Felix: Tell us about the inspiration behind the business.
Julian: My brother and I, who are two of the three co-founders of Twice, are the children of Dr. Jonathan B. Levine and Stacey Levine, who have really dedicated their whole lives to oral health and oral care and creating companies. And one of the most amazing things they did was start a nonprofit, which is called the GLO Good Foundation. And the GLO Good Foundation is set up to bring dental professionals to communities that don't have access to care. And in 2015 we joined 30 other dental professionals as well as Lenny Kravitz, the musician who has been a patient of our dads for a long time, who has a community of people in Eleuthera in The Bahamas that really don't have access to care. And so in 2015, Lenny brought us down about 35 volunteers to set up at a full-service dental clinic in the middle of his town. And over five days we treated 400 people for full-service dentistry, root canals, extractions, dentures, cleanings, whitenings, education. It was an incredibly moving and life-changing experience. I'm one of the lucky ones who has never needed to have braces or have any medical issues as it relates to my mouth. For the first time, I saw how life-changing and transformative dental care could be for someone who really has been lacking access to care for their whole life. And this mission that we went on was just extraordinary. We've now gone back on that same mission, five straight years. And really the second year we saw all the inspiration we needed to want to create a brand and oral care that could give back, and that could really try to upgrade the standard of products. 
Felix: What are some of the ways that your business gives back?
Julian: we are tied to the GLO Good Foundation as they are our charitable partner. We donate our product on all of their missions so that the hundreds and thousands of patients that they see go home with Twice toothpaste. We also donate our time. So we are there on all of the missions educating the patients there and providing them with our product. And beyond that, we also donate 10% of our company's profits to that foundation. So we're able to really make a difference for them and help them grow. And it also gives us the opportunity to tell stories and to share with our customers really what we're doing to make a difference.
Felix: Amazing. So what does that mean logistically for someone maybe else out there that wants to do something similar or to transform their business into being able to donate products, profits, and time to a charitable cause? What do you have to set up logistically to be able to, I guess take advantage of this inspiration that you have.
Julian: Yeah. Well to find it, I would definitely recommend putting yourself out there and searching around because the opportunity to give back very likely exists no matter how niche your category or product. For us it was a matter of... and of course it's very close to us as it's kind of a family foundation. But beyond that, it's finding a foundation and charity that you aligned with from a value standpoint and who in our standpoint or in our belief that we can really help grow. And so it's building that relationship with the people behind that foundation and finding opportunity to give back in our circumstance logistically we are always setting aside inventory to be donated, and we're making sure of course that we have the proper paperwork and authorization to do so. And that's really what usually it takes very often the nonprofit is able to coordinate logistics so that really what you are donating is your time and your product or resources.
Felix: Got it. So you don't have to go through efforts of setting up infrastructure yourself to have a charitable aspect of your business as long as you have a partner that has experience with this.
Julian: Right. Yeah. If you have a consistent partner that isn't more of like a promo but is really a mainstay of a partner, then yes, you need to create that agreement with them and have very clearly defined ways that you guys work together.
Felix: Yeah, I was going to ask that next. What are some ways that you need to coordinate with I guess a charitable partner in terms of things like, I could imagine that they have certain missions that they have that they might see you as a partner that makes sense to take on for that project and maybe you have ideas that you want to bring to them. How does that all kind of work, Is there some kind of session or meeting or a time where it makes sense to coordinate on project ideas, whether they originate from the commercial aspect, your business in this case versus the charitable partner?
Julian: Yeah. From our standpoint, we typically coordinate every quarter and look ahead to mission trips or events that are occurring that we can partner up or that we can help them and lend a hand. It's typically the brand reaching out to the nonprofit versus the other way around, and just offering to be helpful and to be there, a little bit goes a long way as it relates to that. So typically quarterly calls or meetings.
Felix: Got it. And maybe a situation is different because you began the business almost like a hand in hand with a nonprofit, but for the most part, are there certain requirements that you see nonprofits have before they consider taking on a brand partner?
Julian: They definitely have to align with the values and I think the more aligned the product or service is with the delivery of care or product from the foundation, the better. So I don't think that there can just be for lack of a better word, random connection. So in our circumstance there was complete alignment, not only in a shared mission to want to deliver better oral health and oral care to people in need, but also the product itself. Toothpaste is something that all of these patients need to go home with. They need to be educated as to how to use it. And so there is complete alignment from both, an ethos standpoint as well as a product standpoint. So looking for that is best.
