Revolutionizing Oral Care with Wide Mouth Toothbrushes – Dr. Bobbi Peterson of Big Mouth Toothbrush

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Hey there entrepreneurs. My name is Sushant and welcome to Treptalks. This is the show where I interview successful e commerce entrepreneurs, business executives, and thought leaders and ask them questions about their business story and also dive deep into some of the strategies and tactics that they have used.

to start and grow their businesses. And today I’m really excited to welcome Dr. Bobbi Peterson to the show. Dr. Bobbi is an orthodontist by profession and the founder of Big Mouth Toothbrush. Big Mouth Toothbrush is creating electric toothbrushes with innovative patented design that create a spa like sensation while brushing with its powerful sonic vibrations.

And Dr. Bobbi is also the first black female orthodontist to invent an electric toothbrush. Uh, and today I’m going to ask Dr. Bobbi a few questions about her entrepreneur journey and some of the study and tech data she has used to start and grow her business. Now, before we dive into this interview, if you enjoy this kind of content, please make sure to hit the like and subscribe button.

And for more content like this, please visit our website, Treptalks. com. And with that, uh, Dr. Bobbi, welcome again. And thank you so much for joining me today at Treptalks. Really, really appreciate your time.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Thank you so much for having me, Sushant. I’m excited for the interview.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Awesome. So you’re a doctor and that’s, I’m assuming that’s your primary profession.

And of course, now you’re an entrepreneur. Um, what was your motivation for? Starting this business was it was there like, did you always feel like you had this entrepreneurial, um, gene in yourself and you wanted to kind of express that

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: kind of so once I finished dental school, um, I did work for another orthodontist.

I did a residency and I did work for another orthodontist. Now, having worked for other people. For quite some time. Um, that was pretty much my drive to want to open my own practice. So, right out of my residency, I graduated in June. I opened my office in August. So, right away, I knew I wanted to work for myself.

So, I, I, I think that. I am, um, someone who likes to make my own decisions. Uh, if I’m going to be in a work environment, I want to create that type of work environment for me. And as an entrepreneur, you can do that. Um, so yes, to answer your question, that was my, that was my drive. Now, in terms of, so that was opening my practice.

Now, in terms of starting an e commerce business, how that applies there is, again, with that same drive, you, you, you create a product. As in my case, you create a product and you’re connected with it, right? The connection you have with your product is your drive. And it also makes us that you’re going to love what you’re doing.

And as an entrepreneur, you’ve got to love what you’re doing because it’s hard work. It is very, very hard work. And there’s so many levels to it, but yeah.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: So, I mean, it definitely makes. sense, you know, that you are creating this product, a toothbrush that, you know, being a dentist yourself, what is, what is different about this toothbrush?

I know there’s the most obvious thing I believe is the, the head of the toothbrush, which is wider than a regular toothbrush. Right?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Sorry, I want to show it to you. Okay, so Um, like you said, like I’m an orthodontist, so you want to know how I came up with like the whole concept of the design?

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Yes, what motivated you to, or how did you come up with this idea?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: So, um, in my practice, I have a couple of hygienists that work for me. I’m going to try to, I’m going to give you the shorter version, but we noticed, myself and my colleagues, we noticed that there was a higher prevalence of periodontal disease and gingivitis. It just happened maybe about, uh, eight, nine years ago, but I also noticed that the latest advances in electronic toothbrush heads were getting tinier and tinier, and I took a survey in my practice, and one of the questions asked people how long they brushed, how long it took them to brush their teeth.

Now, dentists tell you to brush your teeth for two minutes. Most people only brush for one minute, so I kind of put all of that information together and said, okay, if people are not brushing for as long as they should, all, all the toothbrushes out there are so skinny. How are we going to help gingivitis and periodontitis?

So I said, I personally would have wanted a wider head on my toothbrush. So that’s where the idea came from. But once I got going, and once I got with my engineers, then I learned so much more about, once I had the idea, I learned, and I started asking questions, I learned so much more about what other qualities, or what other, um, what other things that I could add to the toothbrush to differentiate it from other toothbrushes.

So that’s how I came up, that’s how we came about, but here’s the toothbrush.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Yeah, I mean, very unique design, and I’m assuming that the, the benefit of a wider Head is really a bigger portion

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: of the area. Yes. It covers more surface area when you’re brushing. So basically with this toothbrush, um, and we’re doing some studies, you could potentially cut down tooth brushing time.

So if the majority of people only brush for one minute, maybe you will hit all the surfaces in your mouth for that one minute, because it’s almost impossible not to brush your gums with it, you know?

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: In terms of oral health, is it, uh, I mean, I, I’ve always found it easier just to have like a regular manual toothbrush.

Is there any benefit to having like a manual toothbrush versus, you know, having this kind of a electric toothbrush? What, what exactly is important in terms of having, having a good oral health?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: So I can, let me ask you your first question first. So I’m going to compare it to, um, riding a bike and driving a car.

So will a bike get you there? Yes. Would you rather drive a car? Is a car more of a luxury for you? Will it get you there faster? Will this toothbrush brush your teeth faster? So, do the manual toothbrushes work? Of course they do. You know, they’ve been in existence forever. I’m actually, I just finished the design for my manual toothbrush.

