The post was originally published in Russian on Startup of the Day. Alexander kindly agreed to republish what we think is of great value to our readers.
American dentists charge sky-high amounts of money for their services, that’s why people tend to buy the insurance and that’s how most visits to the dentist’s get paid for. That’s why the prices in the price lists rise even higher – at least, to let the insurance people bargain and get discounts.
Avia Dental Plan, by no means a startup for a while now, (probably just like several of its competitors) procures this discount without attachment to the insurance. For the patient, it comes in the form of purchasing the club subscription and an opportunity to get treated by almost any dentist at a price 2-3 times lower than the default. For the dentists, these are customers who will otherwise go to a competitor, nobody wants to pay so much extra after all. Avia Dental itself earns off subscriptions. The cheapest option costs about 100 dollars per month – free by American notions, but the service doesn’t need to do much, only reach an agreement with the dentists one time.
Flossy, the startup of the day, does the same, and even refers to Avia Dental – we take our prices from there, it’s not more expensive or cheaper, it’s the same. But the subscription itself is free. The whole service is free. Also, the startup has an eye-pleasing mobile app, as opposed to Avia Dental’s website with a 90s design. And the customer books an appointment with a dentist right there, no need to make any phone calls.
Flossy doesn’t charge the dentists as well, yet, – but perhaps, it simply shows different prices to the doctor and the patient and takes the spread. Or it doesn’t do it but will start after some time. No idea. Anyway, if you process a substantial stream of actual calls – it’s not difficult to earn on them.
The startup brought in USD 15M of investment in its recent round.
Alexander made his career in Russian internet companies including Mail.Ru, Rambler, RBC. From 2016 to 2018 he was Chief Strategy and Analytics officer in Mail.Ru Group. In this position, he worked on M&A, investments, and new project launches. In 2018 he became Deputy CEO in Citymobil, a Russian Uber-like company that was invested by Mail.Ru Group and Sberbank (the biggest Russian bank), then he left the company to launch his own projects. Now Alexander is a co-founder of United Investors – the platform for co-investments in Russian early-stage startups. His blog #startupoftheday (#стартапдня) is one of the most popular blogs about startups in Russia.
