EPISODE 465: The Start-Up Practice Journey with Steven Reinlie DC

Hey, chiropractors. We're ready for another Modern Chiropractic Mastery Show with Dr. Kevin Christie, where we discuss the latest in marketing strategies, contact marketing, direct response marketing, and business development with some of the leading experts in the industry. 

Speaker: [00:00:00] Welcome to another episode of Modern Chiropractic Mastery. This is your host, Dr. Kevin Christie, and today I'm bringing an interview with Dr. Steven Reley from Austin, Texas. He's been in our MCM coaching program for a bit now, and we really lay out his career path and then, uh, making decision to go from, uh, working for a practice for quite some time to opening up his own practice a little over a year or so ago and, and how that journey has been for him and some of the.

Lessons and the good things, the hard things and, and all the stuff that goes into opening up a practice. And we, we kind of dive into that, which was great to sometimes, you know, spotlight some people that are making that dive into, let's call it chiropractic entrepreneurship and, and what it's like and how they are navigating, being able to do that.

So before we do, I just wanna make mention. We are gonna be, if you're in Europe or you want to go to Europe, I'm gonna be with Dr. Chris Chippendale in the [00:01:00] uk June 20th, 2026. And we're gonna talk about the patient experience. It'll be a one day masterclass. He'll do half of it. I'll do the other half. You will leave that day, uh, really, really understanding how to apply a great, remarkable patient experience to your clinic.

You will leave with a new patient experience. It won't just be theory and didactic lecture. You will work through improving. What your patients are experienced, and it's not just clinical. There's a lot of things that go to it, so we'd love to have you there. We have early Bird until March 31st. You can go to Bitly b.ly.

Forward slash MCM UK 26. It'll be on June 20th in London. So check that out. We'd love to see you there. I know we got quite a bit of, uh, listeners here that are from Europe, and we'd love to, to see you there and connect with you even further. So without further ado, here is my interview with Dr. Steven Reley.

Dr. Kevin Christie: All right. Excited to [00:02:00] have Steven on the show here today to, uh, really talk about kind of a origin story of graduating from school, going into a, a, a career path and, and where we're at now. Uh, before we dive into some of that, tell us about yourself.

Steven Reinlie: Um, yeah, thank you for having me on. Always a pleasure to do something like this.

Um, my story is probably not all that different from a lot of people's stories that decide to go into the chiropractic field. I graduated December of 2021 from Parker, um, and I was our class valedictorian. I don't say that to boast, I say that to put out there that there was nobody knocking on my door to hire me.

Yeah. So I always like to remind people that it's about who you know. How you present yourself that's so important in this type of work. I mean, the clinical skills are obvious. I think we all aspire to be good at it, but just getting [00:03:00] good grades on your test questions doesn't mean much. Uh, so, you know, I got out just like many of us do.

You're looking for finding a way to pay back your student loans and pay for your life. Uh, joined a practice here in Austin, Texas. Uh, I grew up in Round Rock, Texas. Um, so moved home. Got married a few months later. I mean, it was a lot of life happening at one time, which I'm sure many of us can relate to.

And got off to a really great start as an associate. And I was with that practice, uh, up until about, um, two years ago, let's just call it that. Mm-hmm. Before branching out and doing my thing. And here we are doing this now and it's been a lot of lessons. It's been a lot of fun. It's been sometimes staring at the ceiling and wondering what the hell did I get myself into?

But I feel like many of us probably experience those emotions regularly.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, and I'm glad you kind of brought up, you know, the fact that we are in a unique profession where, you know, if you go to Harvard Medical Medical School and you are top of your class, like you're gonna get a top residency, [00:04:00] then you're gonna get a top job offer that it's gonna be $500,000 a year.

You know, like there's certain medical professions where a lot of that. Does carry a lot of weight, but, uh, like they say, uh, the, the, the DC in our last of our name is basically what our grades are. Alls you need to, to graduate and you can still, you can still be successful, right?

Steven Reinlie: That's right. Yeah. I mean, the only, the.

The only thing I got out of it was, uh, a sleepless night. 'cause I did have to give a big, you know, speech and, uh, that like, I prepped for months. I had a feeling that that was coming. So I went to Toastmasters, did the whole thing. I kept questioning like, am I the right guy for this? 'cause I'm not like, super rah rah turned the power on chiropractic.

The guy that went after me that was like. The, uh, big speaker of the event, I can't remember his name, but he was talking about your blazing PISA forms. My father-in-law still brings that up and very not like how many probably of us practice. Not anything against an adjustment, but like it was very talk the tick [00:05:00] for those that understand that world and, uh, like that's just not me at all.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, no, it's, uh, but yeah, it just kind of shows that, um, there's more to it when we do become a chiropractor and we actually graduate. There's, there's a lot to becoming, let's call it a, a, a successful chiropractor. And there's a lot more, uh, sleepless nights. Probably the best thing you got outta that experience was the learning how to do some public speaking, right.