So they do work. But most dentists would recommend some sort of electronic or sonic toothbrush.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: So it’s almost like, I mean, in your description, it says that it creates like this spa like sensation, which is almost like this luxurious sensation that’s kind of, uh, an additional to it’s like elevating your tooth brushing experience.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Experience. That’s exactly what it is. And that’s exactly what we, what it says on the box, elevate your tooth brushing experience.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: So you talked a little bit about the product development process itself. Can you talk a little bit, you know, when you were, when you. Had this idea that I’m going to have my own product.

Like what was your initial thought? Like did you want to just create one toothbrush? Were you like, what was your thought? What was your vision at that time in terms of having a business?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Okay, um So I, I got with the engineers, like I said, came up with the design initially, yes. I, I thought I was only going to have an electronic toothbrush.

I didn’t really expand my horizons. I knew I did not want, um, to develop like a toothpaste or any type of, um, chemical product. Um, the, the next idea that came about after this was. The big mouth tongue scraper. I think that a lot of oral care companies have, you know, toothbrushes, they have toothpaste, they have rinses, but not many people focus on how clean the tongue needs to be.

So, we dropped our tongue scrapers this year, but to answer your question a little bit better. Initially, I had, I had a vision, right? But not having created a product before. I didn’t know what was ahead of me. So yes, I was very motivated to create my toothbrush and put the best toothbrush possible on the market.

But, um, as I was going through my journey, there were a lot of things that I found out, you know, needed to have been improved. So we upgraded, you know, there were certain things that need to be improved before I could even think about expanding, you know, into other products. Yeah, there was a lot of lessons learned because they don’t teach these teach you these things in dental school or even in college, you know, like even in business school there.

They teach you things like that are like textbook, but you really don’t know or understand anything until you start to experience experience it. Start your journey or speak with people that have gone through it or have been in that field for years. That’s how you learned that not really in school. Yeah

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Can you talk a little bit about how so you you definitely were working with some engineers or product designers?

Can you talk through that process a little bit? How did you come to find the people the right people who can help you in designing this thing? And what was that? Was there a prototyping process? Did you go through like different prototypes and you finally said, okay, this one seems to hit all these or check check boxes.

And, and, you know, how did you come with the final design of the product?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes. So there is, um, a website called Upwork.

Yes.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: And yeah, it, it, it worked for me. I, I went on there. I probably corresponded with about 10 to 15 mechanical, electrical, mechanical, electrical engineers, um, until I narrowed it down to two and then one, right?

Um, I basically did kind of like a sketch Of what I wanted it to look like, so I gave it to, um, a guy who I know was an architect. So he, he helped make a, cause I mean, I’m a dentist, I’m not an artist. So I made like a rough sketch and he, um, did the drawings. And so that we could start the, um, patented, patenting and prototype process.

Uh, we, I gave it to the engineer, engineer. Further develop the design and I went through three different prototypes. I’m sorry for the three prototypes that were not were no good, but didn’t work. And the fourth one was the final one. And that was the prototype for the electronic version of the big mouth toothbrush, which is what was featured on Shark Tank initially.

That

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: was the electronic version before, before we upgraded. Right. So believe it or not, my products had only been on the market for about six months before I pitched to shark tank. Right. So yeah, but the thing is, I mean, that’s like my favorite show. So I knew, you know, when you’ve won shark tank, you can go on there with an idea.

You can go on there with a failed business. You can go on there with a successful business. You know, there’s a variety, but I, I felt from watching it for so many years that my best bet going on that show was to have some sort of numbers, some sort of proof of concept, you know? So that’s why as soon as I hit six months, I applied.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: And the good thing was, if I remember correctly, you, you already had some, some decent numbers. Like I think you said 60, 000. Uh, yeah, it’s

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: okay. It was okay. Um, I made a, I made a, I made quite a few mistakes in the beginning. I would think I would say, um, just probably the same mistakes that all, a lot of entrepreneurs make when you’re selling a product, like, you know, you know, I don’t know the, all of the ends.

I didn’t know. I know now, but I didn’t know all the ins and outs of, you know, how manufacturing works. How to choose a manufacturer. Um, you know, definitely has to be someone, some, a manufacturer that’s rep prep reputable. Uh, I know that I didn’t realize that when they say, Oh, tooling, the tooling phase will be 30 days.

It’s sometimes turns into 60 days.

You

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: know what I mean? Like there are, there are just so many components that I wasn’t aware of that I am now that helped me to make my business function a little bit better.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: I guess, you know, being a first time entrepreneur, you know, you, when you don’t know what you don’t know, it kind of helps you a little bit also.

And, uh, given that toothbrush, I believe this topic came up in Shark Tank as well. You know, where they said, you know, they’re, they’re pretty big players in this, uh, industry. And when you were starting out, like, did you ever think about competition or this is a saturated industry? You know, how am I going to succeed?

Like, what was your, um, What was your, did you have any sort of a validation process at that time or any thought process on, on how you’re going to compete in the market?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yeah. That, that a big thing that came up, um, while I was on Shark Tank. And to be honest with you, I didn’t think much about it because I was focused on making something that’s diff that’s different than what’s on the market.

Hmm. So, yes, I mean, there are other toothbrush companies. My, my, the way I look at my business and the way I looked at it then and still now is that I created something different. Now, I’ll be the first to tell you that not everyone can use a huge toothbrush. You know what I mean? But at least now people have a choice.

