clicky.

All of each office and each lab and everything kind of stayed to themselves. Yeah. It was fun. It was cool. It felt like we were getting bigger, kind of like a corporate, more corporate setting. How many people would you say was at that? That was a decent size. That was a big that was a big jump from harvest. That was a big jump. That was my first Christmas holiday Christmas party. Forties. I think less. You think less?

I think maybe 30. OK. Not that much less. 30. 30. We'll say 30 to 40. There's like three roundtables to to the ball. The room that we were in specifically was about 100 times too big.

Part 39:27

It's also where Ilya started. Ilya is one of our lab guys. And in this episode, we'll show you what he made with some video and some pictures when Carly edits it. But we that was where he really started. So we did a we did a gift exchange. And he Ilya, our lab guy, decided to bring this pig that he had made out of like a broom. He carved it out of wood. It was out of wood, but there was like a broom involved.

And yeah, wasn't it a fountain? It was a fountain, but it was a fountain. And that was the hot ticket. Everyone wanted it really badly. And so after that, he decided to start making these things. But then instead of making them for a gift exchange, he decided to make them for a gift exchange. He made them for me, which has culminated into the most gosh, incredible. If you don't want this man making your teeth, then you are absolutely bonkers.

He is a true artist. He is truly in the best field. He's everybody should be grateful that he's behind the scenes. Yes. The lab working on these after this year. I don't know what is. I think the Eiffel Tower might be coming next or something. They get bigger and bigger every year. Yeah. I just want to preface that. Yeah. And they get like. And it's usually a surprise. We don't know. Breathtaking. Yeah. So this year was just.

Most of the time it's been like kind of fun and it's got some sort of relationship with us. But this year was like true piece of real legitimate could go at an auction house art. Four months in the making. Four months in the making. Unbelievable. So Drive Shack was fun. Yeah. And then the next year it was at Seagate. The golf course. We had a magician. I love that. That one I feel like was 50. I love that one was bigger.

That was. We got probably 50. Yeah. And then last year was at the location that we keep most of our patients. I won't say keep that most of the patients stay at for the holiday or for the travel package. And that one was outdoors a little cold. Yep. But we sort of established our routine. Which will probably stay in line for a long time. Which is we kind of it's almost like a big living room and we play a game of some sort.

So that year was family feud. Family feud. Family feud. Yeah. Family feud. That was really fun. That was a lot of fun. And then this year was bingo. I love bingo. Bingo was fun. That was a lot of fun. And we had like done in one style bingo. And it was just really great. It was a great idea. It was awesome. Today. This. This year's was inside the ballroom. Yeah. And it has culminated to 80. Yeah. 80 people.

And that's. I guess, you know, I try not to really like feed off of my own ego, but it's been really, really fun once a year to see all of that come together more and more and more. That was amazing. ▶Like you said, there was people, you know, maybe some staff members that just started this year that were meeting people that they've never met before. And but not in like, oh, no. Like, oh, my gosh, you're so and so like a very excited.

I was excited to see, you know, staff I haven't seen from some other offices. Like it was it was so great. The tables, you know, we had kind of everybody sitting with staff. They knew stuff they didn't know just so everybody could blend. It was a lot of fun. So it was a lot of fun this year. We did a grand prize. Yes. I was going to say that when we were talking about bingo. So that culminated.

We do. Typically, we'll do. We do like 10 or 15 gifts and those gifts can range from PTO to, you know, normal corporate type gifts. Yeah. And the winner of each mini game, if you will, gets to pick randomly from under the tree. So they can only blame themselves for picking the gift. Oh, yeah. But it culminated this year and no PTO, but maybe a little bit better. It was definitely better. There was a little scavenger hunt involved.

Part 413:45

And Anna. Well, I would shout out Anna from our apparel office. She won a cruise. A cruise. That's crazy. We don't know where it's going. We hope it comes back. She gets to select where she's going. Yeah. She's going to sit with one of our team members and select which one she wants. ▶I hope she doesn't choose the poop cruise. Listen, I never watched that. I didn't watch it for a reason. I was scared. No, I mean, that's amazing.

