Dylan Bates stepped into the role of CEO at Salt Dental Partners with a plan to use his experience in the physical therapy field to drive growth for the DSO. And it worked.
The Phoenix-based DSO appointed Mr. Bates to his position in 2023. Mr. Bates previously served as CEO and COO of ATI Physical Therapy, where he was credited with helping the physical therapy chain grow to more than 800 locations nationwide.
At the time, Salt’s network included more than 50 offices in five states. Mr. Bates told Becker’s that he planned for Salt Dental Partners to reach nearly 100 offices that year. Salt was also considering diving into oral surgery. The company has since achieved both of those goals, plus more.
The DSO announced earlier this month that it experienced a 300% increase within its geographic footprint, a 261% increase in affiliated practice brands, a 282% increase in its doctor network and a 206% increase in practice locations. Salt Dental Partners now supports 65 practice brands, 233 doctors and 156 locations in 20 states.
Mr. Bates recently connected with Becker’s again to discuss the company’s milestones and goals for the future.
Note: Responses were lightly edited for clarity and length.
Question: What were some of the strategies used to drive growth in Salt’s network?
Dylan Bates: When I jumped into the CEO seat, I was really excited to apply lessons learned and tactics that led to success in the physical therapy platform that I ran for 20 years and scaled from one location to over 800 when I left … I went out and recruited some team members that were my running mates in the physical therapy world, very trusted inner-circle folks, who knew how to set out and build infrastructure that supports our practices and doctors. We went out very intentionally to go talk to blue chip practices coast to coast and pull the story of building something that was very special and that was going to lead the specialty DSO space. We had some early adopters and some practices that brought their friends, so once a blue chip practice would join, they would see what we were building and understand the opportunity we had to truly be the leader in the space. They recruited their friends, and we built a very robust business development engine. I think I was on 93 commercial flights in 2023, so I was on the road a lot telling a story and really setting a vision of doing something very special.
In a very short amount of time, we’ve aggregated so many great doctors and great practices. We’re growing organically. We have operational infrastructure that I think is very much taking great practices and making them better after they join us. So, it’s a very attractive culture, momentum is there, and what we set out to do is truly playing out. We’re excited about where we’ve been and where we are today, but most importantly, where we’re going tomorrow.
Q: How did the company go about recruiting and retaining doctors?
DB: We have approximately 240 doctors at Salt right now, of which one-third are partners and they have meaningful equity in the platform. I think first and foremost, we have the right structure, so the aligned incentives. The partners own a large majority of the equity of Salt Dental Partners. We’ve never had a partner doctor leave. So we have 80 partner doctors, and we have 100% retention, and some of those partner doctors go back six years. I think it’s the culture that we’ve created [and] the events we have. We have an event every September, a partner doctor summit. We [also have] our spring event. We get 90 plus percent partner doctor participation in those events. I think that speaks to the lean forward nature of our partner doctor roster, folks that join for the right reasons, they feel the support and they see the resources we provide to them and their teams. [There is] a lot of focus on technology and tools we’ve created where they see that their practice that has continued to grow on their own gets a lot better after joining Salt. We also have great associate doctor retention because they feel the support, and the partner doctor at the practice level very much supports the associate doctors. It’s a very different approach than many DSOs out there. I would put ours up against anyone in the industry.
Q: How does Salt plan to expand further into oral surgery this year?
DB: We view [oral surgery] as a natural extension of our foundation of pediatric dentistry that then leads to orthodontic care for those patients who need it. We view it as a continuity of care and a convenience of care offering in markets where we have all three of those verticals … We’re executing on that as well as standalone oral surgery practices that are growing and that want to be a part of a young, dynamic group. We definitely have plans to continue to invest in oral surgery standalones, but also our focus is to create that care continuum between pediatrics, orthodontics and oral surgery.
Q: What else does the company have planned in terms of growth?
DB: Organic growth is front of mind. I’m happy to say we have an accelerating organic growth trend north of 10% right now, which is industry leading. I think that’s because of the doctor buy-in, the operational playbooks, the resources we provide [and] amazing doctor recruiting. I know that’s a pain point for the industry. We’ve got a great talent acquisition team, so we’re adding specialists across the platform, filling gaps where we’re needed and able to when we see an opportunity.
We have a robust business development team, so we’ve got $15 million of new EBITDA under [Letters of Intent] right now. We acquired more than $20 million of EBITDA in calendar years 2023 and 2024, and we’ll do more this year. So, that’s another growth lever. We’re looking at a few other things, but primarily organic growth, continued business development growth and keeping this thing moving in the right direction. We are opening de novo locations, so we plan to open 10 de novo locations throughout the second half of this year, with that accelerating in 2026 and beyond.