There was no choice before. I didn’t like those skinny toothbrushes, so I, so I changed it, you know?

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: No, that definitely makes sense. I mean, you know, if you’re going in as an entrepreneur, I think, um, it definitely helps to differentiate your product, right? Regardless of whether it’s a regular commodity or anything.

Um, In terms of your manufacturing, you said, you know, you, you were pretty new to manufacturing side of things as well. How did you, can you talk a little bit about your, how did you find your manufacturers? Is it being manufactured in the U S? Um, are you still with the same manufacturer? How is it being created right now?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Okay. So that’s kind of like a long story. And I don’t think we have a lot of time for that, but I’ll give you like the key pointers. So initially I was referred to two manufacturers from one of the engineers I worked with. Right. And this is probably going to be really good for your audience, because one thing I did not do initially was research, um, the prices for some of the, um, available, um, tools that they use.

So basically, basically with a toothbrush, there are a lot of things that are going on inside of it. There are things that it’s made of the shell, right? I didn’t research costs. I don’t think I shopped around enough. And what ended up happening was. That engineer played the middleman. I found out later that he was charging, he was upcharging me.

Because he was the middle, because I, because I had been working with him for a little while, I trusted him. But, um, I, I really should have done my research in terms of how much certain designs cost and, and how much. Um, the materials cost to make them. I, I, it took me about a year to get out of that mess.

But I would say that that was one of my, that was one of my biggest mistakes. So yes, the toothbrush is still manufactured in China. It is. Um, but the company. Also has a base in Canada, so, um, the travel cases, the next set of travel cases, the, um, next set of some scrapers, those are going to be manufactured in Canada.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: And, uh, you haven’t had any issues working in China, like in terms of quality control, or, I mean, I’m assuming this manufacturer It kind of specializes in these kind of products.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes, so there are tons of certifications and that’s one thing that your, your listeners should understand. So when you’re having your products manufactured in another country, um, you have to look up what certifications and what certifications they need in order to produce your products in their country and for it to be shipped here because I didn’t realize how much shipping costs, especially when you don’t have proper, um, proper licenses.

Right. So I had to, I had to make sure that, that when I, when I switched manufacturers, I had to make sure that they have all, and you know what? Most manufacturers that have that, they’re going to put that in the forefront. They’re going to put, if you start talking to a manufacturer and you have to ask them, For their credentials or ask them to show you where you can find that that should be a red flag.

That’s because the manufacturer I work with right now, they were very upfront with me. I didn’t hardly have to ask them anything. I just was picking shoes what I wanted. They wrapped themselves in a nice little package and gave me.I know you’re going to ask me these questions. Here you go.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Was there any, um, because with someone, when, when someone comes with a kind of a new concept, right, which is a little bit different than what’s, what’s available in the market, uh, even manufacturers are a little bit hesitant in, in working with, with those kind of entrepreneurs.

Did you, uh, face any, I know you got introduction with the engineer that you were working with. Like, was there any issue of minimum order quantity or something like that?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes. I, and I understood that, that I was taking a risk and I understand that it costs a lot of money to set up a factory to create something that’s never been created.

So I, that part I didn’t understand. Uh, so, so the cost though, so yes, there was a large, um, initial quantity that I had to purchase, but it was pretty good for me because I, you know, I sold out. I sold out early within like two months. I sold out that quantity within about two months. So, and that, that’s another thing I wasn’t prepared for.

So, so once that happens, I had orders still coming in and they were like giving me bad reviews because I wasn’t getting them their, their products on time. Not, not product reviews, but just, I guess, customer reviews because they would think that they’re supposed to get their product the following week.

And I’m talking to the manufacturer, like you said, it was going to be here this day and it was just. Lesson learned though,

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: how did you, how did you launch? Like, how did you, I mean, that’s, that’s a big challenge for a lot of entrepreneurs, right, where they have a product and now they want to launch. And the big challenge or uphill battle is even with like something new design, you have to kind of educate the market.

But to me, it seems like in your case, you know, it, it, uh, went off the shelves rather quickly. How did you launch that, that your, uh, your, your launch was so successful?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: I don’t get a lot of anticipation. So what did I do first? So, of course, I have a website up at the website up set up Shopify about at that point in time. I believe that was the only, uh, platform that I used was just Shopify and you just direct to consumer from a website. Right? Um, but once, once I received the product, I didn’t just start taking orders.

I did some advertising. So I had a pretty decent, um, social media base. Um, I asked a lot of my friends to try them and to post and tag on all on the same day when I launched all in January. Um, and I boosted a lot of posts on social media and because the design is so unique. Some people didn’t even really have to speak about the toothbrush if they just showed it and if people are scrolling and they know They’ve never seen it before they’re going to stop and say oh, what’s that?

So a lot of it was word of mouth. Um, a lot of it was because of the design Um, so yeah, when we launched we had we had quite a few pre orders. So that’s another thing always take pre orders Always take pre orders. Yes, always set up a time to take pre orders

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: And I think that it also helps that, uh, you have the credentials, right?

Like you have the, the, that you’re an actual doctor and actually, I mean, that, that kind of adds the credibility to it, that, you know, if, if somebody is creating this new design, that they can kind of trust it.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Right, exactly.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: And, uh, I believe, um, in the, uh, in Shark Tank, you also mentioned that there was, there was another, uh, something that helped you was something around the Black History Month or something like that, where

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes, that’s why I sold out.