Steven Reinlie: Yep, absolutely. So it's just like anything, it's a muscle that you have to exercise. Some of us are blessed with more muscle than others, but it's a trainable thing and uh, it was a good thing to go through. It's helped me, you know, uh, I, for whatever reason, get asked to do stuff like that from time to time, and it's good for building your network.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, I, you know, I wanted to bring you on, you know, I've been fortunate enough to coach you a little bit here for the last year and a half or so, and, and kind of that, that transition from associate to, uh, owner and, and, and dive into that transition there. And I, I want to set the [00:06:00] tone a little bit for the audience where I, I believe you did a good job within your associateship to grow a practice within a practice.

I think one of the. Mistakes that a, a lot of young dcs make a lot of associates is they, they might go into it with a mentality of like, oh, I don't want to build his or her practice. You know, you almost kind of go into this job, uh, wanting everything to be provided to, to you and, and not. Also build your own patient base because you have this feeling that, oh, I'm gonna leave in a, in a fair amount of time and I don't want to put all that effort.

It's something I can't take with me. And, and you didn't have that mindset. You built a, a really nice practice patient base within that practice. And I think, um. You know, young kyber need to understand that when you do open up your, your own practice, if you decide to do that, right, like I don't think it's for everybody.

Not everybody has to open up their own practice to have a successful [00:07:00] career, but if you de, if that is what you want to do, you probably rather it not be the first time you've tried to build a patient base. If it happens that way, fine, but. Look at it as a really good test run if you are working within a practice.

So what were some of the things you took out of that experience of like building a patient base within the four walls of say, another practice that, uh, was beneficial for you?

Steven Reinlie: Um, I come from a father who's a serial entrepreneur, so I have some level and understanding and did the ride to work with dad stuff in the summer and

Dr. Kevin Christie: mm-hmm.

Steven Reinlie: Location, location, location, son, and you know, all that. Right. So. Some of this wasn't completely foreign to me, but it's very different. Um, yeah. You know, trading hats from associate to owner or even if you're an associate and they feed you versus like you're an associate that you gotta go out and get still 'cause your paycheck is dependent to some degree on it.

Um, I am a pragmatist by nature, and [00:08:00] after two or three years of in this practice, I realized that my income was very much capped if I didn't go and learn how to get my own clients, develop my network. And so I was able to negotiate myself into a purely revenue based share split. Mm-hmm. Um, and I pitched it to him as, Hey man, this removes overhead from you.

Like if I don't show up, you don't make, you don't lose a dollar. Right. But I'm taking risk. You're not taking as much risk anymore. Now I want to, since I'm taking some of that risk, I want more ownership of the revenue share. Um, and so we were able to agree to some terms that made sense for both sides. Um, as I like to bring up to him, every dollar that comes to my paycheck is a dollar less in your business.

So I'm not, you know, I'm not, uh, unaware of the negotiation that we're doing here and trying to provide values. He can also expand. Um, I say that because, you know. I had to go out and learn how to look for opportunities. That's probably one of the best things that came from setting up our [00:09:00] arrangement.

Like that you listen to your patients and they say, oh yeah, I'm working with a personal trainer, or blah, blah, blah, and it's, you know, that's important to know, but it's important to go, oh, that's great. Would you like me to coordinate some care? You know, I can talk with your personal trainer or whoever.

Just like many of us might send narratives to PCPs or those types of things. So I just made it a habit and then I put it in our intake paperwork. Do you work with a personal trainer? I'm, you know, data mining for contacts. Mm-hmm. Um, so I'd go out and make some phone calls. Some people are super interested in connecting and some aren't, and you just play that game.

Um, and then I learned some of that on somebody else's dime, I guess you could say. Mm-hmm. Nurtured it. Schedule. Got busy enough. You know, get into life and you kind of put some of that stuff on the back burner. Um, I was able to negotiate myself in a, a good enough place that I could say for most associates I was probably in the top percentile of earning and I had some version of our life of golden handcuffs.

And then it started to become [00:10:00] apparently clear that that practice life cycle. Was very much changing from where, um, I had learned and kind of developed some of those skills. Mm-hmm. And a couple years ago I started packing my parachute for a variety of other reasons. And, um, one of my personal, or I guess you'd say professional goals several years ago was to meet with 40 people that I had never talked to, you know?

Mm-hmm. Practice hold leads, practice developing. You know, just getting a warm intro and an email and that's it. That's all I have to go on. Um, basically once a week so I could learn to navigate those. Because I knew that was a skill, like I was gonna have to have a lot of confidence with to go out and develop my network.

Plus, you never know what opportunities are out there. I was hunting for, Hey dude, I got a room over here, you can rent it for me. Mm-hmm. That stuff just doesn't show up on, you know, uh, LoopNet or whatever.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah. So

Steven Reinlie: it was a skill to that I find invaluable, which gave me a lot of confidence for kind of stepping up and [00:11:00] going out and doing this thing now.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, definitely. And then, uh, let's, let's chat about where that transition was. When you left and opened up your own, you, uh, were subletting a space. How did you find that space? Was it through a contact that you had met?

Steven Reinlie: So, honestly, um, it was through exactly that exercise. Um mm-hmm. I had a patient. Say to me, she didn't know any of this was going on.