Felix: Mm-hmm (affirmative)- How do you balance things like priorities between the, I guess the commercial aspect of your business versus the priorities from a nonprofit? Have there been situations where, I wouldn't say they conflict, but maybe their priorities are kind of conflicting where obviously a commercial business has different priorities than a nonprofit?
Julian: We haven't run into that issue and I think it's really about making sure that what you commit to is something that you can fulfill. So in our circumstance, 10% of profits and donating product on all of their missions is something that we're able to stand behind.
Felix: Got it. Now when it comes to making sure that the message, and the mission that you're business has alongside with a nonprofit, how do you make sure that is clear or visible to your customers? When you do have a partner and you do have a more mission focused business behind your brand, how do you make sure that that is something that your customers know about?
Julian: Absolutely. Great question. For us, part of when we created our business and our website, we had a video which showed us and the founding story and how we give back and partner with GLO Good. As a result of that video. Of course, we had copywriting and sections of our website really just dedicated to telling our story and showing them the impact. I think customers are hit over the head with brands that donate a dollar to this or buy one, give one. So to try to go a step further and really show the work being done in action, so that they can vividly understand and imagine what goes on. For us that was really important. Similarly to the extent you can, letting your customers know how their purchase makes an impact directly from a quantitative standpoint, from a measurable standpoint is something that we've continued to try to do and get better at.
Felix: Yeah, I was going to ask next. So do you find that customers care about this mission? Are they making purchases because of your mission behind? Obviously you sound like you started this business without that in mind, but obviously the more that you're able to grow your business, the more you're able to help the nonprofits. Do you find it that as a message that will resonate with customers that will lead to more sales?
Julian: Yes and no. Is it a reason customers buy? Yes, but it's a small reason. In the end of the day, you need to have a product that really speaks to the consumer, and showcases to them how it's going to improve their lives. The element of the social give back in our story has really been a great I guess benefit in terms of retention, and people wanting to support Twice, and people wanting to tell their friends about Twice because of the work that we do because we're not just a typical toothpaste company. But in terms of that initial purchase, that is less of the reason that people make the leap.
Felix: Once they become a customer for the first time, what are you doing, I guess, tactically to retain that customer? And it sounds like you're alluding to make sure that they are aware of the mission, but what are some ways for you to use the mission to keep up the retention rates for a customer to keep them coming back and buy more and sounds like also to spread your business, your brand via word of mouth.
Julian: Yeah. So the mission comes through in a couple of ways. Through email, email marketing, when we go on our missions we do recaps of the missions share before and after share stories. Share how they're supportive Twice was able to make a difference in addition. And of course those emails go out to all of our purchasers and we're also sharing on social media. So our Instagram profile, which is our main focus, gets a good amount of love during that time to really show the mission and the work that's getting done. And so those are really the two ways that consumers will see it. Outside of that, and almost a little separately, we have been building an ambassador program of dental professionals because we have found that we are very aligned with their mission to provide better oral health to their patients.
Julian: But also from a formulation standpoint, they love what we're doing and they're able to also share with their patients and their friends and their communities our story. And because they are such a service led group of people and community, they really attach themselves to our mission. So whereas you or another consumer myself may say, Twice as a beautiful story, but I'm not going to buy them because of their story. Dental professionals are actually really clinging to that because they know how big of a problem oral health is, and how far mission work can go. So that was pretty interesting development that we've had over the last six months.
Felix: That is interesting. So definitely would talk about the ambassador program in a bit, but I want to get back to the origin story. So once you were, came back from this mission, the first time you're inspired to create business, that gives back, what were the next steps? How did you actually get this off the ground?
Julian: Oh man. Wow. Bringing me back. Not that it was that long ago, but yeah. In 2017 we said enough is enough. If I go on another one of these missions and don't start an oral care company, I'm just gonna cry my way out of it. These stories are so moving. And we dove head first into the market of oral care products, and we said, what can we make unique? What can we make different? And when we looked at toothpaste, even as sons of a dentist, we weren't loyal to any toothpaste. We didn't know what was in our toothpaste. We didn't know what products we needed, really when we looked at the category overall, we were hit with more like, okay, you've got this multibillion dollar category that I'm not loyal to a brand. That purchase decision is confusing and I don't even really know what's inside of it.