And she is so, so well deserved. She was so excited. It was more exciting. It was more exciting watching somebody else win it. Like, I was enjoying that a thousand times more. It was, again, well deserved. Anybody who won it would have, you know, would have been well deserved. But that was amazing to watch. She was jumping up and down. Oh, my gosh. It was incredible. It was really, really fun to see the excitement and the joy, even with the crowd, like the group.

Yeah. I mean, it's a lot of, it's four, again, what, four offices all together in one room? Yeah. Yeah. Four offices. So, that was great. Really kind of fun. Five, if you include, because the lab is kind of its own location at that point. Yeah, yeah, you're right. It's not for patient care, but it's obviously a location, a self-serving or self-contained group. So, it's always really fun to bring everybody together. And like you were saying, you know, sometimes the, Jacksonville specifically, we'll speak to, since they're the newest addition, they don't really know the lab people.

Yeah. And so, it gives them a chance to sort of intermingle. And certainly, Tampa and Jacksonville don't know each other. So, to be able to like put those names and those faces together is really a fun, rewarding night. We've also taken a couple years off of Perio, wanted to do their own thing for a little while. So, this year was really fun to bring the Perio crew back in because it allowed them to see how much we've grown.

Yeah. And we kind of... Yeah. You see, we probably, all of us that work for Dun & One, be it in Jacksonville or Tampa or Boca, we all see it as this like big entity we're trying to grow. We see it bigger than we really think it is, than it probably really is. And Perio kind of only knows Perio. They don't have four other locations. So, I think it's always good to kind of bring them back in the mix and say, this is the reason why we're sending you.

You have to submit a time off request. Yeah. Because it could get lost. Because there's 80 some of us. Yeah. Also, don't forget what you made, what you cooked. Oh, yeah. ▶So, this year I took the scary task on of making the beef side of the meat. Were you scared? A little bit. You know, I've never prepared for 85 people or 80 people or whatnot. So, I knew it would be fine. I knew it would turn out.

But definitely starting the process was like, oh, goodness, what have I done? Yeah. Because... Because maybe I can finish them all and they're all safe, healthy, fine.

Part 516:46

And they taste good, we'll say. But getting them all to be like hot and warm, that was really pretty daunting. I did hear something that night that was kind of funny. Somebody came up to me and said that they were like, that steak was so good. Yeah. We did tomahawks and we did prime rib. Yeah. And we did 17 tomahawks and like 24, 22 pounds of... 25 pounds of prime rib. I feel like that's just like the nicest piece of the meat ever.

This is great. I don't ever... I've had tomahawk once in my life. I don't think we saved any money, by the way. No money was saved. Yeah. I texted... I sent a message to Nick, who was sort of chief budgeteer, if you will, for the process. And I definitely texted him and said, what's my budget? Yeah. It was good. But it was so worth it. It was so good. It was awesome. But I had one of our employees came up, or maybe it was a spouse.

They came up to me after we had eaten and such, after the night was over. And they said that that meat was really good and soft and juicy. ▶And they said it was so good that I think a patient could have eaten it on their three-month diet. That's pretty... Honestly, it probably was valid. My husband had a plate of just meat. It was awesome. Like I've never seen... No, nothing else. It was... It was a second plate or something.

And I think Dr. Dan took a photo of it because it was hilarious. I did. It was just meat. For like two days, he was talking about the steak, everything under the sun. It was so good. I've taken Brian as my... Whether he likes it or not, I've taken him as my designated sit-next-to guy. He loves it. It's probably the third year in a row. I think it is. Yeah. It's definitely third year. It is. It is, for sure.

Did he come to the DriveShack one? Yes. But he, with his work schedules, usually... He came later. Yeah. Yeah. He has a reputation now for being late. I don't have to do better about that. Yeah. Next year, we're not doing that. We... This was probably the... Well, an additional, like, we're getting bigger and more efficient and more prepared. Remember, like, the first couple of years that you were with us? Mm-hmm. When we would sit in an admin meeting, it was like a scramble to decide what we were going to do and how we were going to do it.