She goes, Hey, you should meet my personal trainer. He actually is in your neighborhood or near where you live. I said, oh, I'd love to. This was during that year of the 40 people.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: And I walked in there and she set me up, said nice things about me. Um, he was super easy to talk to, get along with we same in terms of age, relatively speaking.

So there's just, you know, you're looking for any one thing and we do this all day long. We are intervening. Yeah. Literally all day long trying to find like, oh cool, you're into barbecue. So am I. What kind of smoker do you have? Just finding something to develop a relationship. Yeah, so, um, we hit [00:12:00] it off. He was a former NFL player for a few years.

He was looking for someone that did the work that I did, 'cause it helps him and his business and its appearance. And there was just enough space that we needed to throw up a ceiling and another wall. So we made that happen. Um, so I knew, like I had that in my back pocket. It took several months before this all transpired.

Mm-hmm. But I knew that that was there. And then I had another, uh, contact that I had made here in the Austin area that I had been seeing his, uh, uh, he's a personal trainer, his clients for probably eight years at this point or whatever it was. And that was again, from just. Person mining, talking to a previous client that we both shared.

She said she loved him and then I went over there. Mm-hmm. He's a stalwart, Eric Cressey, uh, blog reader, um, that I've done all of his mentorships up there in Boston. So we hit it off right away, spoke the same language, and then he just started sending me business. And so I had called him about a month before I thought stuff was gonna hit the [00:13:00] fan and said, Hey dude, like.

I think I'm gonna need a space. Can I put my portable table in there for a little while? And he said, sure. So after, um, you know, the transition happened, I was over there cleaning his space up, readying it for mm-hmm. Potentially the next day's business. And I'm walking out of his facility and a friend of mine has a clinic right across the parking.

So I walk in there, it's like a Tuesday at 10:00 AM and he's, we get to chitchatting and he's like, what are you, what are you doing here? Like, you know, because I'm usually busy seeing patients.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: And I explained to him what was going on and he is like, Hey man, I got a third room right over there. You can rent it from me.

And then that's how that happened. So

Dr. Kevin Christie: yeah,

Steven Reinlie: it goes back to relationships who, you know.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Mm-hmm.

Steven Reinlie: A great book that I read was Rejection Proof. I probably read that 10 years ago. You just, you don't know what opportunities are out there until you ask. And most people don't want to say no 'cause it's uncomfortable.

So even if they can't please you, there might be this adjacent [00:14:00] door that's available that you had no idea to ask about. Mm-hmm. Because I didn't walk into his office thinking like, maybe he's got another room. I walked in there, just say hi. 'cause I had shit else to do that day. Yeah,

Dr. Kevin Christie: yeah.

Steven Reinlie: And uh, he was like, oh man, look at this opportunity I have.

And I'm like, sweet. Actually do need that opportunity. Um, your relationships with people is probably the. Biggest thing I've learned over this last several years. And, uh, your opportunities are directly tied to that.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, I have a, uh, story, uh, I'm getting old enough now where I have stories from quite a long time ago, and they seem to, uh, come, come to a pass here every so often where you're like, oh, I didn't realize that was going on there.

But, um, I had an opportunity back in 2009. I was inside of a gym. And I'm, and I'm gonna, uh, tease out a little bit with you on moving outta the gym, but we'll get there in a second. Uh, I, I kind of knew the gym situation I was in at the time was on Delicate terms because the business of the gym didn't seem like it was [00:15:00] doing so good.

And I had someone connect me with this woman. She had a place called Ellen's, uh, fitness Studio. Right? So I go over to Ellen's fitness studio and I check out the space and it really wasn't gonna be a, this space was okay, but I can only use it certain during certain times and it wasn't gonna work out too much.

And this, this woman was like in her fifties, right? And I just kind of. Kind of poo-pooed it and, and didn't do it. And, and I move on. And so fast forward, it's like 2015. And the person that, uh, had connected me with that Ellen's fitness studio, she's like, did you know what Ellen ended up doing? I'm like, do you know, do you know who Ellen is?

And I'm like, no. What? She's so Ellen like a year later. Gets connected with this person that knows how to franchise things and they opened up Orangetheory Fitness together. The first one was, the first one was in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, which is next to Davy, Florida, which is where her studio was and my practice was.

And I was like, you gotta be [00:16:00] kidding me. 'cause I mean, if I could have hitched my wagon to her

Steven Reinlie: Yeah,

Dr. Kevin Christie: you could've been huge

Steven Reinlie: corner in every big city.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, you could. You could have chiropractic clinics in every Orangetheory fitness. Right. I'm sure it wouldn't have come. Come to that. But yeah, I just was like, man, I can't believe I, I, I blew that opportunity.

Steven Reinlie: Well, that's kind of how you and I first got connected is I was. Being tasked potentially with a similar opportunity in another fitness studio that is a big franchise and you know, that has come and gone as quick as it came on. You know, I remember when I filled out my first forms, I thought maybe at some point in the next year or two I'd have six locations just because of the nature of the business that was asking me to potentially put offices in all those places.

