From Associate Burnout to Ownership: The “Pay It Forward” Model Transforming Chiropractic with Dr. Jeff Danielson

Welcome back to the Successful Chiro Podcast. I’m George Birnbach. I’ll be hosting this today. And today I have got someone that I’m excited about. I’ve been looking forward to talking to this gentleman for a while. My guest today is a chiropractor who opened his first clinic in 1999 with nothing. No investors.

 

No safety net, and he turned it into one of the largest and most profitable wellness practices in the Midwest. But that’s not even the interesting part of this guy. The interesting part is what he did next. He looked around and he realized that the profession, he. Our wonderful chiropractic profession wasn’t taking care of its young doctors, and we’ve all seen those associateships.

 

So he started buying practices and handing them to new graduates he was taking care of, and he was training. He built a coaching company. He launched a hospitality business with eight restaurants, and now he runs close to 20 LLCs all by himself. Through it all. His core mission has resonated with me and stayed the same for him.

 

It’s called Pay It Forward, and Dr. Jeff Danielson, you’re the founder of Northern Life Wellness in Burnsville, Minnesota. You’re the CEO of Big Fish Enterprises. You’re the co-owner of Trellis Hospitality. You’re the host of the very entertaining Chiro Feast podcast. Not to mention. You’re teaching as an adjunct professor over at Palmer.

 

In Northwestern. So Jeff, welcome to the show and tell us about you for Gimme the 32nd dating profile. You know, uh, thanks for that amazing introduction. I, I wanna meet that guy. Who is that wonderful guy you’re talking about? Well, you, you mentioned the, the dating, uh, profile. Um, I, I’m gonna, I’m gonna go back to how I was inspired, um, because I think, I think it’s worthy of, of the story and it’s worthy that everybody who listens, uh, to this podcast go and find the movie, Pay It Forward.

 

Now j George, have you seen that movie? It’s got Haley, uh, Joel Osmond. It’s got, you know, I don’t know if I have, I don’t know if I have. Tell me the story. So I was on my honeymoon in Breckenridge, Colorado, and, uh, we were renting, um, a house that was owned by my sister-in-law and we’re just hanging out and we’re like, we, let’s watch a movie.

 

And they had, uh. 15, 20 movies, uh, on the shelf next to the television. Now this was in 1999, so no, they were not DVDs, they were VHS tapes. And so I pulled one off the shelf and it was, uh, Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt, and Hailey Joel Osmond as a young child, um, in a movie called Pay It Forward. And I popped it in and watched it and I was absolutely

 

inspired by that movie because it, it, and, you know, and, and to be honest with you, um, who’s, who’s the gentleman, um, that, uh, Jim cil is in that movie, and Jim cil is famous for, uh, playing Jesus Christ. For playing Jesus, yeah. The Passion of the Christ, which is another, uh, groundbreaking movie. But, uh, but Jim Czo played a, uh, uh, a homeless person in that movie, and this little boy learns.

 

That, and he’s inspired in a class that’s being taught by, uh, Kevin Spacey. His teacher inspires him, and, uh, he decides that he’s gonna pay it forward and he’s got like this multi-level marketing plan of like, if I pay it forward to three people, and then if each of those three people pay it forward to three people, um, this can be a movement.

 

Yeah, and I thought, man, it, it gave, it’s a great concept. It’s given me goosebumps just talking about it because. Ultimately then when I was in practice and I was starting to see what was happening in our profession where practices were failing five years outta school, uh, chiropractors are out of business because they never were taught how to run a practice.

 

They were taught how to pass the boards. They were, you know, taught how to be a good doctor. They were not taught how to be a business person or how to be an entrepreneur. I mean, all the stuff that you guys teach there, none of that is, uh, at five star. Um, none of that is taught in the school since. And, and it’s not just chiropractic’s fault.

 

I mean, every profession is like this. I mean, lawyers are not taught how to run a law firm. Right. Absolutely. They’re taught, they’re taught the law. You know, dentists are not taught how to run a business. They’re taught how to deal with teeth. So the problem is across the board in all businesses. Um, but it’s unfortunate.

 

So then you see all these chiropractors, 50% of chiropractors, five years into practice are not practicing. And, uh, and, and they, they fail. And so, um, I set out to change that. And, uh, so I started investing in doctors. With the intent, uh, to, so I was bringing them into my practice. Um, I was training them because what I was having happen at the time, um, so, you know, George is, I was speaking at the school and I would have young people come up to me and they would resonate with my message, my passion, my philosophy, all this stuff.

 

And, uh, and they’d want to be an intern in my office. So they’d come in, they’d be interns. Uh, I started hiring associates. And I, I had, I, I’m a slow learner George, and, and so I ha I think I had six associates that I poured my heart and soul into to get them to understand how to build a practice. And after about a year and a half to two years, they all did the same thing.

