The End and the Beginning
*Disclaimer: this is a long post meant mostly as a journal entry for myself. Please feel free to read it, I just don't know how interesting it will be to anyone else
Our decision would be based primarily on a few factors:
1. We want to be "out west" to be close to family
2. We don't want to be freezing (or wet) for a significant part of the year
3. We want a temple nearby
Uncle Pat and Aunt Wendy moved to New Mexico two summers ago and have had great things to say about it. I also found out around March of 2009 that Comfort Dental had spread from Colorado down to New Mexico and was looking to grow. So, we investigated New Mexico, found that it fit our 3 basic criteria. Sara and I went down in April 2009 and took the grand tour of Albuquerque. After that trip I initiated contact with Comfort Dental and got the ball rolling to meet with them in the Fall.
So, that is where I was at as of October 2009. I was fully committed to Comfort Dental of New Mexico. I had put in a cash deposit. Bruce was emailing us with updates on how the other partners were doing. He was actively looking at real estate to set up our future office. I had mentally and emotionally settled in to the idea of becoming a Comfort Dental partner.
Several months go by, over the course of which, I have some second thoughts regarding my desire to go ahead with Comfort Dental. A small part of me felt like I could do better. I don't just mean better financially (the CD partners do very well) but I mean that I could do something more personally satisfying than simply signing up for a franchise and settling in to play by their rules. Those thoughts came and went. I finally got over them and went ahead with the plan as outlined. Then Spring Break happened.
For our Spring Break, Sara, Lily and I traveled to Utah to see Ashleigh, Kyle and Cami (who drove out from Calif). It was a great trip and we spent most of the time trying to sell Ash and Kyle on the idea of moving to New Mexico after they finish school. We explained to them the job I had lined up and how great it would be etc. My classmate, Pako, also took a trip out West. He is considering starting up his own practice after he completes a 1 year residency. It just so happens that Albuquerque was on his list of places to look at for his startup. So, I hooked him up with Bruce so he could take a look at the Comfort Dental offices and learn about their arrangement.
Pako went on his trip, visited Bruce, as well as some other offices I am familiar with and came back to Wisconsin safe and sound. I caught up with him at school after Spring Break to ask him how how trip was and he made a comment that went something like this, "Well, you can spend 350K to buy into Comfort Dental, where you get a crummy looking office and you play by their rules. Or, for about the same amount, you can start your own office, make it look nice, and do whatever you want with it. I just don't see the upside."
Everything Pako said is indeed factually correct. Comfort Dental places little emphasis on designing and building offices to look beautiful. and they most definitely set up the rules on how you practice dentistry; including where you are, how often you are open, what procedures you can and can't do, etc...
I already knew all of this, but as I said earlier, I had gotten over it. What do you need a beautiful office for when you are making as much money as those guys in crummy offices? Why do you want to add more procedures when you can make so much with just a few simple ones? Why do you care about when your office is open if you are only there about 32 hours a week anyway?
I had asked myself all of these questions before, and hesitated to ask myself the one question that is clearly more important, "Is this what you want to do for the rest of your career?" Or, the same question, phrased differently, "Can you do better?"
That conversation with Pako happened last Thursday morning at about 10:30 AM. By late afternoon on that same day I started seriously exploring what other options I had.