Julian: Yet I've been using it every day, hopefully twice a day since I can remember. So for us we identified that category is one that we wanted to go into. From there we did a lot of research, manufacturers of toothpaste, ingredients that should be in toothpaste, ingredients that shouldn't be in toothpaste. And this was no quick experience. This was an 18 month experience, 11 months of which Cody and I slept on our parents' couches in their living room.
Julian: So very much the entrepreneurial hustle that I'm sure many folks listening know about. But we just absolutely immersed ourselves in everything, toothpaste, ingredients, manufacturers, and did our research and reached out and spoke to folks and partnered with the right people thankfully, and 40 versions of toothpastes later, we arrived on our products and while we were formulating our products we really identified part of our value proposition, which through our research we found out in a fact that 100 million Americans, one in three people don't brush their teeth twice a day.
Julian: And so that lent, that helped us figure out our name Twice and helped steer the creation of our products, which was an awakening and a calming toothpaste. One to use in morning one to use at night or really just to inspire you to actually brush twice a day. So it was a long process filled with a lot of research. And a lot of the getting comfortable being uncomfortable and patience.
Felix: So lots of parts of your story there that I think there are lessons and so on dive into little bits. So when you came back from your mission, I hadn't considered this, but you didn't actually have an oral care product in mind yet and you're looking around and you sounded like you said that a couple of the criteria that helped you decide on toothpaste was first thing was that you look for a category that does not have brand loyalty. Why was this important for you to identify a category that does not have a brand loyalty as an opportunity for you to go into?
Julian: Yeah, well we wanted to really try to create or we are trying to create something special, something memorable, something iconic. What better category than a product that you have to use every day, twice a day in your life. For us it just so happened that the oral care category as we saw it through toothpaste was one that was really big, but that didn't have loyalty. And we liked that specifically because of the storytelling and brand personality and the brand first approach that we could take to creating the business, which we hoped would translate into loyalty.
Felix: So obviously there are giants here already in the toothpaste space and they don't have brand loyalty, but they have lots of dollars and lots of pull, where you at any point concern, maybe we can well come in, we might make some progress, make some tracks and all of a sudden they'll come and just squash us. Was that ever a thought in your mind?
Julian: You're always scared of the billion dollar giant. I think there's definitely enough food for everybody to eat. So we were not necessarily scared of the billion dollar giant. It was more about us finding our path, finding our positioning and sticking to it and just continuing to push and grow little by little.
Felix: Got it. Now the second thing you mentioned here about why you settled on toothpaste was that the purchase decision is confusing and I totally agree. I walk into aisle and I don't even look at it is just so overwhelming. I'll just grab whatever's quickest thing just so I can stop trying to analyze what toothpaste to get. So certainly I can feel the fact that is confusing. It makes a lot of sense. Now as a brand, as a business out there, when you do recognize that you are going after category, or in a category where the purchase decision is confusing, how do you come in and take advantage of that fact, and what do you do to make it easier for you customers?
Julian: Sure. When we were formulating and going to purchase product to test frankly, the idea of a toothpaste for sensitivity, and gum health, and teeth whitening and cavity prevention, there was an option for every need. And what we learned through manufacturing was that it's, you're very capable of creating a product that is healthy and effective at doing all of those things. And so the idea of taking this approach to say, we've got the formula for you, right? This isn't, a bandaid for one specific thing. This is like the elixir. This is the recipe for your oral health and overall health. And so for us it was really important to try to create a thoughtfully made formula that really combined both health and efficacy and delivered a multi-benefit product to our consumer.
Felix: How did you identify what benefits you should make sure to include in your formulation?
Julian: Yeah, it was a mix of both market research in terms of what's out there competitively from a benefit standpoint as well as working with our chemist, frankly and our dad as well who is a dental advisor for our company, leveraging their decades of expertise, catering to patient's needs and oral health. There's nobody better to talk to about that than the professional that's at to cure a lot of problems and help try to create healthier patients.
Felix: And you mentioned to that there are a lot of customers, a lot of customers in this space when they're shopping, they also don't know what's inside of the toothpaste. How do you open that kind of black box? Any product that could very quickly become scientific and technobabble, and talking about ingredients that you cannot even pronounce. How do you make sure that you don't fall into that realm of being overly complicated to your customer?
