This week on the podcast…
Jonathan Wainberg joins Dr. Andy Roark to discuss how lending and insurance will play a role in pet owners affording veterinary care in the coming years. The discussion covers current trends in pet owner spending on wellness, best practices for communicating cost of care, and where the lending and pet insurance markets may be going in the coming years.
This episode is made possible ad-free by CareCredit credit card. For more information about helping pet owners in your practice pay for care or access pet insurance for their furry family members, check out the CareCredit website or the Pets Best Pet Insurance website, both Synchrony solutions.
You can also listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts.
This episode is made possible ad-free by CareCredit credit card. For more information about helping pet owners in your practice pay for care or access pet insurance for their furry family members, check out the CareCredit website or the Pets Best Pet Insurance website, both Synchrony solutions.
ABOUT OUR GUEST:
Jonathan Wainberg General Manager, Senior Vice President, Pet
Jonathan Wainberg brings over 15 years of financial services expertise, and a record of commercial ingenuity, market expansion and energetic leadership driving revenue growth to his role as CareCredit’s General Manager, Senior Vice President, Pet. In this newly established vertical, Jonathan will lead CareCredit’s expansion of the veterinarian credit business, pet insurance and additional market adjacencies.
Prior to this, Jonathan served as SVP, General Manager GAP. He joined Synchrony following a 15-year tenure with GE Capital, where he was the Senior Managing Director, Global Sales for Industrial Finance in London. He was a key member of the senior leadership team that reorganized and streamlined GE Capital. Jonathan developed the strategy and led the efforts that allowed GE to provide financing support to global customers in new markets, surpassing sales targets by more than 30%. With on-the-ground roles in the US, Europe and Asia, he’s managed teams around the world and delivered complex strategies in more than 50 countries.
Earlier, Jonathan joined GE Capital in Corporate Finance in New York, ultimately becoming Managing Director, responsible for the Eastern US, Canada and private equity firms, in 2012. As Managing Director, Jonathan originated, structured and negotiated leveraged loans and highly structured financings for leveraged buyouts, re-financings, expansions and restructurings of middle market and large cap retail companies. He was a top individual sales contributor from 2007-2010.
Jonathan has an MBA from Georgetown University and a BA in History with a concentration in Marketing from Concordia University in Montreal, Canada. He began his career in the executive training program at Macy’s in New York, where he also had various merchant/management roles.
Jonathan is a native of Canada, with a dual US-Canada citizenship. He has traveled to over 85 counties, enjoys entertaining, wine and playing with his energetic 2-year-old son.
While based in Costa Mesa, Jonathan currently resides in Bal Harbour, Florida with his wife and son, Jonathan will relocate to Southern California soon.
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Episode Resources
Language That Works Infographic: https://www.carecredit.com/sites/pc/pdf/speak-pet-owner-healthier-pets.pdf
Uncharted upcoming events: unchartedvet.com/upcoming-events/
Episode Transcript
Andy Roark:
Welcome everybody to The Uncharted Veterinary Podcast. Guys, I am your host, Dr. Andy Roark. Guys, I got a special bonus episode for you today with the one and only Jonathan Wainberg. For those who don't know Jonathan or didn't hear him on a previous episode, he is Senior Vice President for Synchrony, working with teams at CareCredit and Pets Best, both Synchrony solutions. Guys, he's got his finger absolutely on the pulse of what is happening in finance, in vet medicine, and that's what we're going to be talking about today is keeping care affordable. What does the future look like for pet owners paying for vet medicine? Guys, this is a sprawling conversation to ask him about where he sees the industry going, where lending is going, things like that. He's got a lot of ideas. I found it really, really interesting. So guys, without further ado, let's get into this episode and this episode as a bonus is brought to you ad free by CareCredit.
Speaker 1:
And now, The Uncharted Podcast.
Andy Roark:
And we are back. It's me, Dr. Andy Roark and my friend Jonathan Wainberg. How are you?
Jonathan Wainberg:
I'm doing great. I'm just happy to have been invited back to one of your podcasts. I thought for sure on my first one, I tanked it, but listen, I'll take it.