So I launched in January and then in February, Black History Month, we did Black History Month, Black History Month sale and a big marketing boost. And once people found out that I was the first black person to design an electronic toothbrush and they found out during Black History Month, which is where when the one month during the year that everybody’s thinking about, you know, black people, we, we sold out.

So I was, I would just, I just wasn’t prepared enough for it. But that is what happened. And then it took another 45 to 60 days, I guess, to receive another shipment.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: And what have you learned about the people who are buying from you now? Like, is there a specific kind of demographic that is buying this, uh, this product or what have you learned about your customers?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: So initially I felt like my demographic should have been anyone who had teeth, right? I thought it was that simple question. Not that simple. Um, I noticed now that most of my consumer definitely people who enjoy luxury,

right,

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: who enjoy luxury, definitely people who, who are in fitness, uh, healthcare, uh, people that wants something that’s new on the market, which is a large group of people like techies.

They want to try something new on the market, especially something like this that they’ll use every day. Um, so those are my main concerns, but pretty much now that everyone is learning about the toothbrush, even if even the, even if they’re not a reoccurring customer, they’re going to want to try it.

Anyone who sees it, like, they want, they want to try it

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: for sure. In terms of financing, I mean Anybody starting a business that’s a big, uh, that’s that’s a big topic, right? You know, how do you finance? How do you get the and to me it seems like or it sounds like Uh initially you did have to put up a significant investment Uh, can you talk a little bit about that and and the reason you went on shark tank?

Even just hours after six months of launch. What was it primarily financing or were you looking for a? A business partner, someone who can get you, you know, bigger exposure in the market and eyeballs.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes. So, um, yes, there was a significant amount of money that had to be invested from idea to prototype to getting my first shipment.

There was a lot of money invested there. That was your own,

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: your own money?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Well, I borrowed from my practice.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: So I

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: had to put it, I got to put it back. So I, I borrowed. So basically I took a loan from myself. Um, to invest into the creation of the product. And I wouldn’t say that I needed the money. Like I didn’t go on Shark Tank because I needed the money.

I mean, of course, 150, 000 helps, you know, that’s going to help. But I wouldn’t say that I actually needed it. I definitely, like I said, I was only on the market for six months. You’re on the market for less than a year. I think that one of the best things you could do is get a great partner. Someone who can, who can not, that’s going to walk, that’s going to hold your hand through because Barbara, she does not do that.

No, no one’s going to walk by, hold your hand and walk you through everything. But the reason why I really love her is because she, she’s the type of person that. Um, makes you want to work hard. She makes you want to impress her. She, if you ask her a question, she’s going to answer it. Uh, but she’s not giving out any handouts to her entrepreneurs.

She, she likes to work with people that are self sufficient like she is. And, and no, no enough about the business to ask the right questions to elevate their own business.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: That is so interesting. And, and anytime I talk to, uh, shark and trying tank entrepreneurs, I always ask this, you know, what is it like working with, you know, these, these, uh, these, uh, these entrepreneurs, successful entrepreneurs?

And to me it sounds like you kind of have a hands off relationship. Like do you have any sort of a annual meeting that you go and kind of talk about your performance? No, we, how,

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: oh no, we, we, uh, I, I speak with her team pretty regularly, I’d say. Every other week or so, I speak with, uh, her, her, her team member, like, especially when we did the upgrade, I went to her office.

We had a nice little meeting. I showed it to her. Um, she liked the improvements and that’s it. Then we just started having personal talk.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: And what, like, what is kind of the biggest benefit that, that you have? Is it really just the feedback? Like, do they help you with marketing, uh, uh, you know, distribution?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Where? No, not, not really with distribution. They do help with marketing, um, but they’re, she’s just a great consultant. Like her team is just a great consultant. They’re very, they were very, very knowledgeable about, um, just the market period. You know, what ways that you’re able to, um, just focus on the, the.

The people that you can reach right away, right? That’s the first level you focus on. If you let the consumer that you can reach very easily, uh, for example, there’s, um, there’s a system called Klaviyo. Have you heard of Klaviyo?

Right.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Things like things like that, like where you get what they call it, grabbing the low hanging fruit so that you can master and really, really, really profit off of that.

And that helps you scale. Right. Um, So we definitely play deal for my business. Then, of course, we expanded to, um, Amazon. So now we’re on Amazon. We’re doing really well on Amazon. Our Amazon store is beautiful. Um, we’re, we are currently in a couple of boutiques in Soho. And it’s funny because. The boutiques.

So, you know, in some, in like tattoo boutiques and, and like they do piercings and stuff, they also do tooth jewelry. So one of my things that I also used to do is teach them how to place the gems properly. So after I did that, they wanted to sell my toothbrush and make it a part of their aftercare for their clients.

So that’s how that developed. And then now our newest initiative. Is, um, outreach to dental offices. So now we’re in a couple of hundred dental offices in the country. Where they’re actually selling our toothbrush and they get commission.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Wow. That’s, that’s great. Yeah. So, so is your business now, of course, you know, it seems like you have some, um, physical presence.

You’re reaching out to dental offices, but, uh, primarily your business is still, you consider it an e commerce business or like we, what was your. Your goal is to keep it as an e commerce business, your goal is to become more mainstream, like get in, you know, some of the big box stores, um.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yeah, no, I think that I would like to stay direct to consumer.