 

They shook my hand. They said, thanks, doc, I’m gonna go open my own practice now. And I’m like, oh, great. Now I gotta start over, right? Yeah, sure. I should have learned after like the second one, but it took like six before I really got irritated. And so then I created a program where I was gonna bring in an associate with the intention.

 

That they were not gonna stay in my office long term with the intention that they were going to, uh, I was gonna invest in them and we were gonna buy a practice together. Right. And so I did that 11 times, um, over my career. Um, and that’s what Big Fish, uh, does. Uh, PIF my, uh, my company, PIF Holdings, uh, stands for pay it Forward Focused.

 

Mm-hmm. And that’s what we’ve been doing, is teaching chiropractors how to invest in the future. I think it’s pretty amazing. Let’s, let’s, I love knowing what someone’s doing today, but let’s go back for a minute. Let’s go back, way back and let’s talk about, you know, you grew up in Marshall, Minnesota about as far from Los Angeles or the Twin Cities restaurant scene that you can get.

 

What was the moment that you knew chiropractic was gonna be your path that set you on this? This focus that eventually became you being a mentor of these young doctors, how did you get focused on this? That’s a great question, George. Um, believe it or not, um, I was a trimester one student. Um, so. You know that God’s hand is in something when, when something can happen.

 

As remarkable as this story, I’m gonna tell you, I, I went to chiropractic school, um, because I knew that, well, to back up even another step, I, I knew I wanted to be in the, uh, be a doctor of some sort, but I didn’t know what type, and so I started interviewing. This is when I was in, in undergrad. I started interviewing.

 

Um, dentists, orthodontists, optometrists, podiatrists, chiropractors, um, I, I didn’t know. Um, I took a job at a medical center as a. Um, a nursing assistant. So I emptied bed pans and I wiped butts, and I was spying on the, uh, residents that were at the, um, at the hospital, uh, because I thought maybe I wanted to be an orthopedic surgeon.

 

And when I did these interviews of all these different, you know, professionals, the one thing that I found was, and I, I, I, I interviewed three chiropractors. All three of them said the same thing. I can’t imagine doing anything other than what I’m doing now. Absolutely, yes. So many people have that story.

 

It’s fantastic. So I I, I was like, why is it that these chiropractors are so happy? And, and, uh, and the orthopedist that I talked to at the hospital that I was at, St. Paul Ramsey Hospital, downtown St. Paul, Minnesota, um, they were like. About 50% of ’em said no. If I had to do it all over again, I would not do, do this.

 

Wow. 50%. That’s a lot. So anyway, I, I made the decision to go to chiropractic school, so here I am. And I, I’ve never been to one. And, and I, I remember the first day Carl Cleveland ’cause, so I went to, uh, Cleveland Chiropractic College in Los Angeles and Carl Cleveland, um, was, uh, doing the very first class, the very first day of chiropractic school.

 

Here I am and there’s, uh, 127 students, you know, a whole bunch of us. He said, those of you that had a, have had an experience with a chiropractor and it inspired you to be here, stand up. And it was everybody in the room except two of us, and I was one of ’em. Wow. I had never been to a chiropractor other than to interview the couple, you know, three chiropractors just to see if they enjoy.

 

What they were doing. I’d never been. And so I felt like a, a piece of dirt, you know, in the room. ’cause everybody stood up and his point was, we inspire the next generation of chiropractors.

 

And I thought that was cool. Um, but I didn’t know anything about chiropractic. But it wasn’t until about eight weeks later that I attended. The Philosophy Club. Mm-hmm. So at lunchtime, they have a whole bunch of different clubs that meet around the campus. And I went to this, this club called the Philosophy Club.

 

I, I didn’t know what that meant. Um, and I, uh, I listened to a chiropractor, um, it was a chiropractor from, um, Oceanside, California. And he stood on the stage and he explained innate intelligence. He explained what a subluxation was and he explained how when you remove a subluxation, that it allows innate what God put in our bodies.

 

To work, to do its job, to run all your organs, and yes, your heart, your lungs, your kidneys, all of these are connected to your spine. So when you’re making these adjustments, you’re not just helping back pain. It’s, it was the big idea. It basically stood on that stage and explained the big idea in chiropractic, and I was blown away, and he tied it to his faith.

 

In the creation of the human being and how we’re creating, how our bodies work and how God designed this, and I was just, and, and as being a Christian and a man of faith myself, I was like, mm-hmm. Oh my goodness. I mean, I think you could visually see a light bulb above my head just like light up, like a spotlight.

 

I, I couldn’t believe what I just heard. And, uh, from, from that moment on, I was just, I was inspired to be a real chiropractor and, uh, I, I think it was about. Uh, one trimester, one trimester la later that I took over as the president of the philosophy club and I ran that club. I got to meet, uh, uh, Fred Barge.

 

Um, I brought Reggie Gold to the campus, um, Sid Williams and I got to meet these. Giants in our profession and hang out with them and ask ’em questions and and that was the beginning. That was the beginning. I think that’s fantastic. You know, Fred Barge, um, fell off a stage and landed right in my lap my freshman year at chiropractic school.