And we've gone from six down to one, one really good. That's, that doesn't sound good, but it's super successful. I'm very happy with it. But again, you don't know. You sometimes you think, Hey, this is a golden ticket, and it just dovetails a different way. Sometimes you think this isn't gonna work and it is a golden ticket.

[00:17:00] It's, you know, it's keeping options alive, finding, um, high upside, low risk, which is what that was, and negotiated that agreement to be extremely low risk on my end. And who knows, it could have been a high upside and it just didn't work out.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, it, it, it didn't, but, uh, probably for the better and I know.

When you and I started working together, you know, you had, you had the few different locations going on and you were growing and obviously running yourself ragged with all that. And one of the things that I always try to recommend, because you just never know the nature of the, the particular gym you might be running, and I, I do think it's a great launching pad for.

Uh, chiropractor, especially kind of, you know, evidence-based sports, chiropractor types. I think it is, it can be really good, but you need a plan to get out. And that was something that, that you've, you maintained, but you did a great job of getting busy enough to then, um, you know, kind of graduate from renting from the gym.

And, and so tell us now where, where you're at, what you're doing and, [00:18:00] and why you did consolidate down.

Steven Reinlie: Yeah. So, um, I realized two major things. One, I'm not in the luxury practice situation. I have kids, I have a mortgage, um, in my late thirties, turning 40 here pretty soon. We've got 4 0 1 Ks and Roth IRAs and five 20 nines and all the things like, I'm sure many do.

So the idea of just staying myself with a tiny, tiny little nut to crack is not really a thing. If I were a made man and already 55 and just, this is doing it for fun, saying low overhead and inside of a gym would be nice. Most, most gyms, I think there is a, there is a huge, huge fab going on right now.

That cash base is the only way to do practice and you have to go that route. Clinic, gym, hybrid, um, maybe not even that, uh, BV clinic inside of a gym, rather. Yes. And you'll always have an influx of patients [00:19:00] and it's the Goldilocks of practice, which couldn't be further from the truth.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Mm-hmm.

Steven Reinlie: Um, I have a very close friend of mine, uh, that was with this previous practice that I was part of, and he is in, still in one of the biest gyms here in town.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Mm-hmm.

Steven Reinlie: And he can command any price. You name it, he can command it. Yeah. It's not even, it's like. Pocket change. Cool. No big deal. But he's only so scalable and maybe he'll do more, I don't know. I'm not casting judgment. I'm just, he's one guy. Right?

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: So at some point you still end up trading time for money.

And as I said from the outset, I am interested in building a business. I've already had a job. I'm not interested in building another job. I would like a business. And so most of these gyms with high, high earners and people that have lots of. Uh, disposable income, they, they just don't exist. They're hard to get into.

People that are in them don't wanna give up for obvious reasons. So then we're left with most of these other gyms, right?

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: And they're [00:20:00] all, you know, 1 49 a month or 1 79, 2 25, whatever that is. And that's a nice spot. And most of those people have some disposable income. So it is a fertile ground. But if you think you're gonna go into a gym with 140, uh, members and you're gonna run some, some bang in practice, like you got another thing coming.

So when I got into this gym, my, I, I didn't just rest on my laurels and just do a bunch of workshop to 140 members. Uh, you have to go out and still make connections, meet people and keep your, your, your mindset very broad. Mm-hmm. Because, I mean, truthfully, in my opinion, I think it takes about three or 400 members to service one PT or chiro inside a gym.

And I just, there's very few gyms that have that type of membership that isn't like transactional in the sense that it's more value budget. Mm-hmm. Focused, um, but 69 bucks a month and then they can grow a membership to 500 people. You know, if you're commanding 300 bucks a month for your membership, [00:21:00] it's unlikely you're gonna grow a gym business so large that it will solely support a clinician.

And then if you have any business. Savvy, you're gonna be like, well, why am I just renting space? I should hire a clinician. Yeah, right. So like there is just this constant cognitive

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: Dissonance that's going on there. So I don't think this Goldilocks exists. I think it is, is exciting. But

Dr. Kevin Christie: let me touch, I want to tease that out a little bit 'cause that's, it's, it's a really good point.

And then, and then we will, I'll let you get back onto that. Sorry. Sure. Um, it's a great point because I. You know, for those that in a gym, there's definitely some, and we actually have a few clients where they've got really good gym situations. The gym's been there for a long time. Very stable, very busy.

Good, good flow. Um, but to your point, those particular doctors aren't. Reliant on just the gym members. And I think that is a huge mistake and, and I, uh, haven't really talked about that on, on the podcast before. So I'm glad you brought that up, is that if you [00:22:00] do go into a gym setting, uh, even if it's a great gym, and if you do get some patience from the gym, awesome.

I want you to think of that as kind of gravy and you need to build a real practice. You need, you need external people coming into your practice for it to be a legitimate practice. You can't just rely on, on the gym members. So I'm, I'm glad you brought that up.

Steven Reinlie: Yeah. I view it as two things, uh, a floor.