I do not see myself going into retail anytime soon. I have been approached by quite a few stores. Um, but I don’t like the deals that they come up with, uh, and, you know, and then after consulting with my, [00:28:00] my team, it’s just, it’s just not right for us right now. Maybe in the future, I might select one retailer and just work with that one retailer exclusively, but it would have to be, um, a luxury brand.

Hmm.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Do you have any, who would be an example retailer like that?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Um, well, if it’s, I would love to do like maybe Bloomingdale’s,

you

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: know, like a, like a luxury department store, then that’s what they would be considered, I guess. Um, sex doesn’t sell toothbrushes, but I think it would have, if, if I was going to do it, but I’m not, you know, I’m not, I’m not there yet.

Like I’m, I’m juggling too many things as it is. And yeah. Yeah.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: That was going to my, my next question. I mean, you’re, you’re, I’m assuming you’re a full time doctor and you said you have two offices. And yeah, and now you’re

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: big mouth is literally a full time job now.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: How do you manage your time? Like what, how much time are you spending on your, your, like your dental practice versus like your e commerce?

Well,

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: you see, you see, I’m still at the office right now. Um, I, I have, I’m developing a really good team and I’m learning to delegate more, but, um, and I also have other dentists that work for me. So, I have dentists that work for me in Philadelphia and I have dentists that work for me here. Um, but as you know, my presence is still needed in order for things to function properly.

So, um, I would say that I’m, I’m, I’m just learning to delegate that. That’s what I need to do in order to be able to not, you know, drive myself crazy. But yeah, big mouth is definitely a full time job. Now. I’m literally on the phone all day. I’m on the phone and me, I’m in meetings all day in between patients.

But that’s just the life of an entrepreneur. I mean, that’s just,that’s just what it is. You have to accept that you have to grind, grind, grind for as many years as you can in the beginning so that you can live a great life when you retire. And that’s what I’m focused on right now.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: I mean, that, that is so interesting.

You know, that’s, that’s kind of the dilemma of an entrepreneur. Like, you know, people go into entrepreneurship, want to do business. Because they want more freedom, right? That’s kind of the primary driver. But then they end up working, you know, 18 hours a day. Um, yeah, in the

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: beginning, that’s just what it is.

That’s just what it is in the beginning, in order to make sure that if you have a product, I mean, if you’re, if you’re launching a product, you’ve got to work really, really hard in the beginning so that you can scale. Once you scale to the level that you want to be scaled to, then you’re fine, then you’re good.

You can relax a little bit, you know, but I have a little ways to go. At least I feel like I do.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: What is your kind of like your, your, do you have a. Some sort of a metric or some sort of a finish line where you would say, yes, now I can take some time to relax. Is that, is that like some sort of a revenue number?

Is that, how would you, how would you know, how would you know you arrived?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: That, that is such a good question. I think that question changes for me every year or every, every few months or so. It just changes. It’s like. Once you hit a certain mark, you’re just like, you know what? Oh, I know I can get here by that, by this month, or I can probably get here by, by, by next year.

So, yeah, you know, ask me that question in like another year, and I’ll probably be able to, you know, put, like, be a little bit more exact. But right now Yeah, there’s just too much. There’s just

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: too early.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes.

Yeah.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Can you talk a little bit about your marketing? I know you said that you are, you’re on different channels, so you have your own website, Shopify website.

You’re doing some email marketing with Klaviyo. You’re on Amazon, which is doing well. Um, are you doing a lot of paid advertising? Are you, is it, is most of your stuff organic? Like, how are you kind of reaching more people? I’m assuming your primary market is the U. S.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: My primary market is the U. S. Um, but we have sales, you know, the U.

K. Mexico, Canada, Asia. Um, yes, I do paid marketing. I can tell you about a couple of mistakes I made in the beginning with these influencers. So I was under, I did do influence from, I still do influencer marketing, but I, I look more in depth into their engagement and ask more questions about, um, how much, you know, they produce much, how much they have produced with other companies.

But initially, what I would do is say, oh, this person has a million followers. Let’s see. If they can post a toothbrush. So there are, there are a couple of different factors because someone has a million followers, a, it doesn’t mean that they’re all real B, it doesn’t mean that they can sell anything because a lot of these influencers, people go to their page.

Not to buy things. Sometimes I go there for entertainment. Sometimes they go there, you know, for, for, um, inspiration, right. They may not go to their pages to purchase anything. And you have to be really careful because some of these influencers, because they have so many followers, they deal with a lot of brands.

Once you, once you are a brand ambassador for like 10 things, nobody’s going to trust your opinion on everything because everything can’t possibly be great. You know what I mean? You can’t, everything could not possibly be great. So, um, now I have. Someone on my marketing team that researches these influencers and what they produce and the flow of traffic and all their engagement before we reach out to them.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: But your primary way or primary, um, marketing methodology that works in terms of acquiring new customers is influencer marketing.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: No. Um, so we, we, I would say we’ve done some, we’ve done a lot of different advertising. We’ve, uh, we’ve boosted posts. We, um, Google ads. We do a lot of Google ads and Instagram ads, YouTube ads.