 

So I think I got to meet him more intimately than I had ever thought I would. Yeah, that’s funny. And that was fun. But if, if we look at this, you’re getting inspired now. You are in la, right? You have a practice in Santa Monica. You’re adjusting people like Gregory Hines and Ted Danson, and that’s a long way from where you grew up.

 

What was it like being 25 years old with your hands on people like that, and why, how did you end up going back to Minnesota? Well, I, you know, I grew up in Minnesota. I think I always knew that I would, um, eventually get back to Minnesota. Um, you know, you mentioned, you know, some of the, some of the people I got to work with, uh.

 

The La Clippers basketball team, the UCLA track and field team. Um, I worked with, uh, uh, Florence Griffith Joiner. Oh sure. Flo Joe. Um, she was, she won many gold medals in the Olympics, uh, back in the day in track and field, and she was known for having those really long fingernails. Her fingernails were like three or four inches long.

 

Um, and she would run with those fingernails. It was amazing. Um, right. But I mean, I got to work on some pretty amazing people. But you know what, I wasn’t intimidated by that because they didn’t know what I knew. True. And that how the body works. They didn’t know what a subluxation was. They didn’t know how, how the nerves connected to everything.

 

They didn’t know any of that. And the same thing is true, you know, sometimes those chiropractors, when we first come out of school, were intimidated if we’re taking care of a nurse or another doctor or a dentist, somebody that’s smart. Right? And I mean, I’ve got a rocket scientist that I take care of, uh, even to this day.

 

He’s way smarter than me, but he doesn’t know about innate intelligence. And so I just jumped on the bandwagon of just sharing that news about how the body works and explained that to people. And it blows people’s minds because we don’t know. I mean, just as the general public, we don’t know how our body works, you know?

 

I mean, you, you, you eat a, you eat a peanut butter jelly sandwich, and your body makes eyeball tissue out of that. How does it do that? You know, but we don’t even think about that. Um, but so I just started sharing, you know, with analogies, using good analogies so that people can understand it. But every once in a while, yeah, I drop a few, uh, you know, big words so that they know that I’m smart and I know what I’m talking about.

 

Um, and I’m not just talking about bowling balls and, you know, garden hoses or whatever. Um, but you know, it’s, it’s fun to see the light bulb, uh, turn on and, uh, I think, you know, Jeff, I think it’s fantastic and hearing how grounded you are philosophically, and chiropractic really resonates with us over at Five Star.

 

But you know, you and I both know you’re going back to Minnesota, you’re in Burnsville. It’s 1999, things are going well because you trust you, you trust your philosophy, but there’s always a turning point. There’s a moment in a practice where something starts to click and some, or something breaks so badly that you’re forced to change everything, right?

 

For me. I started to realize that marketing without structure was just money out the window. A, a chiropractic office without philosophy had no real grounding. There were, there were things that really changed how I thought about building a practice. What was the turning point? Coming in with all that passion coming in with all that fire?

 

How did you refocus your thoughts on. I can build something for me. Because you’ve done a million adjustments, you’ve done a million spinal adjustments in that clinic. How did you refocus from personal development and clinic development to associate development? Yeah. Was it just the movie it, was it just a movie?

 

Um, I build my practice on spinal screenings. You know, if you, if you go back to the, to the nineties, um, you know, uh, the, the, the later nineties, you know, the, the late eighties and the early nineties was the insurance craziness. Yes. I, I was never a part of that because it was pretty much bust by the time I got into practice.

 

Um, so I’m glad I never tasted that. Um. So I built my practice doing spinal screenings. I did thousands and thousands and thousands of spinal screenings. I knew how to get people in the doors because I knew that if I could have a person, a human being in front of me, and I could explain, you know, and I.

 

Okay. I, I’m gonna, I’m gonna turn in my man card here. Okay. I had a fanny pack, um, uh, you know, one of those little, uh, belt things with a little purse on the side. Sure. And, and in that fanny pack. I had a a three segment spine. Um, and you know, the very typical three segment spine that you can show people a subluxation and show where the nerve gets pinched.

 

And I had that in the fanny pack, so I’d be doing a spinal screening and then I would pull out my fanny pack and I go that spot that I just pushed on in your neck that you said, ow. You know, this is what it is. And I, and I explained that and I said, you know, if you’re interested, we’re doing a special here where you can come in for a consultation exam, x-rays, whatever, uh, report of findings for 20 bucks.

 

And I would sign people up like crazy. Mm-hmm. And I knew how to grow that practice. But then there was that moment, and what you’re asking me is. Um, you know, when is that moment of, you know, figuring out that you need associates and, and it’s, it’s kind of twofold. Number one, I was also inspired by Bob Hoffman.

