Dr. Paul Crane, a periodontist on Long Island, N.Y., recently partnered with interdental brush manufacturers to establish a web-based company called Interdental Brush Buyers’ Club (IBBC). IBBC’s software is designed to provide dental professionals with supplies of free interdental brush samples while encouraging the use of interdental brushes by patients through education, incentives, and discounted prices.
The IBBC provides solutions to common barriers dental professionals face in recommending interdental brushes, including the high cost associated with providing product samples, and compliance difficulties patients have finding the brand and size recommended.
“An adequate supply of samples is required by the dental professional in order to provide patients proper introduction, education, demonstration and sizing of interdental brushes,” Dr. Crane said. “Our goal is to better enable the most important educator, the dental professional, by furnishing the necessary supply of samples to teach patients the skills they need to kick start this very important life-long oral hygiene habit.”
The company’s founder said partnerships included arrangements with Sunstar Americas’ Proxabrush G·U·M brand, Piksters, TePe, and StaiNo. The IBBC facilitates patient compliance by promoting reduced pricing and larger quantity orders. Automatic shipments are encouraged so patients will no longer have to remember to buy them. Prescription pads are provided, which directs the patient, making it so easy to find the exact size and brand recommended by their dental professional on the IBBC website.
By simply recommending their patients to the IBBC website, dentists accumulate credits equaling 7% of their referred patient purchases. The unique custom shopping cart software links the patient with the referring doctor by use of the doctor’s telephone number. Dentists can then log on to their secure personalized login page and trade their credits from referred patient purchases for office samples. They also have access to details of their patients’ transactions to evaluate compliance. Credit and referral histories are clearly documented.
The IBBC also allows manufacturers a no-cost opportunity to expand their marketing base and to advertise to dentists and their patients. The IBBC website promotes each participating brand with a prominent link to company information and enables distribution of their samples to dental offices, again, at no additional cost to the manufacturer.
The IBBC website contains a variety of educational information about the importance of interdental brushes in the prevention and treatment of periodontal disease, including a bibliography and abstracts of clinical studies along with superior 3-D instructional and educational videos.
For more information, please visit www.interdentalbrushclub.com.