Right. Yeah. Like just being present, I'm likely to land some clients. Right. Yeah. And that helps.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: And then, um, it was inexpensive, relatively speaking

Dr. Kevin Christie: for

Steven Reinlie: sure. Um, and it's hard to find a room to rent. It just really is. Mm-hmm. Um, it's doable, but it's hard. And so my goal with that was. Awesome. This gives me as much runway as I possibly can with the finances we already had saved.

Yeah. And then it keeps my nut as low as possible. Yeah. And it allows me to hoard money. 'cause I didn't, I, I've [00:23:00] have hardly paid myself anything compared to what I'm used to and mm-hmm. We're fine in getting by, but it's not sustainable. Mostly because I needed a hoard of money to go pay for this new office.

I can happily say I've paid for outright, yeah, a fully funded op, you know, OPEX account syncing fund, emergency fund, all the stuff from, you know, things that your program teaches from profits, first model and et cetera. Um, being in that micro clinic situation. And not taking my eye off the goal, which was to build a real clinic, I was able to position myself to go after it with money and not debt.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, yeah. No, it's, it's huge. And that was the thing that I do preach. You know, I, for me it was, I was in gym then I was in an orthopedic group. But if you're gonna be in those situations, definitely try to leverage the low overhead. Get external, get people in there, into the, into your practice. Even if it's in [00:24:00] a gym, save up money and be able to, um, at some point, if it makes sense, which I think I would say, uh, the vast majority of the time, it does make sense.

I do again, know some chiropractors that have had a really good long term situation and that's awesome. Um, but to, to get your own office space so that you can then. Think about the next steps there. So, uh, tell us about your, your new space and, and what you're excited about on the future with that.

Steven Reinlie: So the new space is great.

It's about 1300 square feet, which is a huge upgrade from 150, whatever that was, you know, and then, you know, places that I was at had common areas for exercise and rehab, but I paid for the 150, if you will. Um. Outside of that, you know, I've got two offices for care or you know, tables, and they have their own very minimal setup for bands and lightweights for exercise.

The flow that I see in this office is I can bounce between two rooms. I can mm-hmm. Leave. [00:25:00] Needles in people and run therapies or et cetera, eventually have patients staged once we scale to more volume where it's really necessary because I'm, uh, my billables per hour are too low. They fit the model that I was in.

But I don't have the, the volume quite yet to demand all the other pieces that go with running a more sustainable billables per hour type practice. Yeah. I also have a small space for exercise in gym, and then I have a very small space for, um, a staff room. And I have just recently, uh, at the beginning of January, hired my first full-time staff member.

Who is an hourly wage who has helped take some of the burden off me. Now we're still early on and we're creating an our wheel for what that looks like, but as I was commenting a moment ago, today's the first Friday and god knows how long months that I have my paperwork done, when I'm gonna walk outta the office, which is on my [00:26:00] KPIs, and I can finally go red to green for once.

It's been months since I could say that. So this clinic is, is. Um, not efficient right now, but that's growing pains. I've only been in, in it for two and a half months. I, I signed a two year lease with first right of refusal, with the goal of, I could always tack on another year or two. Mm-hmm. If I need to.

And I'm not ready to move out of this space, but it allows me to stick my elbows out. 'cause before I, I was stuck. I couldn't hire a staff member. There was nowhere for them to go. Um mm-hmm. And I hadn't, I did not have a second room, so I had maxed out what I had and my schedule was, you know, if you look at your Jane stats or whatever, it was just a hundred percent utilized for months and months and months, and I had no lunches staying late.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Mm-hmm.

Steven Reinlie: So now I can become a touch more efficient, which improves my billables. I've got a place for staff so they can start taking over my social media things, and I can just become the, the, uh. You know, character, if you will, in all of our [00:27:00] videos. Um, so this clinic, it's going to grow to three to maybe four patients per hour over time.

I have space for my sports science stuff. I have space for actual real exercise. I have space that I can brand my own videos. I have space for a staff member, and then if I'm lucky, I can start bringing on other. Therapies, whether it's shockwave, laser or something else. Uh, you, you name it.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah. And you know, you are a cash-based practice and it's something that we've been kind of, you know, you've built up the practice and I think you and I have worked together to try to now carve out the, the future in a sense.

And, and you've been putting all the work to do that. And, and part of that was Yeah, we needed to. Maybe get a little more efficient with the patient care on how many you can see within an hour without sacrificing quality of care. Uh, how do we, we've increased rates, you know, and you did well with that, and that there was no blowback on that at all.

And so we're, you know, I think a lot of the, a. Let's call it the, the, the rehab based [00:28:00] or sports chiros, uh, that are cash based can struggle with that hourly capacity number. And so we, you know, kind of worked through what those capacity blocks are. Money wasn't really a capacity block for you. It was more of, like you said, time and space and maybe a little bit of a, of equipment.

We've, you've, you've done a good job of fixing the space block and you got new space and doing all that. And now hiring, uh, you know, you took on a lot. You know, you moved, you hired you, you did, you, you closed down a, a location. I wouldn't say close it down, you consolidated, which really I think is gonna be a, a, a higher leverage point for you, which has been great.