Yeah. And do you remember? There was a year, like, 2022. The month before. Yeah. November. Well, we had gone to the... We went to them maybe in October. Mm-hmm. I think we were thinking about doing the, like, the booze cruise, the dinner cruise along the intercoastal. And you went to them, and they had said, like, no, like, you're way too early to talk about Christmas. Yep. But then we went, like, I don't know, it felt like three weeks later, and they're like, what?

We're full of books. You want to talk about Christmas? Yeah. Yeah. What are you, crazy? It's a hard... It's a hard task with as many people as we have now. Just, again, making sure everyone has a good time. They're all involved. We're all sitting with people, you know, all fun things.

Part 619:49

But Daniel and Nick did a great job this year. I can't take that much. I didn't do much. ▶I didn't do anything this year. Well, that's my point, is, like, the responsibilities have been picked up and taken by their independent groups, and it's been... It's nice, because it's kind of, like, all under place, you know? Yeah. My wife, Beth. Oh, yeah. And Nick and Daniel really... Bore the brunt of it. But that was... It's kind of fun to get to the point where, like, there's now, like, a party planning committee of sorts.

It was great. It was so nice to see everyone. So nice to see how big everything's getting. Like, again, it's just fun to get to all get together. I see everybody, you know, but it's nice to... Other people to get to see everyone and all be in one room. It was so fun. And it's... These people aren't family, but we talk a lot about our culture. And we won't even use those stupid cliches of family. But it's such a close-bonded group that bringing it together and introducing different groups of friends of sorts together is really fun to see them sort of develop.

And so it kind of, to me, it embodies, one, on the business side, like, we're growing and we are staying cool and hip and vibe and all of that stuff. But also, it's that yearly, like, okay, the holidays are starting. Like, my family has come together. My good friends have come together. We've done our thing. And now it's, like, time for the holidays, which culminates in actual family time. But that's where it's kind of starting. That's my kickoff now.

Oh, every step. I look forward to every year getting dressed up. You know, it's always a fun thing. I think patients will be surprised if Carly, she should add the photo of the whole, like, everyone who was there. Yeah. Because patients will come and be like, oh, is this, you know, you guys have a staff of six. Let's say they're, I'm like, well, you know, how do you want me to explain this? And sometimes I go down the rabbit hole.

Sometimes I say, you know, I try to keep it simple. But it's truly, it's so much bigger than I think our patients at our Mizner location or whatever location, they don't realize it's a whole huge family team. It's way bigger than anyone probably thinks. As you were saying that, I was thinking about weddings. So back in the day, weddings, before everyone had them on their phones or camera on their phones, they used to set out the disposable cameras.

I love those. And the popular thing when I was a kid was like, always some goofball high schooler would, you know, our college kid would dip off and like take a picture of their butt, you know? And so that when it got developed, the bride had to go through the butt, you know? You know, ha ha ha, tee hee hee. No idea until you get it developed. But it was really cool. We did, we did the, we should put a link on it too.

Yeah, the POV. Yeah, it was called POV. POV, yeah. It was a service that essentially turned your phone into a disposable camera of sorts. You had 25 shots a piece through a QR code. Yeah. It only costs $30 for the whole event for everybody to have the access. All the photos. Saves it all to an album. But do you know nobody, which is hilarious. Nobody took a picture of the butt. Nobody took a picture of their butt, but also nobody, at least maybe I didn't realize that the photos I was taking was going to go to a shared, like anybody who signed up could see the photos.

Thank God we're not taking pictures of our butts because. That's what I was saying. I was very proud that that's. They were all appropriate, all as they are. That died in the 90s.

Part 723:30

Yeah, definitely not going to happen, but it was, that was really cool. There were so many little fun, cool things like that. It was amazing. Yeah. And speaking of weddings. Nick and Jessica. So Nick, our COO, COO and his wife got married in Mexico just several weeks ago and did a little wedding speech. Got a little teary eyed. He's like my little project boy. Yeah. How long have you been working together for? Seven years. Yeah. Or eight, seven or eight years.