Julian: Right. Such a good point. It's a matter of not going too deep but deep enough to know that there is a level of thoughtfulness in creating the product to establish trust. One interesting fact is that a lot of the same products that have now been widely publicized to not be included in products, whether they're personal care products or products around the house or food and beverage are also in toothpaste. And so you're a lot of the same familiar names that have been removed from your shampoos. But guess what? They should also be removed from your toothpaste. So it's a matter of showcasing the degree to which we made the product clean and also being relatable by helping them understand that, Hey, these ingredients that you no longer using your shampoo is also now not in your toothpaste.
Felix: Interesting. So you're noticing that the consumer is becoming more educated with these ingredients, that you are making sure to latch onto the ones that they are more familiar with, and then also talking about how it's not inside your product or it is inside your product. If it is something that they desire.
Julian: Yeah, absolutely. There are certainly customers that just want to see that you're made without and if the ingredients are less important. But there are also a lot of consumers, especially in oral care, surprisingly where they've had a problem. There's an ingredient called sodium lauryl sulfate or SLS, which is a sulfate and it can translate to irritation and canker sores in the mouth. And a lot of people have developed those issues of canker sores or dry skin, and their dermatologist says, have you checked your toothpaste? And they look at him like he's got six heads. And so there are a lot of people that are looking for a toothpaste with specific ingredients excluded. And so we want to make sure that we're letting that customer know.
Felix: Awesome. So I want to talk about your packaging. So very beautiful design. How is that made? How did you guys come up with the packaging for your product?
Julian: Great question because we're going through a little bit of an evolution right now. When we created the brand, and I'm sure everybody can relate to this when you create the brand versus a year and a half in, when we created the brand the idea was to really create these two formulas that were used for morning and night to inspire better brushing habits. And so one tube was white and one tube was black to represent morning and night and the white tube has some elements of blue to reflect the mint flavor and the evening flavor, called Twilight has some elements of lavender to reflect the lavender flavor in that. So we wanted the brand to be more modern to still reflect the benefits of the product, and to really look good on your countertop. I think a big complaint as it relates to toothpaste was that, I hide it when my friends come over. I don't want anybody to see my toothpaste. 
Felix: How did you get that information on people? How did you know that behavior, I mean, you're not obviously standing in your customer's bathroom while they are getting ready for their friends to come over. So how did you get that kind of feedback? I think it's important for anyone out that is trying to think more intelligently about how to design their packaging.
Julian: Yeah. Well it was really about what we were doing before launch. Of course, post-launch we've had a good amount of reviews and people talking about that benefit, but prelaunch. It was a matter of vocalizing what we're doing, Hey, we're making it, we're making a new toothpaste brand because X, Y, Z problem exists. And you would be surprised when you open up to people and you tell them about what you're building with the passion that you have, where the story goes. We have so many people coming back to us and telling us, yeah, I hope you make it look good because I always hide my toothpaste, or it would be great if I had a good looking toothpaste tube because I always put it away or put it in the drawer. So it was really anecdotal feedback from consumers or potential consumers as to ways to upgrade and make the product better, which was ultimately our North star.
Felix: Got it. Yes. Especially for, for like CPGs, like toothpaste, things that almost every consumer needs to have. Don't build your product in isolation because you're probably get immediate feedback or immediate thoughts from people that you could certainly use to collect data on. Right. So I think it's important that you don't kind of hide the fact that you're working on a product like this to get that kind of feedback. So on top of the packaging here, it also lists the benefits it says here, premium toothpaste includes teeth, wine and caddy, prevention, sensitivity relief. How did you decide that those are the three leading benefits that you wanted to stamp on your product?
Julian: Yeah. It's funny because we literally are just undergoing some evolution in terms of our packaging as we're evolving the business. So I love it. Those three benefits are really the three biggest benefits that consumers look for as judged by the leaders in the category. The largest growth category for all of oral care has been teeth whitening, which has been told to us from retailers and is available and in industry research. Beyond that, the number one ingredient that dentists recommend be in your toothpaste is fluoride. And fluoride is an ingredient for cavity prevention and enamel strength. And so there's your cavity prevention and you got a billion dollar brand built on having sensitivity relief toothpastes with Sensodyne. And so for us, we wanted to make sure that we were able to tap into all three of those benefits with our formulation.
Felix: I like it. So I think that's an important point too, which is to use the research the billions of dollars, the millions of dollars that your industry leaders of our response on identifying what the consumer cares about. And I think that the part that you have to balance now was like, where do you kind of carve your own lane? So at what point were you like, okay, let's go with lead with these benefits because that is what consumers care about. But then how do you add your own kind of perspective, your own flavor, your own twist on it?