And so you just, you you're consistently taking what the next block is in, then attacking it. And that opens up to the next level there, uh, which has been pretty cool to see, which. Has allowed you to utilize profit to then reinvest in the business. And I wanna commend you on the delayed gratification. Um, 'cause you're not 28, you're [00:29:00] 38 or in the late thirties.

Right. And so it's, it's even, it gets even harder to have delayed gratification in your late thirties and then in your late, late twenties. Right.

Steven Reinlie: It is tough. I mean,

Dr. Kevin Christie: yeah,

Steven Reinlie: my wife's been literally barking at me for years to buy a truck. 'cause our family needs it. Yeah. And I'd be taxing in our personal life for years 'cause I didn't know what was gonna happen in my professional life.

Yeah. I mean this has really been four or five years, basically since the fall of 2020. I've just been in taxi mode. I have not been in attack mode. We paid off our student debt, um, which everybody knows that's a huge thing. Whenever Uncle Sam decided to turn that back on, I can't remember what it was, but it was literally the night before it was like, okay, payments are due.

And we had been just saving, 'cause you know, you didn't have to pay anything for those couple of years. And we wrote that last anti-climactic check off and it was done. I remember like, that's it.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah,

Steven Reinlie: that's just go to bed now. So we, we just took care of that and then just took care of the next thing and then took care of the next thing [00:30:00] and just.

Uh, to, I view this business as a vehicle for us to mm-hmm. Either buy back time or, as I've always said, I retire when I choose to go to work, not because I have a certain number of money in my account. I don't know if I'll work forever and see patients forever. I don't know. And at this point, it's not a thing that I need to know.

I'm really focusing on. How can I build this to be a real business? I don't want it to revolve around myself. I don't want people to just only refer to my business because of who I am. I want to provide kick ass jobs for people that come in here and either want to be, you know, they are a clinician and mm-hmm.

Want to be a part of it, or it's. Some type of support staff or a personal trainer. I want people excited to show up.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: And in order to do that, that takes time. It takes energy, it takes some vision, it takes some money. It takes being really disciplined fiscally and delaying, delaying, delaying. Mm-hmm.

And [00:31:00] you know, you have to toss, you have to play tug of war. Um, yeah. Between what are your personal goals? What are your professional goals? Um, and so I have a very supportive wife and spouse, and she's been wildly patient with me. She's an entrepreneur as well. Mm-hmm. She's the complete opposite of me in that regard.

She's, she's a creative, so, um, it's, it's been fun to see how your personal finances. Your business. Finances almost mirror each other in a lot of ways. And so we've been, you know, prior to running this business, very conservative with our, uh, financials personally, which lends itself to just operating a clean, uh, optimized business.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Well, it's a, I've referenced this before in a podcast, but I think it's a good time to do it again. Uh, I listened to a podcast, I, I mean, it was like six or seven years ago, but the gentleman was talking about. In life, you know, kind of the first half of your life is [00:32:00] you're building the vessel and then the second half of the life, if you build that vessel, well the second half of your life is filling that vessel.

Right? And and it really, um, it resonated with me because I think. A lot of us have our buddies, our friends that are corporate, uh, since they graduated undergrad and they just went into corporate careers. And for them the vessel is like family and house, early house, get a house early, uh, 401k only. You know, like it's a.

It's, it's looks different for us a as chiropractors. And then if you decide to, to, uh, you know, own your own practice at some point it's a whole lot, it looks a lot different than your friend that is the, the corporate employee. And so you, uh, you may start behind, right? Like you might be 26 years old when you graduate school versus 22, like your friends, and then there's a lot of other things going on, but when you.

Decide, you know, get, whether it's get married, have kids, that's part of the vessel. Buying a house that's part of the vessel [00:33:00] you're building, opening up your own practice and doing all that. Uh, you know, for me, I didn't, I didn't buy my first house till I was 40, but I did buy my office real estate at 33.

And to me, that was part of the vessel I was trying to build professionally. And if you do it, sometimes it looks like. You're 40, 40 years old and you're like, wow, I just now feel like I can really put some gasoline on this. And, but from 40 to 60, the, if you do, if you build the vessel right from 40 to 60, you're earning potential there.

In your asset building, there can be so exponential that you just. Bypass all your corporate friends that are just kind of saving for 401k and hoping that they can retire at some point. And that's where that delayed gratification goes. That's where instead of buying the new car, you're, you're, you're moving into the new office space and instead of buying the watch, you're buying the shockwave, [00:34:00] uh, you know, like it's certain things like that.

You have to make that decision because then. You're gonna really be able to bear fruit that second half there.

Steven Reinlie: Well, it's, it goes back to, you know, the Rich Dad Poor Dad book. Yeah. That mentality. You know, if, let's say my monthly nut to crack is 10 K for the lifestyle we wanna live.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah.

Steven Reinlie: You know, if, if I only have a few minor assets that are making a few hundred bucks a month and a little 401k here and a little of this and a little of that, like.

Okay, cool. You know, like I can't sustain my lifestyle where my money works for me. This business, and the reason why I want to build a business is 'cause I want the business to be that asset. It's just, it is my 401k. It's where everything's going. That's the goal. Now we may find out 10 or 15 years from now.