Uh, we just, we’re now streaming our first main commercial on a major streaming platform, which is MSN, NBC Universal. So that platform has like Peacock, it has MSNBC, it has Shark Tank. So, you know, they’ll say if there’s someone that’s watching Shark Tank, my, my commercial will come up, you know, and they’ll say, Oh, you know that.

That’s just, that was a, you know, someone that was on sharpscape. Uh, so we, we pretty much expanded with that. We, we have a lot of people that post for us. We have, we’ve done, um, lots of conventions. I just came back from Vegas. We did a national dental convention out there. Uh, and it’s surprising. It surprised me that all of those dental students knew exactly who I was.

They knew about the toothbrush, Um, so, yeah, I think we have, there’s a variety of ways that we market, but I would think our main, our main sources of marketing that brings us, that brings in the most income will probably be the Google ads and, uh, and, um, you know, just online.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Can you talk a little bit about your team?

Who’s, I mean, it seems like you’re, you have, you do have a team. Yeah. I’m very curious to know what, I mean, it also seems like you’re kind of every day is still very, it’s not very, you know, uh, like you’re wearing a lot of different hats. Right. But how are other people? Who are the people that are kind

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: of helping you?

Okay. So of course I have my dental staff, but they, they, they, um, they’re my dental staff. It’s sometimes they’ll, they’ll help me with, they’ll help the group of people that I have that are packaging the orders. Sometimes they’ll, they’ll help them. So I have a group of people. Package the orders. I have phones one for the emails.

I have, uh, three people that help me with the marketing. Uh, one does my SEO and what might help develop my website. Um, the other that’s my head of marketing. She deals with, um, kind of like the P. R. with the toothbrush. Uh, she, she interjects any people, any companies that reach out that want to break with brand partnerships.

Um, and then my, my 3rd person is in charge of she’s the director of regional sales. So she handles. Um, the contacts between. The business and the dentist that sell

like

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: the dentist need or if any of the dentists have questions or they need more marketing material or if they want to change their buying status from percentage to wholesale, like she she handles all that for me.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: That is so interesting. Are dentists very kind of receptive to selling this this product? Do you usually find that to be the case?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes, I do. But dentists that have been practicing for a long time. Not so much. New younger dances, dentists that have been practicing between 5 and 10 years. Um, I think that I don’t know a lot of older dentists are kind of just kind of like stuck in their ways a little bit.

Um, and. They’re nearing retirement, so they’re not as interested in residual income. I think that dentists that work for other dentists and newer dental practices, they want to bring in as much money as possible. So especially if they have something new, and a picture of Barbara Corcoran and me on their front desk, people are going to be like, well, what’s that?

And all they have to do is scan it, and every time their patients scan it, they get 50%. Yeah.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Very nice. In terms of your, your operation, I know you talked a little bit about your operations. You, you, you know, you, you have your warehouse in the building and, and, you know Yeah. You, you have a team that’s they’re shipping out mm-hmm

Um, yeah. Can you talk a little bit more about your, your operations? Uh, how do you like, just

set up

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Yeah. The setup. Uh, do you, do you offer free shipping? Do you, do you charge for shipping? Are there returns and so forth.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: So yeah, that’s a good question. So we don’t offer free shipping. We do, we do have sales.

We do bundle deals. We have like, we just did a, um, a 24 hour flash sale and it was, you know, by the, by one toothbrush, either the black one or the Sonic one, you get a free tongue scraper and you get 20 percent off. Um, we have, we’re going to have a crazy sale coming up cause my birthday is next month. So I’m going to give them, um, like basically like half off of everything.

But only for one day between one o’clock and four o’clock. So all of them, everyone has it. That’s another incentive for people to follow you because people always want to know when that next sale is going to be. Like all those people that complain that my toothbrush costs too much. Those are the ones that are going to be holding that are going to be following that do follow us to try to see when they could get.

Um, or sometimes it’s like a family who wants their family to have it, and they have to buy like five of them. So then they’re hanging on waiting for that next flash sale, you know. Um, I’m sorry, did I answer your question? I know you were asking me about marketing.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Oh, no, no, I was talking about operations.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Oh, operations, okay.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Sorry,

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: I got thrown off by the sale, because that’s when we really need all hands on deck, and that just happened yesterday. So, uh, when we received the shipments, When the toothbrushes come in, or when the supplies comes in, we have a big storage area downstairs that sectioned off, has everything sectioned off with all the big mouth stuff.

And then those stuff’s on the other side. Then there’s an office where all the packaging takes place. I have someone down there that, um. Monitor’s inventory. So we make sure we have all the bubble wrap and the tissue [00:40:00] paper and the, um, the cards that go inside of the thank you cards. We have cards with me and Barbara on them.

We have cards that we send out specifically just to the dental offices, um, with all the information and everything on them. So we have to make sure we have all the supplies and people, somebody, there’s someone down there that keeps inventory. Um, so when they come in, the orders come in, we have a printer, a label printer that prints all the labels out for the day.

Um, And then the boxes are pre made, they pre made the boxes with the singles or doubles or whatever. So as the orders come in, for example, if there’s like four orders of two boxes, they’ll get it to one person. That person goes and puts the label on those boxes that are already prepared. Puts it upstairs.

