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| Developing a Niche |
Located in central New Jersey, the practice is only about 30 miles from New York City. “The majority of our patients are women,” says Glasgold. “However, whether male or female, they run the gamut from working class to very affluent. The common thread is they all are keen about quality and receiving the best results possible.”
Significant numbers of new patients self-refer to The Glasgold Group on the basis of name recognition alone. However, patients still are more likely to come by way of a referral from relative, friend, or colleague. Increasingly, though, a number of them are brought to the practice after first having used Ellen Lange Skin Care products or as clients of Lange’s skin care clinic.
Although The Glasgold Group uses paid advertising to attract patients, reliance on that form of marketing is minimal. “I have always had mixed feelings about advertisements,” says Glasgold. “ We have found that it does not directly cause patients to show up at the door. For the most part, what they do is create awareness of your practice and inspire people to ask around about your. At best, paid advertising is a tool to support and reinforce word-of-mouth.”
While the procedures performed at The Glasgold Group are entirely aesthetic-oriented, there was a time when most of the cases were reconstructive. “My background was ears, nose, and throat cases, so initially, my practice was heavily concentrated in head and neck surgery and rhinoplasty practice. In 1980, I also wrote and edited a text on the application of biomaterials in facial plastic surgery and was involved in work on the technology of chin implants.”
When Mark Glasgold came aboard, a greeter emphasis was placed on aging-face procedures. “Mark was instrumental in broadening the aging-face component of the practice,” says Glasgold. “It was possible for Mark to do that because, being young and just starting out in practice, he had the time and opportunities that I, as long-established practitioner, did not.”
For Mark Glasgold, he decided to practice alongside his father because of his deep affection for him. “We have always been a very close-knit family, so having the opportunity to work with my dad was appealing just because of the bond that exists between us,” he says.
Moreover, though, coming under his father’s wing made good business sense, meaning that Mark Glasgold could expect to circumvent most (if not all) of the struggles that normally accompany the building of a practice from scratch.
“My father’s greatest ambition was to see me be successful, and with that in mind he did everything he could to promote me to the practice’s patient base and to the community,” Mark Glasgold recalls.
Lange, meanwhile, had spent several years working as a public relations representative for a skin care products manufacturer before deciding to become an esthetician. After completing her training, she established a skin clinic in conjunction with her father’s practice. This eventually let her to begin developing her own skin care products.
Having his children involved in the practice has been a source of great pride for Glasgold, particularly one day about 3 years ago when he first noticed that Mark Glasgold was being requested by new patients as often as he was.
“It was no longer Dr. Alvin Glasgold and son. It was now Dr. Alvin Glasgold and Dr. Mark Glasgold, co-equals,” he remembers. “It was no longer a matter of new patients saying ‘I want to be seen by the doctor with the most experience.’ It was now them saying, ‘I understand that Dr. Mark is the best surgeon around for face lifts; I want to be seen by him.’ For me, this was wonderful to see happen.”
Still, working together creates a challenge, such as keeping shop-talk in its proper place during family gatherings, Glasgold indicates. “It is sometimes hard to separate office and home life,” he says. “I think it tends to be easier to interact with your kids as kids if they are not also your clinical colleagues and business partners. Event so, the rewards of working together as a family outweigh the few negatives.”
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