Conversation
Highlights

Sometimes the best startup ideas come from watching family members struggle. For Khaled Boukadoum, that moment came when his sister graduated from NYU Dental School. Despite years of clinical training, she faced a daunting challenge that her education hadn’t prepared her for: running the business side of a dental practice.

In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Khaled Boukadoum, Founder of Torch Dental, shared how this personal insight led to building a digital supply platform that’s raised $49.5M in funding. But the journey from identifying the problem to scaling nationwide wasn’t straightforward – it required rethinking how to drive technology adoption in an industry known for its resistance to change.

The Supply Chain Reality Check

When Khaled and his team dove into dental practice operations, they discovered a surprisingly antiquated system. “The supply ordering side of things was pretty broken,” Khaled explains. “It was a bunch of whiteboards or pen and paper and Excel spreadsheets. And Excel spreadsheets was like the most advanced dental practices.”

The inefficiencies went beyond just tracking inventory. Price transparency was non-existent, with practices paying wildly different amounts for identical products. Even more concerning, the traditional supply chain actually incentivized overspending through commission structures.

Starting Small to Think Big

Rather than trying to revolutionize the entire industry overnight, Torch Dental started with a hyper-local approach in Manhattan. “Part of the beauty of Manhattan and the density of it is there are hundreds and hundreds of dental practices on the island,” Khaled shares. This concentration allowed them to rapidly iterate on their product based on direct customer feedback.

Their initial go-to-market strategy was decidedly low-tech: door-to-door sales. Khaled and his co-founder would sign up practices, gather feedback, and immediately implement changes. This boots-on-ground approach proved invaluable for understanding their market, but it wasn’t scalable.

The Digital Transformation Challenge

The team quickly realized that the biggest hurdle wasn’t building the technology – it was getting dental practices to adopt it. “You really have to make sure the value prop is super clear and the ROI to the customer is apparent and materially better for them in order for them to adopt the tech,” Khaled emphasizes.

This insight led to a crucial innovation: pre-demo analytics. Instead of trying to sell practices on features, Torch Dental built a tool that could show potential customers exactly how much they could save on their current orders before even seeing a demo. The approach worked – practices could save 15-25% on the exact same supplies they were already ordering.

Scaling Through Digital Acquisition

As Covid-19 hit, Torch Dental was forced to abandon their field sales model. But rather than seeing this as a setback, they discovered an opportunity. “We found a lot of success in actually doing things fully digitally and allowing practices to sign up on their own,” Khaled notes.

This pivot to digital accelerated their expansion. Today, Torch Dental operates across 48 states, using a mix of digital marketing, trade shows, and referrals to reach new customers. Their marketing strategy has evolved to be “super metrics focused,” prioritizing demand capture and generation over brand building.

Looking Ahead

With plans to open an Austin office in 2025 and expand beyond just supplies into broader spend management, Torch Dental’s vision extends far beyond their initial solution. But their core insight remains the same: in traditional industries, technology adoption isn’t about fancy features – it’s about demonstrating irrefutable value.

For B2B founders targeting traditional industries, Torch Dental’s journey offers a valuable lesson: sometimes the path to digital transformation starts with a knock on the door and ends with a crystal-clear ROI.