Julian: Right? In the beginning, our own twist was this idea of morning and night toothpaste. Your beauty routine is different in your morning and night. Why should you use the same toothpaste? You feel really good, you feel a little sick, you feel a little low, thinking about using different toothpaste products for different moods. So that was the original spin. Really as we evolve the business, we saw more and more that the degree of care that we put into this formula is really what sets us apart. We would have dental professionals telling us, why is this any better than crest? Why is this any better than Colgate, skeptical of course.
Julian: And when we would tell them about what's inside and what's not inside and how it's made, they were like, wow, they were blown away. And so for us, that really evolved to become how we could put our own spin on it. And so now we are really hanging our hat on having these clean and effective formulas that marry both the best of natural with the best of science led formulas to create something unique and different. And so it's taken a while to get there and to how we talk about ourselves. But knowing that at the core, our philosophy was we want to create a formula that's the best of both worlds. That was really what helped guide that.
Felix: So you've mentioned a couple of times now about the redesign with the packaging that you're coming out with. So With the details you can share, what led to the focus now on let's improve us evolve this packaging.
Julian: Sure. I think in the beginning when we started our company, the product pipeline was really exciting. We had met a lot of people in the industry that make a lot of different products, and we were already starting to work on prototypes of different products. But as we continued to business, we saw that we really can create something special in toothpaste and focus on toothpaste. And one of the key ways that we can differentiate, which was really shown to us a lot through our customer feedback and reviews was how much they loved the flavors of our toothpaste. And so when we think about growing Twice and as we're growing Twice, one of the ways is going to be by expanding flavors. And so our existing packaging is really white and black. And so the future of Twice is going to be a lot more colorful. As we think about, Twice in a year from now has six different flavors of toothpaste versus our current two. And so as a result, really to show the energy of the those flavors, we're going to become more colorful.
Felix: So let's get into a little bit of that in regards to formulations. So when you first got started, you mentioned that it took 18 months and then you said 40 versions. So what is that like when you are trying to formulate a product like this and what was happening during those 18 months?
Julian: A lot of back and forth the toothpaste product that you apply onto your toothbrush and brush your teeth with has so many intricacies. The texture, the color, the degree to which it foams when you start brushing, the degree to which it foams while you're brushing, the aftertaste, the after effect, the different sweeteners that can be used. Every little ingredient plays a very big role in the overall experience of the toothpaste. And so we had in mind what we wanted it to be like and feel like. And so it was just a constant tinkering back and forth, of trying to create that with the ingredients that we wanted to use.
Felix: How did you test you were on the right track?
Julian: Yeah, I mean we definitely had our friends and family a lot of people coming over to brush their teeth, which was pretty fun. But that was it. It was anecdotal. It was believing in ourselves and in our ability to create what we wanted to. But yes, we absolutely leaned on friends and family to make sure they were coming by and get their perspectives.
Felix: Were there any things that you learn only at scale about the product or maybe that you're testing your own personal test and only friends or family testing. They were all giving you certain feedback. But then more feedback came once you went into the market.
Julian: Yeah, that's a great point. I mean, I think the little bits of feedback that you can get from people really can't be dismissed because if one person says it, good chance there's a thousand voices or more behind that. One of the big changes or evolutions of the product was how much it foams. Again, that SLS detergent, that bad ingredient is the reason why toothpaste foam so much. Unfortunately it's in almost 99% of products out there. And so everybody expects their toothpaste to turn their mouth into a bubble bath when they brush their teeth.
Julian: So I'm a lot of the feedback that would be constructive criticism was love of the flavors, but it doesn't foam as much as I'm used to, so I don't feel as clean. And that was a piece of feedback that a minority would say to us when they were reviewing it, but then they would say, but I know you have healthier ingredients, so I'm okay with it. But then of course, when you introduce your product to the masses, education is such a hard business to get into in terms of what's healthy, what's not. So really trying to do the best of both worlds where we don't compromise on the health of the product, but still we deliver the experience that people are looking for.
Felix: Got it. Now, when you first went to market, how did you know that the 40th version was the one that you wanted to go market with? What about it? What kind of feedback were you getting were you felt confident in going to market with it?