That didn't work out. That is the cost of doing business. But the same is true for a 401k or a Roth IRA. I mean, just ask some of those people several years ago that were retiring and they're like, oh crap, the market tanked. What do I do now? Or inflation is going crazy. [00:35:00] Like, do I cash out? Do I ride the inflation bug?

Should I work a few more years? So there's nothing certain in this world. I do know I have. A lot more control over this asset than I do just sticking it in, in ETF and hoping that I pick the right handful of 'em and trusting that, you know, every seven or eight years it's gonna, on average go up and double or whatever.

But at the end of the day, um, so much of this boils back to. Being satisfied in your person and finding mm-hmm. Purpose and why are we on this planet and what are we trying to do? And it can change and it can fluctuate. But where I know right now I'm in my late thirties and have kids, you know, those existential questions can wait for a little while.

Right now it's put head down and grind and work hard, and that's where we're at.

Dr. Kevin Christie: And now you're at that point where you'll be able to, you know, you're, you're building the golden goose essentially. And then you'll be able to take profits and do what you will with it. One, one thing that was fascinating, we, we had [00:36:00] just gotten back from our West Mastermind and we kind of went around the room 'cause it was the first meeting for the year and, uh, introducing some people and some of the unique things that they have going on.

And, you know, we have one member that. Uh, has done well in practice and now owns like seven, uh, waxing salon or parts of waxing salons. He's invested in that. We got another one that owns a basement. Uh, I don't even, I don't, we don't have basements of Florida, so I never even know what it is, but it's like base basement proofing company.

We had about six members that have investments going on in other types of, of businesses, or they own their. Practice real estate. And so every time you're writing that mortgage check to your real estate, that's, that's for savings and, and it's exciting when you get there, that's where it becomes exponential.

'cause not only do you get to pay yourself more and you, you know, max out your 401k or your business and that type of stuff, but then you take profits and you can either reinvest it into your business to pay yourself more or you reinvested in other things and [00:37:00] become a little bit of an investor. Which to your point on the Rich Dad, poor dad, I guess that's the, uh.

That's the holy grail of the development. What is it? Uh, job is, is stage one, I think. Then owning a job is stage two, and then owning a business is stage three, and then being an investor is stage four. Is that right?

Steven Reinlie: Pretty much. Yeah. So I mean, we know right now we have our highest nut to crack and it's only gonna continue to expand.

Like this isn't ultimately the nut we're looking for, but this is the, uh, investment vehicle that we are investing in. Mm-hmm. And right now it's a lot of sweat equity, um, and over, and some of it is financial for sure, but the business has been able to pay for the business so far. Yeah. Which has been great.

You know, my seed money from my person. Was probably what, let's call it the last six years of practice. I mean, this is my 15 year, 15th year of practice. But the last six or seven years were like, things started to click and I started to understand mm-hmm what game I was playing. Um, [00:38:00] and so there was a lot of that.

That was. Seed money, if you want to call it that way, those relationships. But the seed money to start my business was a few thousand bucks. Yeah. I mean it was, I had a portable table and you know, like no down payments on anything. They're all handshake agreements, which I don't recommend, but you got to judge your relationships too.

Some of those, I just wasn't sure if I pushed a hard paper copy. If they're gonna be like, nah, take a hike. I'm not really interested. Like I'm not recommending that. But you have to have some. You, you, you need a little bit of luck. I definitely had some of that, but some of that was already built in. And then being really, really patient and smart with your money and keeping your, what is my focus?

Okay? Mm-hmm. What is I need to get my own space 'cause my biggest threat to my business right now. Mm-hmm. Is anybody could say, Hey, get out. We have another use for that room. So, okay, cool. Now we've gotten to that part. Now my biggest threat is just making sure that I can continue to expand my margins, not because I'm trying to retire early.

It's [00:39:00] so I can sustain growing this business in a way that. The business better for the people that we serve. Mm-hmm. Which I know is a, a point that you've talked about before, which is it's not evil to make money. Um, we need those things to become better clinicians so you can have better tools so you have some space in your mind where you're not stressed constantly and you're not focused on the thing that's in front of you.

And so that's where we're at right now, is improving how this clinic operates.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Love it. And I think you're at the tipping point here soon, which is exciting to, to see. And so, um. A LA just last question. Like what, you know, the, speaking to the audience, if someone is either, uh, looking to maybe open up their own practice or they own their own practice, but they just really haven't necessarily hit that tipping point there, what would you recommend for them?

Or what would you, what would you say? What kind of advice do you have for them?

Steven Reinlie: I have two big pieces of advice. Um, and I say this to my boys all the time. I've got a 10-year-old and a 7-year-old. We have a rule the first week of school that [00:40:00] their job is to go meet three new people. Mm-hmm. Okay. We are trying to develop the skill of connecting with people.

Okay. So if you struggle with that, then you need to work on it. Mm-hmm. And I am left-brained really good at taking tests. It pissed me off when our dean at Parker said, straight A, students tend to struggle in practice 'cause they don't connect with people and then they go to research. And I was like, bullshit.