 

Mm-hmm. Okay. Bob Hoffman at the time, I think he was the ICA president. Um, and he had something, uh, that he was promoting called the. Um, the associate driven practice. Mm-hmm. And I listened to his tapes and the information that he had, and I’m like, yeah, that really makes sense. I can’t just do it myself.

 

You know, I, I can’t, you know, if I wanna scale, I, I gotta have some people with me. And so, um, at the time I was an associate myself and I decided I was gonna open my own practice and I hired an associate from day one. So when I opened my own practice, there was two of us, me, with my practice that I had brought over from the previous, um, uh, person that I was working with, and then this brand new doctor, um, that was actually from Palmer.

 

And she was marvelous. And that associate was with me for 27 years. Wow. 27 years. And her name is Charlene, and I honestly, she’s like my best friend. She’s my work wife. Um, uh, she chews me out and yells at me just like my own wife. Um, yeah, so I, I mean, just a wonderful relationship with her over the years.

 

And then, um, then for me, the game was on. Right. How do I scale with multiple doctors? How do I keep them busy? How do I inspire them to do the things that I knew how to do? How do I train them well? And uh, and then how do we make this system work? And, and you guys at Five Star. Oh my goodness. I the win-win, uh, program that you have, it’s exactly what our profession needs because as you know, the chiropractic profession is kind of known for eating.

 

It’s young and, you know, just, I, I hear the, the craziest awful, most, most horrific stories about young doctors being taken advantage of. And then sometimes it goes, it flips the other way around. The old doctor gets taken advantage of, you know, it’s just. It’s not nice, but when you have a program like Win-Win.

 

Then it does what it says it does. It wins on all sides and that’s how it should work. I agree with you. You know, in 2007 you started Big Fish Enterprises and that is when I started working full-time with Five Star and coaching young doctors and we really redesigned, um, the old versions of associate chips into the new version of associates because like you, we were frustrated by seeing young doctors come in into more.

 

I don’t know if predatorial environments is the right word, but they weren’t really future focused on the careers of these young doctors. Right? And now, you know, our programs are how to get these doctors from zero to profitable in weeks and successful at the money they wanna be making in a real win-win environment.

 

But Big Fish. Isn’t just coaching, right? You actually purchase practices for young doctors and you walk with them for 3, 4, 5 years while they buy it back from you. So you’re putting skin in the game that most people in our profession, they won’t put up. Right. Walk me through how that works from the day a new grad joins you to the day they own their own clinic.

 

Yeah. So in. You know, like I said, I learned this by losing six doctors in a row and getting sick of that. And so, um, so now when I get new doctors into the clinic, um, as associates, it’s as a part of that program where I train them for two years. So, yeah, you know, the young doctor is all excited. Um, but you know, you’re in training, you’re growing a practice in under the roof of, of my practice, and I am watching you.

 

I’m training you and I am, uh, seeing how you work. Yeah. And I’m seeing how, uh, coachable you are and I’m learning whether or not you are worth investing in. Now on the flip side, what they get to do, number one, they get a salary, you know? Yeah. And they’re getting paid. So they’re, they’re happy ’cause they got bills to pay to pay off school.

 

But they are also watching me and they are determining if I’m worth being partnered with. Okay. And I better be, um, uh, worth being, having someone hitch their wagon to me. And so I need to prove that to them as well. And so if everything goes right, then at the end of two years, we look for practice, we buy a practice together, and we’re in the practice 49 51.

 

I’m the 51. I take most of the risk because of course, the young doctor, they don’t have anything. So if the bank wants to come after somebody, they’re coming after me. Mm. And the bank is happy to, uh, make the deal happen because I’ve, I’ve got money and I’ve got experience and, and all of that. So the bank is happy having me attached to it.

 

So they give you, give you, you know, two, three, $700,000, um, in order to buy these practices. And then I continued to, I put that young doctor in the, in the practice, it’s theirs. Okay. Um, but I’m 51% owner. Um, but, but all the patients there don’t even really know that I exist, right. Because I never go there.

 

And that’s the thing, you know, I’ve seen lots of doctors own multiple practices and they start running around, they do Mondays and Wednesday mornings at one, and they do Tuesday, Thursday at another one. And, and they’re running all over the place. And, and now they’ve got three overheads, but you can only produce so much as one person.

 

So that, that model is. Is not very good in my mind. And so I never, I never set foot in those clinics, but I coached those clinics, right? And, and I’m putting, um, a really good young doctor that I have coached for two years and trained. And then, um, at the end of three years, then I sell it. I sell my 51% back to the doctor.

 

You know, I, I think that’s fantastic and I love the analogy of walking along together. And they have to earn you and you have to be, you have to earn them, and you’re holding each other through a real good accountability cycle. Let me ask you maybe a little more pointed of a question, because I have to imagine you’ve launched 11 young chiropractors into ownership.

 

I hope I have that number right. And I have to imagine that not every one was a simple home run. Right. Without naming names, just looking at what was our track record together, what strategies or skills or character traits, what separates the ones who thrive versus the ones who were struggling? That’s a great question.