Julian: I think if we went to 41, either I would've killed my brother, he would've killed me. We had narrowed down our ingredient list. We had just a list of product attributes that we wanted the product to deliver on, and we were zeroing in on the flavor and it got to a point where we were really happy with it. Specifically our morning toothpaste, which is winter green and peppermint was flavored in a way where you really could taste both of those mints and it wasn't just like this mix of hodgepodge of mint like you're used to. So we love that. Our evening toothpaste, which is peppermint vanilla and lavender had a nose of lavender and it tastes like peppermint vanilla. And so those were really big efforts to try to get the taste, which of course can be so subjective into a place that we were comfortable.
Julian: And also one thing on that was we were right around version 30 or 35, we thought we were done and then we got certifications for our ingredients, and we found out that one ingredient was in gluten free in one ingredient, wasn't non-GMO. And so we had our manufacturer replace those ingredients with the proper versions of what we want it to be. Who would have thought that gluten free is a whole lot different than non gluten free. You'd make one little tweak of a product and you have a completely different experience. So after 40, we were ready.
Felix: Nice. So 18 months is a long time. And I think this is important because the common thing that I see with all the successful entrepreneurs I've been on this show is that it's a long timeline and a big part of the game is just to not give up on yourself. And it's easy to say that it's easy to say don't give up. But what actually helped you on a regular basis? On a daily basis, even when things were looking, maybe never, I'm not sure if they looked bleak at any point, but what actually kept you going during those 18 months? Because that's a year passes by and then another half year passes out before you're ever able to actually have... forget going to market, forget growing business before you have something that is a product that you can sell.
Julian: Yeah. A lot of time goes by. For us it was a matter of wanting to introduce something great again. We were living our most inspired life after this mission work, and seeing an opportunity to create a product that people could really love, that's both healthy and effective and tastes good. And in our minds that product did not exist and it still doesn't outside of Twice. And so we spent all that time just focused on wanting to chase what we thought was great. Of course there's an element of no matter how great you think it is, there's always opportunity to improve.
Julian: And we know where we are today is different than where we are when we launched. But I think we definitely benefited from our parents and their experience of saying stick it out long enough, survive long enough to thrive is what they always said. You're going to go through the tough times. It's what is necessary to create a winning business. And for us it was knowing that we hold the success of Twice in the utmost priority above any personal measure. And so that helped us when times were tough, knowing why we're in this and knowing that if we hold on long enough and we're receptive to feedback, and were responsive to market changes that we'll find success.
Felix: So 18 months passes by, you have the final version of the product right to go to market. How did you guys get your first customers?
Julian: Yeah. We did a couple things. We gifted the product to almost every person we know and we threw an event. I think the event was... I don't know how many people have thrown launch parties or events like that, but they're typically not profitable endeavors, but they were certainly a nice celebration of the launch and a good way to get the name out there. We had invited a lot of friends and friends of friends and some folks who are influential voices and they were able to help us introduce the product. At the same time we had some PR efforts in place to help introduce the product. We were tapping as many friends and professionals that we knew to help us really try to explain our story. Lenny was also very helpful. It does definitely does not hurt having a rock star, an amazing human as, as your co founder. And so he was helpful in getting our story out there and we really wanted to lead with our why, and really explained to people who Twice is by talking about why Twice exists. And so that was the initial, the first three to six months.
Felix: Was it a big splash that kicked off like some snowball that was rolling down a Hill? Was it just a start that's still required a lot of legwork?
Julian: No, it absolutely required a lot of legwork. It's exhilarating when you can launch a business and when you have a lot of people talking about it, especially in your inner circle, but my goodness then the real fun starts. Then you're really operating a business. So for us as first time entrepreneurs, it was a lot about planning and how to sustain growth and how to really plan out our marketing schedules and what the business looks like now, and how to make sure that we're responding to changes and feedback. Where we are today as a business in terms of our outlook and how we're marketing and distributing the business is vastly different than what it was when we started.
Felix: Right. So when you were putting this leg work and even to today, I think you mentioned that one of the more successful strategies for you was around sampling. Is that the same thing as gifting when you mentioned it or like what is sampling?
Julian: Yeah, the gifting that we were doing would be also sampling. We were gifting product to our friends and they were using the product and posting on social media channels like Facebook and Instagram about their experience with the product. More traditional sampling, like going to a fair or a farmer's market or doing a sampling program with another company. It wasn't exactly what we were doing. We were a little bit more I guess scrappy with it, relying on our friends.