Well, so that’s kind of like how the ship runs. And then, um, we get pickups every day, depending on how many orders we have. Uh, normally the UPS will pick them up pretty much every day. Yeah. [00:41:00] Um, and yeah, that’s how we do direct to consumer. My fulfillment with Amazon is fulfilled by Amazon.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Um, do you see any difference?

Like, could you, do they charge you more? Yes.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yes, they caught me more, but everyone shops on Amazon. It’s just so convenient. It’s just so convenient. Like, I do, I look for everything on Amazon. You know, it’s literally shopping at the click of a button. Um, so people love that convenience, especially Buy With Prime.

I now, on my website, I have a button where it says Buy With Prime. You just click one time and you get whatever you want the next day. So that’s really, really important, but I, I profit more with my direct to consumer and I sell more direct to consumer as well because of all the other marketing factors, but it’s, it’s still a good.

idea to have, um, to have Amazon do your fulfillment if you’re trying to sell in volume. And I do ad campaigns on Amazon as well, like sponsored ad campaign, ad campaigns.

Yes.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Um, and in my field, uh, that is kind of competitive, but the longer you do, you run your ads, the more, uh, exposure. you get on Amazon.

So I just keep going, keep going, keep going. And then now I’m noticing that the scales are the, um, the toothbrushes scaling on Amazon. So now I know that there’s a bare minimum that I’m going to make, but then there’s a maximum goal that I want to reach. So every month I increase it.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Um, talking about the price.

Of your product. Of course, as you said, this is more targeted towards the luxury segment, and I’m assuming that you’re because you’re getting this manufactured in China that that kind of helps with your cost. You have a healthy margin on this margin.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yeah, I have healthy margins that my margins allow me to, um, to do like the whole better wholesale deals.

They allow me to create better sales. Um, but it’s just [00:43:00] not something that.

Do like all the time. I mean, folk strategies as well,

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: for sure. And the best, uh, uh, in terms of your future vision for the business, um, I know you talked about creating, uh, new product, the tongue scrapper. Do you, do you see, I know one of the things that, you know, a lot of entrepreneurs who are working with Shark Tank, uh, entrepreneurs say that, or, or the, the, the advice that they get from them, if.

You know, even if they have one product to really just focus on that one product and get the as much distribution as possible to maximize the potential of that product. Like, do you, are you getting the same kind of advice? Or do you, are you kind of thinking of, um, increasing or, you know, adding new products?

Yeah.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: So it’s funny that you say that because. Um, I have friends in business that work for retailers where [00:44:00] they’re like, you need more skews. You need more skews, like more skews, more skews like that. That’s their advice that they give to people. Um, my partner, she didn’t say she didn’t say she never told me that, but I have heard that that’s what a lot of entrepreneurs like that’s their.

That’s what a lot of sharks like that. That’s what they advise their entrepreneurs. Um, for me, I kind of did do it that way. Like, I upgraded my toothbrush, not changing the design anymore. Only changing the color. And then I moved on to another product. So I have like the travel case, and now I have the tongue scrapers, and now I’m gonna have the manual.

You know, so I don’t think that what they mean is just Oh, sorry.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Yeah, I can hear you.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Are you there? Sorry. I don’t Okay. I don’t What I would advise is, yes, when you come out with a product, make sure that that product is stable, right? Once that product is stable. But I wouldn’t say you have to Stabilize the next product and [00:45:00] stabilize the next product.

No, once that product is stable, build things around it that you can, that you can add because once, once people love your product and they can go on your site and you have a lot of little things up there, they’re going to shop. They’re going to buy other things. So I would, my advice would be to just stabilize your main products and build products around it so that people, you know, they want to buy it.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Yeah, of course, the more, the more skills you have, the more options people have to buy. So that definitely makes sense. Yeah, I know you talked about some mistakes already. Uh, in every entrepreneur, entrepreneur’s journey, there’s always mistakes made, lessons learned, failures. Um, you’ve already mentioned a few of them.

Is there anything else, any big mistakes, uh, that, you know, that, uh, taught you a lesson and that you would want to share with other entrepreneurs?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Um, yeah, the, the biggest, one of the biggest was, like I said, the thing with the manufacturer, do we do, we’re not doing proper, proper research with that and then, you know, just the marketing thing, uh, with the wasted, like a lot of money wasted, [00:46:00] uh, like influencers and, um,

Companies that might say, oh, I can. Get you into this magazine and that magazine and that magazine, uh, but you have to pay me like 20, 000 or something crazy like that. Once my friend told me that that happened, I started to price out exactly how much other forms of bigger advertising were like advertising on streaming platforms and, um, you know, advertising on YouTube and going hard with the Google ads.

And I’m, and I’m looking and I’m thinking, I’m like, how could anybody fall for that? But surprisingly enough, they do. Um, and not only that. I don’t think that you should have to pay to get into magazines, you know what I mean, like that, that just didn’t make sense to me. Let me think of any other mistakes that I can think of.[00:47:00]

No, just developing a product. There’s just a lot of trial and error. Yeah, I would just leave it at that though. I spoke on my mistakes that I could think about right now. Um, yeah, I’m just always willing to learn.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Okay. Um, so now I’m going to move on to our rapid fire segment. In this segment, I’m going to ask you a few quick questions and you have to answer maybe in a word or a sentence or so.

So the first one is one book recommendation for entrepreneurs and why?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Shark Tales by Barbara Cochran. This is about how she turned a hundred dollars into a billion. It’s basically a true story.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Awesome. Awesome. Uh, an innovative product or idea in the current e commerce, retail, or tech landscape that you feel excited about?