Something like pivotal years. Like. Yeah, it's been great. But yeah, that was Nick. Didn't have a moment for Dr. Dan to speak at his wedding. So Dr. ▶Dan made a point to do a speech at like a best man speech. I'd say I got him back. It was so good. I think we were all crying. It was very, it was great. It was fun. We're all suckers for a good speech. Suckers for that. And the feeling of community and Christmas and the family time.

So yeah, it's just always been kind of a good wrap up for the year and sort of becoming more and more. It's not what we set out to be, you know, but it's always been a lot of fun. Yeah. I think patients are curious. I've had patients like two things too this past few weeks. Oh, you guys, when is your Christmas party? I'm like, oh my gosh, I guess it's a known thing that. So that was, I was like, it was like two days.

I was like, it's in two days. That's awesome. Amazing. You knew that it was coming up. Incredible. Yeah. So the. Yeah. And from a patient perspective, you know, it's always fun. And one thing that will stick with me for a while. Is Dr. Hauer came to me and you, I think at the Christmas party, maybe he was, he was talking about how, you know, it's a really cool group and how, how excited he is to be a part of it.

And one thing that he pointed out was that off of Christmas time, we get a lot of gifts. He's noticed that we get a lot of gifts from patients, but then also like now, as we're coming into Christmas time, like we get a lot. And since he goes to a couple of different office, he was like, you know, it's really cool to me that you have enough, you have patients that think about you during the holidays, which is really awesome to have somebody see that and, and have that be a thing.

And also be a part of a group that we take enough time with our patients to really kind of pull them into that fold, into that like family, that community holiday time list, if, if you will. Yeah. Um, and. And so that's, that's always been very, that, that was kind of a cool little moment, um, was when he mentioned that for him to observe it, et cetera. And, and I say that because when we bought the periodontal office, that was one thing that really impressed me about Dr.

Lindsay was when I would go in there around Christmas time, it, that place is chock full. Like you're hungry, go in the bag because there's popcorn and chocolate and fruit. Beer and wine and your name is insane. Um, all gifts from patients and friends and such. So, uh, I think that's a good sign of, you know, maybe how your office is doing with your people. And, um, you know, I guess the cool thing about being a provider of teeth is, you know, happiness is a big thing in the holidays and Christmas.

And so is, um, family and being able to eat in the community. Oh, yeah. And gathering around a group, whether it be, um, salads to meats, to whatever it is, uh, to pictures, to just being around people and being able to feel like you can talk to that community. That's something that we offer year round. Uh, and as a group, you know, that's as a group of, of all the people that we had there, they're all a part of that.

And, um, so, you know, I'd done in one, we're really excited about this time of year. Cause it really allows us. Oh, it allows our patients to enjoy what the services that we provide and, um, you know, we'll plan it out though. They have surgery three months prior because they're want Christmas. They're going to like a family event. I hear it all. We have patients that send us a family photos. ▶I had a patient that's just sent me, he just got engaged last week and sent me photos of himself smiling with his new fiance.

And we were just talking about, there's so many amazing stories of patients that their lives have changed for, you know, whether it's again, just photos or jobs or interviews or weddings and family.

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It's just so nice to see that. And you, you know, you, we get busy in the day to day. And so when I get something like that, it's like, wow, that's so nice. They're number one, they're thinking of us. Uh, number two, they're doing great. And there are families. So we, you know, they're a family now are done in one family. So it's so nice to get the updates and see them doing well. It is. And so with that, you know, if you are a past patient, we hope, we hope that you have the most beautiful, wonderful Christmas and get to enjoy those types of family traditions and foods and things that you want.

▶For those of you that are not patients of ours, but maybe our potential patients, you have one year to eat your Christmas, to eat your Christmas meal. Um, but regardless of where you stand and where you are as a patient, friend, family, whatever it is, we hope that, uh, your Christmas celebration, your Christmas celebration is warm and surrounded by people that you know and love and get a chance to look back on the year and enter into 2026 with, um, you know, good, uh, a good attitude and a good position and, uh, wish your family and friends all the best for 2026.

Yeah. Have a great holiday. Yeah. Thanks for listening to everybody.