 

Um, I will tell you that all 11 of ’em. Were at least triples, if not home runs. Fantastic. So, and, and, and the only reason I can say that is that I have had, um, probably 50 associates begin the training program, and we have vetted them so well. That when we made the decision to buy a practice for them, we were 95% sure that it was gonna be a triple or a home run.

 

That is a gold level secret. That is fantastic. You know, I know in our world, in the Five Star world. We are taking young doctors and we are installing them into really successful mentorship relationships with these doctors. And then they grow a practice and they get taught about career and business, and it’s a real deep end of the pool experience as Dr.

 

Lloyd has even said on your Chiro Feast podcast. But I like to hear the reality that, listen, we tried to do this with 50 people. 11 made it through. To the graduation moment of getting an investment into their own practice, because now people listening to this, if that little bug in their ear is going, ah, it can’t be a hundred percent.

 

This gives all the validity that they’d ever need. Yeah. Yeah. It wasn’t a hundred percent of the people that started in the program that made it through. There were, you know, like about 40 out of 50 that didn’t make it, and they didn’t make it for various reasons. And, um, there were, um, there were a handful that even watching the amazing things that happened in our clinic, seeing miracles happen, seeing, you know, uh, uh, crazy results and the passion and the fun that we have in our open room adjusting area, and just everything that I love so much.

 

There are some people that, that just doesn’t excite them. Right. And, and I can’t, I can’t even relate to that because it excites me so much. But there were some people that realized, um, that, you know, chiropractic was just not for them. Hmm. And that’s, I guess, okay. Um. I, I guess it’s a bummer in my mind because they paid a quarter million dollars to become a chiropractor and only to decide that it’s not what they wanted.

 

Um, and so there are some that, you know, were associates of mine that are not in the profession anymore because they just found out they didn’t like it. Um, and then there were some that just had other issues and there’s other problems, and some were not busting their butt and the work ethic wasn’t there.

 

They weren’t grinding, and I’m not gonna invest in somebody that doesn’t grind, you know? So, you know, it is what it is. You know, Dr. Lloyd had had a sentence that he said to me years ago. He said, you’re never gonna hire you. Right? You’re not the one out there looking for a job, like you’re doing the grind, you’re doing your stuff.

 

But if you walk along with someone long enough. They reveal who they are, their character, their worth, e ethic, and that’s what you are finding in these first two years or so. You’re working with them. Now. I have a really bad habit. I walk into a restaurant, I walk into a hotel. I start taking notes on all these parallels that I’m seeing that I can bring back to a clinic or bring back to the profession you run

 

a lot of different businesses, right. Tamarack Taproom, Woolley Steakhouse, barley and Vine. Jordan, I can go down this list and we’ll run outta time, but what’s the connection that most people who run a chiropractic office don’t see between chiropractic and other businesses or restaurants? What do you see that other people are missing?

 

Um, I, I think it’s the, um, it is the pure. Unadulterated desire to, to thrive in that business. Um, there’s nothing like going into, let’s say it’s a bakery. Where you can tell that the baker is passionate, I mean, the stuff that they put out is phenomenal and, and you just, you just know it. And, and the person at the, at the till that’s selling it, you can tell that they are excited.

 

To show you their product and, and they’re proud of it. Yeah. And, and they, it’s almost like they’re on a mission and finding people that are on a mission, whether the mission is to create the most enjoyable donut or, um, to give the most incredible five star service, um, at a restaurant, um, to create an experience for people.

 

Those are the people that we wanna surround ourselves with. And so in the restaurant industry, that’s what we focused on. In fact, that’s, um, some people ask me, well, how did you even get involved in, in the restaurants? I mean, that right. Everybody, everybody knows that’s the worst investment ever. Um, and I just took a flyer, uh, to invest, uh, because.

 

I had a friend, um, who was getting adjusted by another chiropractor that I knew, and they were looking for investors for this Tamarack tap room that you mentioned. And I, I was like, you know what? I’m open to learning a different industry, and if I, I think, I think I put $75,000 into it, I said, you know what?

 

I’m willing to, uh, to put 75 grand in it to learn something new. Even if it, if it never gives me a dollar, I’ll get some wisdom out of it. And so I took a flyer, uh, and, and invested in that. And I connected at, in such a deep way with a few of the other entrepreneurs that were running it, uh, the CFO and the CEO of this, of this group.

 

Um, they’re now, uh, I would consider them some of my, my best friends in the world. Um, and we, we actually, I just wrote a check this morning for our ninth restaurant called Copper and Rye. Um, wow. And we’re opening that in in May. Right on the facil right next door to the facility where the Minnesota Vikings are headquartered.

 

So, uh, we’re excited about that, uh, program. Um, but now that we have all these other restaurants, now what we’re doing is we’re, we’re inspiring people at these restaurants to look at working in a restaurant as a career move. And what’s really cool about, um, and I’m so excited to, to mention this, um, because.