Felix: Is that so strategy that you focus on today for growth?
Julian: We consistently do gifting programs, but no, it is not a big part of our marketing strategy as it was before.
Felix: Yeah. I definitely want to circle back again to the ambassador program in a second. I want to touch on one more thing, which is around how you really want to make sure that you did not want to get lost in what you were mentioning here was that you wanted to create your business around one core customer. What does it mean to you to have one core customer?
Julian: I think that's probably one of the biggest learnings for myself. My brother would probably be nodding his head as he's the marketing brain of the business. But for us there's an interesting challenge which we've created toothpaste, which is a product that everybody needs. But like every entrepreneur learns either the easy way or the hard way. You can never speak to everybody and you can never build a brand for everybody. So for us it's about really understanding who we're creating Twice for, who's going to appreciate the thoughtfulness of the formula, and the responsibility that we take in growing our brand. So our one customer is who we speak to. It's who we communicate with. It's how we communicate to them on our various channels. It dictates the tone of voice that we use, the words that we use, the content that we put forth focusing in on really that core customer.
Felix: Got it. Now, how precise do you get with identifying a core customer? Because I think this is a very present challenge for newer entrepreneurs where they believe that the bigger the market, the better. The more people that they can serve, the better. But it sounds like what you learned was that the more you do that, the less you speak to anybody at all directly to at least. How does that, how do you identify the core... How precise you get with identifying who is your customer?
Julian: Yeah. I think the best way that we've thought about it is breaking it up into at least a few different archetypes. But then getting really specific, where do they live, What do they do, What do they enjoy doing, What don't they enjoy doing, how do they talk and really thinking about speaking to that type of consumer through what you do. And knowing though that it's speaking to that consumer even as detailed as it can get now so that you can, the brain will open itself up later. It's being specific in your communications now to really win with an audience who will hopefully allow your brand to grow into different markets as you expand and as time goes on.
Felix: Can you give an example how you would, after identifying your core customer, how you would speak to them versus what you might or might not say?
Julian: Yeah. For us, our core customer that we want to win with is the conscious consumer. It's someone who's aware of the fact that the products that they've been using for the last number of decades are probably not that healthy for them. They're effective, but they're out there looking for other options that provide similar benefits but with a healthy alternative. And so really a big trend in that is clean ingredients. And so a lot of our content and our brand positioning is around clean ingredients. And the reason behind the importance of that, the connection of oral health and your overall health, and continuously reinforcing these beliefs that we have as a business so that that customer who adheres to those starts to attach themselves to us.
Felix: Got it. And I want to talk about the ambassador program. You mentioned that this is a new revelation for you guys, where the ambassador program that's a professionals has really allowed you to get your mission out there more. So it tells more about that. How does your ambassador program work?
Julian: Yeah, great question. So again, this was like putting ourselves out there. We went to a dental trade show in Dallas, Texas. We're based in New York. And we set up our little booth, myself and my mom, and we had the most amazing experience. We had all of these dental hygienists coming up to our booth saying, why do I keep hearing about your oil toothpaste company? Why don't I know about you guys? And we would tell them about our mission and our founding story and how we give back. But then we would go into our formulation and our flavors and our approach and our philosophy.
Julian: And it was so clear that what Twice represents is also what these ambassadors or what these hygienists and dental professionals represent. So we left the trade show like, Holy cow, we got to get these people on our team. And so we spent a lot of time thinking about what an ambassador program could look like. I think you look at a company with an ambassador program, and if you looked at 10 of them, you'd find 10 different ways to run an ambassador program. I think for us, we really wanted to build a passionate community, a community of people that are more interested in being together. And being a voice for the movement of better oral health and oral hygiene versus profits. But at the same time, of course we really wanted to create another income opportunity for all these people. And so for Twice there's an opportunity to have dental hygiene ambassadors promoting our product, our brand, our mission on social media, in the office to their patients, to their friends, their family on a daily, weekly basis.
Julian: So what we do is we supply them with content, photos, videos, infographics. We made content with them. We ask them what things they're looking for and we supply them with them so that they have basically ammunition to talk about Twice from-
Felix: I was going to say, I could imagine a lot of industries, our categories can take a similar approach of find that group of ambassadors of you that are close to your ideal customer, that can represent your brand for you, for anyone out there that wants to embark on creating an ambassador program, how do you, I guess, get in touch with these people? How do you get, how do you actually do outreach to get an ambassador into your program?