Mmm.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: I know you’ve mentioned Shopify and Klaviyo already. Anything else? Yeah,

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: no. Oh, I thought she meant like a product. Uh,

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Yeah. Any products that you use? Oh,

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: so, so I, so this [00:48:00] doesn’t have everything to do with the toothbrush, but, uh, like I told you, I was at the national dental convention and they had a shark, a mock shark tank.

And there’s this company that’s basically developing an app or a program that makes it so that, you know, when you go to any kind of doctor’s office, it takes a while for them to like check insurance and stuff like that. They created an app where you could just type in the person’s name. Phone number and what type of insurance and everything that that date that is covered is pop.

It just pops up in front of you like that. I feel is going to be super innovative for a lot of dental and medical professionals.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Awesome. A business or productivity tool or software that you would recommend or a productivity tip?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Um, Research and manufacture. I like, I like, I like Klaviyo. I don’t use it myself, but my, it’s done a lot for my business.

And of course, of course, Shopify, um, I do like how Amazon has, like, this thing called [00:49:00] Amazon University, where they have tons of videos that will help you. That’ll help you scale. Like, I went through a lot of them and a lot of the things that they tell you to do for your Amazon store, you can actually apply to your, your own e commerce store as well.

So I was surprised at how much knowledge, not knowledge, but information that they have right in your Amazon seller central.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Well, I mean, it seems like you’ve, you’ve spent a lot of time learning about e commerce. Um, a peer entrepreneur or business person whom you look up to or someone who inspires you.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yeah, I mean, I have a lot of friends that are entrepreneurs. That I learned from, um, I don’t know. I hate to keep talking about Barbara, but she does inspire me because she is self made. Like she, she came from nothing. You know what I mean? Like, [00:50:00] I, I can’t say I came from nothing, but I, I built all of my businesses from the ground up on my own for the most part.

You know what I mean? So yeah, I would, I would say that I definitely admire her. I, I admire any, any person who is, who is self made that can, that can, you know, Make their own first few million on their own,

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: you know, just, just a tangent question on that because you come across as very driven, right? Um, what, what drives you?

Like, was it something like you grew up in poverty and now that has kind of motivated you to. Really never be in a situation where, you know, you’re, you’re in poverty, like, if that’s what’s driving you, you’re just an entrepreneur. I

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: would say that we, we were poor because my, I mean, I had, uh, I was raised with a single mom and I’m the youngest of eight.

So there were a lot of us. I mean, my mom was a nurse, but she had a lot of kids.

She took care of

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: us and other [00:51:00] people’s children as well. So, um. Yeah, I don’t, I don’t even think we knew we were poor when we were more, but, um, I, I know that my mom, she really liked nice things. So I kind of get that from her.

So I’m like, if I want a certain lifestyle and she didn’t depend on a husband to do it for her. So I’m like, if I want to live a certain lifestyle, I don’t have to make some money. You know what I mean? So I think that was probably the. The mentality and the goal. Like, I want to live a certain way. I want to be able to experience nice things.

And I want the people, I want to be able to create a space where the people around me also can experience nice things. So that was also my drive. And like I said, in the beginning. I, I worked for people for a long time and you can’t create a, a happy, mentally positive space working for other people. I mean, I, I mean you can, but I can’t, some people can’t, I don’t think.

Yeah.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Yeah. That is so true. Right. It’s like, uh, some people are very comfortable in that kind of a situation, like, but others like entrepreneurial personalities, it’s, it’s just [00:52:00] very restricting for sure.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Yeah.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Final question. What is the best business advice that you have ever received or you would give to other entrepreneurs?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: Ooh, that’s a good one. Um, don’t be afraid to fail. Don’t be ashamed to take chances and take risks. Everything starts with an idea. Once you get an idea, build a plan around it and execute. Because that’s basically what I did. And you don’t have to know, don’t think that you’re going to know all the right answers.

You’re not going to know all the right answers. You have to go into it knowing that it’s going to be a learning process. It’s going to be, I don’t care if you were the, you got an MBA from Brown or Harvard, Yale. It doesn’t matter. Business in general is something that has to be learned as you’re doing it.

Of course there are certain rules, laws, terms, but yeah, you don’t really, you can’t master it until you do it.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: That’s so, that’s so true. It’s so true. You can’t, you can’t know everything. Like you have to, you have to move forward, take one step at a time and you know, you’ll, you’ll learn in the process. 100%.

Yeah. Well, Dr. Bobbi, those were all the questions that I had. Thank you so much for sharing your story, for sharing some of your business lessons, successes, lessons learned. If anybody wants to try out your toothbrush, what is the best way to do that?

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: They can go to our website. Big mouth toothbrush dot com.

They can go to our instagram, the big mouth toothbrush. They can DM me. I am Dr. Bobbi on Instagram and or amazon. They can go on amazon and just start typing in the search bar and click bible prime and it’ll be at your house tomorrow.

Sushant Misra of TrepTalks: Awesome. Well, Dr. Bobbi, thank you so much again. Yeah, really, really appreciate it and wish you and all your business, uh, all the, all the, uh, great things and, and success.

Bobbi Peterson of  Big Mouth Toothbrush: You too. Thank you.