 

Two of my partners in this newest restaurant that I just wrote a check for this morning, two of my partners now, they’re only 4.5% owners. Okay? But we are gifting them. Wow. The 4.5%, and here’s why. It’s, it’s a, it’s a gentleman and his wife. Okay. They just got married six months ago. They met at a restaurant called Barley and Vine.

 

You mentioned that one too. Mm-hmm. They met there. He was a bus boy there. Okay. She was, um, uh, uh, working at the, at the hostess stand. Um, and they loved being there together. They weren’t interested in each other at that time, but he worked his way up to being a food runner and then a waiter, and then he eventually, uh, became, uh, assistant bar, uh, bartender.

 

Mm-hmm. She ended up becoming the bar manager at that restaurant. Then, uh, we were opening up. Other restaurants, um, ev eventually what ended up happening is he’s now a general manager. He’s make, he’s making like $120,000 a year as a general manager. He is like 25 years old. Um, at one of our restaurants, she now is a general manager at another location.

 

It’s called Southern Social. Uh, she’s Southern Social Eagan Minnesota. He’s Southern Social Chaska, Minnesota. Now they’re in competition with each other to see who in the family is gonna be the better general manager, and now they are gonna be owners of a restaurant at 25 years old attached to our organization to lift people up and to give them a dream of how they can not just be a bus busboy, you know, in a restaurant, but why not own the place?

 

I think that’s fantastic. It’s cool. It’s just, it’s so cool. I, and I’m so proud of these kids. You know, I’m, I’m proud of them for what they’ve done and their commitment and their hard work, and it’s just, it’s. It’s cool to see it, you know? Um, a really interesting thing is pay it forward is a beautiful concept and when you start really thinking about it, you start understanding that in practice, generosity sometimes has a cost investing money, time, emotional energy into someone.

 

If you had the first six doctors, you invested so much time, just walk away. You could say the same thing about restaurant teams or community sponsorships. I think you’ve done 34 of those. If I, if I read my notes right in, in the research for this event, there is a cost towards trying to pay, its. Forward and not just in dollars, right?

 

But you’re also open about your faith, right? Your bio, your bio on your website even says that your mission has always been to serve God by serving people. And for a lot of entrepreneurs, and everyone likes to throw that word around now in the 2020s, but a lot of entrepreneurs, faith and business exists as separate boxes.

 

You’ve always been ahead of the game, right? You’ve, you went to chiropractic school, never really having experience in chiropractic. You met your wife, I think when you were 12 years old, and now you’ve got, what, three kids, Maddie, Cooper, and Sydney. Right? And you’re running a bunch of businesses, but you are so open about your faith.

 

You seem to merge this all into like all this light coming into the laser. That is Jeff Daniels, uh, Daniels. And so tell me how you do that. You know, um, I, I think it’s a personal thing for everybody. E everybody needs to decide, um, how you are gonna present yourself to the world. True. And in this day and age, um, it’s social media, um, it’s your websites, it’s uh, you know, it’s your business.

 

It’s, you know who you are at home. Um, and. I believe so strongly that who you are anywhere should be how, how you are everywhere. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And um, I don’t have a personal Facebook and then a business facebook. I’ve got one. Facebook, this is me. Yeah, I, I do this, I do, I do that. I, I, but I don’t want to keep people from knowing who I am when I’m not in the clinic, who I am, when I’m not, um, doing restaurant stuff.

 

Um, it’s just who I am. Not, not everybody wants that. Some people just want to keep their private life just very private and, and that’s okay. I mean, everybody gets to decide that for themselves. For me. I found it’s just easier to, because then I don’t have to remember who knows what about me, you know?

 

Because I can’t keep track. Maybe I’m just lazy because I don’t wanna, I don’t want to have to try and remember who I’ve told, what. I just want everybody to know who I am. I am a Christian, I’m a follower of Christ. You know, if that is bothersome to somebody, then uh, that, that’s too bad. Whatever. It’s not your deal.

 

It’s mine. It’s who I am. Well, you know, Jeff, I think that people confuse submission and vulnerability. I think submission is when you’re rolling over and you’re giving in, but vulnerability is really putting your own views out there. Where they can be judged by other people, and it’s one of the strongest things that someone can be, but we’re not really, at least for me, growing up in New York, you know, we weren’t really taught that as young men or young women to be vulnerable.

 

And it creates better friendships, it creates better patient relationships. It creates a lot more trust in the self. Mm-hmm. But let me throw two questions at you really quick. The first one. Is knowing who you are a little bit more now, knowing how open you are about you. If there’s a young chiropractor listening right now, they’re in year two of an associateship.

 

They’ve got some patients, they’ve got some debt, they’ve got a whole lot of doubt. On, because if they’re in practice, sometimes you can feel isolated, even though you’re in a big profession. If you are talking to a young chiropractor, year two, a few patients, a lot of debt, what’s the one thing that you would tell them that you wish someone had told you in year two of your practice?