Julian: You know, we live in a very interesting world and for us, an ambassador is somebody who's in touch from a social standpoint. And so we do out direct outreach on social channels, Instagram, Facebook again, the community that we want to align ourselves with are very passionate. They're very vocal. In fact, a lot of their usernames and handles is their name and then their title, which is registered dental hygienist or RDH. So again, as we're being scrappy and as we don't have tons of budgets to work with, we are doing direct outreach to them through social channels and saying hi and sharing with them what our values are and our mission is, and getting them to come on board and join the community.
Felix: Yeah. So, definitely don't over complicate it. It's what I'm getting out of this is like reach out to them directly. So I want to talk a little about the website, was the website designed in house or how was that built?
Julian: We worked with a company called Zero Studios that are based in Brooklyn and they helped us design and develop it.
Felix: Awesome. What would you say is the most important page on your website?
Julian: Oh man. Having to pick one is like your favorite child I guess. Probably the homepage, it's so funny when you create a website two months later you want to change all of it. You get people that look at your website, they think it's the most beautiful thing in the world or they point out 1,000,001 problems. You create the website to be different than you learn. You should create the website for conversion and it's a constant a fine line that you tow between the two. For us we really wanted to try to share what's different about our product, what the story is behind the product. And it's so hard when you have a lot to talk about, to nail that succinctly and passionately through a website. And Cody and I we're still working on the website and we plan to do a V2 of it, later this year. But it's a love hate relationship. But yeah.
Felix: What about what apps do you rely on as a business either on your website or off your website to help power and run the business?
Julian: Sure. Yeah. The app world is incredible, and we learn about new ones every day. It's a little overwhelming at times. For some good news in the morning, I typically check and see what our customers are saying and how they're reviewing us to have a hold on my finances and understand retention. Outside of Shopify itself, I use Glue. As we've built a subscription business, which we launched really like last March we use recharge to understand our upcoming command and a couple little fun tools FOMO, which is a little plugin that shows some social proof and previous purchasers on the website experience and [EndChoir 00:50:42] which asks exit questions after you've purchased product. So we've been able to survey customers and ask them what company they're switching from or how many people they're buying product for, and ways to just learn more about our customer.
Felix: I like that being able to survey them right at the point that they've made a purchase decision because that kind of information is invaluable to get people off the fence a lot of times. I think it's something that I think a lot of people should look into. So we talked a little bit off air about this, about the COVID-19 pandemic that we're all involved in. And can you talk a little bit about how it might affect your business or ways that you've been able to or either required to or have chosen proactively to adapt to this new, who knows how long environment we'll be in.
Julian: Right? Yeah. What a time. Really what a time to be alive right now. A lot of speculation as to what the next six months, 12 months, 24 months and beyond looks like. How Corona virus will fundamentally change consumer behavior, how businesses operate, what industries are thriving, what are dying. For us, we have definitely benefited from the fact that people need to brush their teeth and health and hygiene are two categories, basically the same category that is emerging victorious. If you can even say that from these times, people are really prioritizing their health and hygiene. So from a business standpoint, we've actually been, we've been pretty stable. This toothpaste is not a product that if you've got a month left of product that you're going to stock up on like toilet paper.
Julian: So we haven't seen any 100% paused increases in revenue. But it stayed steady. It's a consumer staple and it's really showed that through this, for us in terms of distribution will of course remain an exciting Avenue for growth. But knowing that a lot of consumers that were buying oral care products at retail no longer, may want to do that. If they have the option to, we're going to push getting our business on to Amazon sooner than later so that we'll have that ability to really try to increase our net as it relates to being online and being present. So looking at a lot of different online channels that we can get our product onto.
Felix: Awesome. So smiletwice.com is the website. I'll leave with this last question, which is, what has been the biggest lesson from the past year that you are applying, moving forward?
Julian: Yeah. I really think it's a matter of listening to your customers and not being afraid to change. When you start driving the car, it's a whole lot different, every month after. So for us the biggest lesson is to be patient, to be a great listener and learner, and be prepared to act quickly and evolve. Because success is waiting. You just got to find the right way to get there. And more often than not, it is not immediate.
Felix: Awesome. Great, great, great advice. Thank you so much for coming Julian again smiletwice.com is the website. Thank you for so much for coming and sharing your experience.
Julian: Of course. Thanks for having me, Felix.