Uh, it just, I still remember that it bothers me to this day. So if you don't know how to make relationships, I'm here to tell you it's a hundred percent learnable skill. You just have to show up and care and be curious, which is, what is that the art of? What's that famous book that was written?

Dr. Kevin Christie: Is it

Steven Reinlie: the,

Dr. Kevin Christie: the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People?

Steven Reinlie: It's the same author, but it's like, yeah, it's one of those, I can't remember off the top of my head, but I read it and I was like, cool. Okay. So be curious and actually care. So like that, that is vitally important and if you can't do that, then stay where you're at. Um, the [00:41:00] other piece is get serious about knowing where your money goes.

Yeah. 'cause your business will stress you the heck out no matter what. And finances are half the reason why marriages fail. And finances, I would have to be really certain, I'm not an expert, but it would be the biggest reason why a business fails. And a lot of it isn't because you can't make money is 'cause you don't know how to manage it.

And um, I'm really, really a big stickler for where our dollars going. How are we best utilizing them? Not in a, uh, miser kind of way, but because they need to have purpose and those two things, I think give you a good chance.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah, no, I love it. I think is it win friends and influence people.

Steven Reinlie: That's the one.

Yep.

Dr. Kevin Christie: All right. Good. Yep. And then, yeah, I just want to, you know, lastly, commend you also, like you're a very capable person, um, but you haven't tried doing this alone and you knew you had to. Kind of take on some coaching to just [00:42:00] even sometimes be a sounding board. And so I, I think more people need to consider having someone in their corner to help out with it because it's, uh, never easy.

Even if you are, uh, you got a good strategy and, and, and, and the wherewithal to do it, it's, it's good to have someone to help you out.

Steven Reinlie: Yeah, I mean, when I took my associate job, I still remember the last little bit of an interview, um, yeah. At dinner, and they're like, well, why do you want to be an associate?

Dr. Kevin Christie: Mm-hmm.

Steven Reinlie: And I said, I want exponential clinical growth. I care less about the money. Right now I care more about getting good at my job and my craft. Mm-hmm. And that was in line with when we had our first dialogue, I was like, look, I already know I'm gonna have bumps in the road. I'd prefer not to pay for them two and three times.

I'd rather just pay up front a little bit and sign up for some coaching. Know that I'm doing this right. Uh, and right is a broad term. There's different rights of course, but mm-hmm. Um, you know, I have mentors in my life. My, like I said, my dad's a previous entrepreneur. I've got both [00:43:00] my, uh, college roommates are, were entrepreneur or entrepreneurs now.

So I have resources and it's good to have different angles. Mm-hmm. But it's also have someone that's been in the trenches and that understands some of the nuance. Because you know, some of these buddies, they might run a IT company and they don't know the first thing about like clinic efficiency and structure.

Now they know efficiency for their business, and it's my job to play. Interpreter, right. But being able to talk to somebody like you and point me in certain directions, that just shortcuts me and it's, for me, it made the most sense to invest the money to take those shortcuts, then bump my head and learn from hard knocks.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah. And I know it is hard for. Some, you know, that are listening is, is I kind of similar. I, I spent about five years before I opened my own practice and I was all in on the clinical and I really wanted to do that and I, I really want to make sure chiropractors understand is like, you gotta get good clinically.

I think there's this weird dichotomy where we get some chiropractors that [00:44:00] go all in clinically and forever and then never actually learn the business side of it and they struggle and then you get some that. Don't ever get good clinically and then try to put lipstick on a pig with tactics and strategies.

And that's not a, that's kind of house of cards. I, what I've found, and, and I've seen this now over the years, is the ones that have really come out and, and learned the clinical and mastered that within reason over the first stages of their career. And also are not afraid to realize I gotta also learn the business side.

I think marrying those two things is where you really have sustainable, long-term growth, and your patients, uh, are, are all the better for it, right?

Steven Reinlie: Absolutely. I mean, so much of this is self-discovery and I know from, I read the book. To sell as human. That was a big pivot point for me. Mm-hmm. In understanding, I had to learn how I needed to sell.

And you're either in a product business or you're in a [00:45:00] service business. Yeah. And chiropractors are no different than copy salesman, car salesman or whatever. Uh, orthopedic surgeons. We are selling that. We have a solution and then you need to trust us and we can help you. Right. And so for me. I know how I sell is I sell from a place of confidence and conviction.

So I needed to improve my clinical chops and I needed to understand that I've seen this 6, 12, 15, 25 times before and yeah, you're having a shit day with your disc, but like it's going to pass and I need to be able to say that because you're gonna get found out real quick. Yeah. And so that I feel like.

Was really helpful for me. That way I could do the business part because I can just do the clinical part. The business part is, is hard enough.

Dr. Kevin Christie: Yeah. Yeah. So, well, Steven, this is great, man. I really appreciate your insights on this and it's been excited to be, uh, kind of having a, a, a, a front row seat to the, to the growth and excited about this, uh, next stage for you.

Steven Reinlie: Yeah. I appreciate [00:46:00] you having me on and, uh, look forward to it in the future.