 

You know, uh, you mentioned the word vulnerability. Um. I think that is a byproduct of, of, of, of a person being authentic. Mm-hmm. Um, and I, I think, and that’s the word I like to use, is authenticity. I mean, you, you get, you get what you see. Um, this is who I am and this is what I have and, and what I do. Um, and yeah, it puts you in a little bit of a vulnerable spot.

 

And yes, when you invest in, in young doctors. Um, uh, it’s not always gonna be a, a, a victory, you know, it’s not always gonna, things aren’t always gonna work out when you pay it forward in any other way. I mean, there’s lots of ways to pay things forward. Um, and, and when you, sometimes, when you pay it forward, um, it doesn’t work out like the person you pay it forward to makes some bad decisions.

 

Mm-hmm. And, uh, you can’t help that. Uh, it’s just, it’s just what happens. So you have to be okay with. Paying it forward to somebody, and then they squander their opportunity and they end up at the bottom again. Um, you, you can’t, you can’t always fix people. Um, and, and that kind of thing. But, um, you know, I think, I think the biggest thing, uh, you know, in talking to a young doctor that I, I would say is that look for opportunities where you can be authentic, genuine, and you can, um, uh.

 

Speak the message of chiropractic and the hope that is in chiropractic to as many people as you can. And that’s really what fostered my, uh, program of Team doc. Yeah, so my, my coaching company is, is Big Fish, but. Um, but my passion is getting people from the community into chiropractic offices, and I used to do that one person at a, at a time doing a spinal screening.

 

And, uh, 15 years ago I went, I set out to master the process of turning team sponsorships. Into new patients. And I don’t know about you, George, but um, uh, I sponsored from day one in my practice, I sponsored teams. Like my patients would be like, Hey, you wanna sponsor my, uh, son’s ball team? And I’m like, oh, okay.

 

You throw ’em a couple hundred bucks and they put, you know, they put the name of your clinic on the back of the shirt or whatever, put your logo on the sleeve. Guess how many new patients I got from that? Oh, I would, um, I don’t think I could count ’em. There are none of them. I think I went 10 years in practice with getting zero new patients from probably.

 

Almost a hundred team sponsorships. Yeah. But I knew there was a way to, to monetize it and I figured it out. Oh, you did? I figured it out. Fill us in. Well, uh, so we started doing this in our clinic. We started doing team sponsorships. And then I would get in front of, and this is the key I would get in front of the teams.

 

Yes. With their parents. So kids, um, we, we started off with, uh, our goal of getting more kids, more families, and more athletes into our practice. That’s what we wanted. And how were we gonna do that? We were gonna sponsor teams. And so, um, we got in front of teams. In fact, uh, this week we’ve done four. Four sponsorships in one week.

 

That, that’s not a typical week, but we did four of ’em this week. So I personally, uh, spoke to the tennis team in a little, uh, town close to us here called Prior Lake Minnesota. So I spoke to the tennis team and there were 15, um, 15 young men, um, on the tennis team. This is in the high school. And there were about 15 parents in the room, so a total of 30 people.

 

And I spoke, I did a seven minute presentation, and then, uh, they all filed out of the room. After, after it was over and I signed up, uh, 14 new patients. I was there for a total of about an hour and 15 minutes. That’s it. And I walked away with 14 people on my books. Okay. And, uh, the biggest one that I’ve ever done was a, uh, uh, trap shooting team.

 

And I signed up 81 new patients. I did a volleyball program and signed up 73 new patients. But in general, somewhere between six and 12 is pretty common. Mm-hmm. So we had two other, um, events going at the same time. I wasn’t doing the talk, but other doctors in my office were doing that. Um, and I think they had, uh, six new ones at one of ’em and four at the other.

 

So between the three talks that we did, all in the same, at the same time, literally at the same time, at the same high school, different teams, a boys volleyball team, a girls, uh, track and field team, and then the boys tennis team, uh, we had, uh. 14. We had 26, I think 26 new people, uh, put on the schedule.

 

That’s how we are doing it now. It’s the number one way to get new patients into clinics. And it’s the right kind of patients. Mm-hmm. It’s families. It’s. Kids, it’s athletes. It’s the fun stuff that I enjoy, you know? Um, so I, I think that’s fantastic. You know, a parallel story to that is when I was first getting into practice 1998, my first three practices, we would go to these business and networking groups.

 

We’d go to these referral groups, and those referral groups would always, they’d burn out in three months, six months, you’d get two referrals from one of the people. And then I learned the secret for me, similar to what you just said. Was I stopped looking for referrals and I started going and doing talks.

 

And when I met a Chamber of Commerce member, I’d just say, Hey Jeff, what do you need to get out of the chamber to be successful for you? And he would tell me. And then he would in turn ask me. And I’d say, I just look for one talk, 20 minute talk once a year at the place where you work. And I would turn 800 member chambers of Commerce into.

 

400 talks in a year, and we would grow by putting ourselves and our education and our philosophy and our passion in front of these people. But I, I don’t wanna lose sight of this. If I wanted to know more about your company, about your team doc program. We go to my, um, bigfishenterprises.com, right? Yeah.

 

Or they could reach out to you directly. It’s jeff@spinesavers.com. Would that be fair? Yep. That Is there a phone number you want to share with people so they could find you? Absolutely. Like I said, I’m, I’m open and, uh, authentic. So here’s my cell phone. Uh, (952) 240-2888. Yeah, I, I can’t imagine anyone coming out of school wondering how they’re gonna find a great mentorship.

 

I mean, I’d like them to call you. I’d like them to call us. I just don’t want ’em to be out there alone. Yeah, right. A hundred percent. Yeah. And, and, and, uh, and yes, I do coaching, but nothing to the level of what you guys do. Um, and my, my focus is more on the team doc, and so I’m, uh, probably the two best. Um, people that would be a good fit for my team doc program.

 

And so I, I, um, you know, once I figured that out in my practice, then I created an entire package so that I could share it with other doctors,

 

other stuff. But, um, but I. Basically created a program, uh, to teach doctors how to do this. And there’s a very specific set of, you know, uh, things that you have to do in order to do it well and do it right. Right. Um, and so, um, that’s, that’s my focus right now. So if, if anybody is out there that is either new in practice and, and you just, you need more new patients because you’re new in practice and you want to grow, if that’s you, then Team Doc is.

 

Is perfect. The other person that that team doc is really good for is a, an experienced doctor that has hired an associate, but they don’t know what to have the associate do to grow their practice. Mm-hmm. Team Doc is perfect for that because you get the team doc program and you say, guess what, young doctor, you’re running this ready set, go.

 

I’m paying for it and you’re doing it. And, uh, and so it gives the young doctor something to do to grow their practice. Otherwise it’s like, well, I suppose you could go and knock on doors, I suppose you could do spinal screenings, do dinner talks, and there’s all these other things. Right? And I’m not saying any of those are bad.

 

Those are all fine. And I, I think every clinic should do as many things as you can. But I’m telling you, there has not, there has been nothing in practice that has been more like rocket fuel for growing a practice like Team Doc. So, um, if anybody’s looking for that, I’d love to help them. Well, I think that’s fantastic.

 

I, I think all these young doctors, all these established doctors should just. Put chiro feast on their podcast feed. Listen to it when they’re driving back and forth from work. There’s gold in there. I’ve listened to many of those episodes myself. I’ve been on an episode, Noel has been on an episode, but I just think you need to feed your brain with passion like you started this event with.

 

And all of the structure that you’ve built so people can see, it’s, it’s possible. I love what you’re building. I, I love that you’re building it with the door wide open with people being able to see who you are, and I think everyone out there needs to connect with you. I think that’s great. I, I appreciate that.

 

Let me give a challenge to anybody that’s listening as well. Um. Because a lot of the people that might be listening are, are clients of yours. Is that right, George? That’s probably true. Okay, so let me challenge you because if, if, if this pay forward, if you really wanna change our profession and change more lives, then you should, and I’m, and I’m talking to your clients, George, you should be sharing the good news of Five Star Management with other chiropractors that you know are struggling.

 

That’s your job. Your job is to introduce, you know, other doctors that are, are not doing so well.

 

Like it, and it resonates with you and you think it’s good, then share it. Grab an episode and share it with 10 friends that are chiropractors. Get it out there so that more people can be inspired and can hear these messages Practice. Listen, entrepreneurship and it’s, it’s okay. And, and the more you share and the more you pay, you can pay it forward in so many ways.

 

Um, and this the, just a couple of ways that I think, uh, your listeners can, can help our profession, you know, I really appreciate it. Well, folks. If you got a lot of value from this, and I don’t know how you couldn’t, I sure did. I got a page and a half of notes right here on my trusty dandy iPad. I want you to share this with a colleague who needs to hear it.

 

I want you to send them over to Big Fish and get in into Team Doc and I want you to call a cell phone and send them a text and let ’em know that when you throw your cell phone out there to the world, someone’s gonna write you, let ’em know you heard his message. All right, so I’m gonna let y’all go. Jeff, thanks you.

 

Thank you so much and keep it, keep paying it forward my friend. Okay. Yeah, you’re welcome. Thanks for having me and good luck to everybody out there. And, uh, if, if, if anybody just wants to chat as well, just call me and, you know, just gi gimme a call, send me a text and we’ll figure out a time to call. Um.

 

You know, I don’t need a hundred new clients. I, I don’t, I, I don’t. But I love sharing this message. Thanks for the platform and the opportunity. George. I appreciate you very, very much. I look forward to the fall ’cause I, I, I’m working with Emily to get you on another podcast. Uh, I love what you guys are doing.

 

Absolutely. It’s been a ton of fun for us and we’re gonna be really excited about pushing your message out to the group.