Andy Roark:
The exact opposite. No, I appreciate you being here. For those who don't know, you are the Senior Vice President and General Manager of Pets at Synchrony, which encompasses CareCredit and Pets Best pet insurance. Yeah. So I wanted to have you on today to talk to you a little bit about the finances of this profession and the economy in general and where things are going from an economic standpoint in our profession. I think that you have an interesting perspective on this because of your involvement with both CareCredit and Pets Best. Can you go ahead and start at a high level of when you look at the economy at large and we're seeing rising inflation and things like that, where do you see our economy going and then how do you see the economy of veterinary medicine going forward?
Jonathan Wainberg:
Yeah, no, and thanks for having me. And this topic is so important now given everything that's going on in the economy, but just a headline news, we're living this day to day and so it is something that is important for us to discuss. And I think the last time you had me on, we talked about lifetime of care and all the costs associated with pet wellness. Listen, things have changed so much in the last six months and I think it's great that we're here to talk about that. Quite frankly, I think financing and financing solutions and flexible means of payment are going to become even more important as people do unfortunately struggle with some of the changes in the economy, whether it has to do with employment issues or interest rate issues with some of the other expenses going up, and we need to be prepared for that.
Andy Roark:
Yeah. Helping people pay for care is a problem that's not going to go away. If anything, it seems to me obvious that that's going to be a bigger and bigger part of what our jobs are going to be. I was thinking recently, one of the things that landed on me was emergency pyometra on the weekend, and this was a dog that was pretty healthy on Thursday and Friday and then they're at the vet clinic on Saturday with this emergency procedure. It's a $6,000 surgery to get it done, and I understand the economics of that and I understand why it costs what it costs.
At the same time as a pet owner, you look around and you go, “Man, I don't know a lot of people with six grand laying around that they're like, ‘This is not a problem.'” In the vein of sticker shock, I guess, is there messaging that you would like to see from a professional level? Should we be doing things to try to make people more aware of financial planning for pets? ‘Cause I think that's what you and I are ultimately going to end up talking about is, what is financial payment planning for pets, and then how do we encourage people who are pet owners who are generally just going about their lives, they have no idea what medicine costs. How do we get those guys into that headspace?
Jonathan Wainberg:
Yeah, no, I think… And this is the audience that we need to be talking to because they bear the brunt. This is the first line, right, your vet professionals and listening to this and the people that have to assess the health but then provide a treatment plan and show them. So a couple of things we've done, we've partnered with the AVMA on a study language of care, and I have it here in front of me, can't see it obviously on the podcast, but talks to best practices on things to say, and words do matter when you are communicating to pet parents, right. If we think about a term that we like to use in the industry preventative, well that doesn't resonate so much with our pet parents. Something like routine or checkup does much more for that.
And so it's little changes like that to think about, okay, how do we get people just getting more involved in first part compliance of care, wellness of care, because we know that just like humans, pets, if you provide them the standard care, are probably going to live a longer life and a healthier life and a happier life and not have those acute experiences perhaps as much. So try to reduce that. When you think about the financing element of it, we are there's language there as well where don't avoid the conversation, but talk about it in the right way. Address the elephant in the air in the room, right. People are so… The human animal bond relationship has grown so strong over the last few decades that people are willing to spend much more for the health of their family members or pet family members.
And so just preparing them upfront is integral. And so it starts when you… At the puppy stage, right. And you see some expenses, kind of jump up and talk to them about insurance, talk to them about CareCredit and tools that they should have. Because ultimately, as much as we like to plan, there are going to be surprises. Dogs and cats and [inaudible 00:06:34] companion animals, we don't know exactly what's going to happen and so we just got to make sure that we're prepared for the unexpected.
Andy Roark:
Yeah. I want you to expand on that a little bit. Talk to me about best practices inside the vet clinic that you see.
Jonathan Wainberg:
Yeah, I think it's having that open dialogue, right. And it's not an easy kind of conversation, but we need to shift the way the veterinarian teams communicate with their pet owners and perceptions about the value and the importance of veterinary care, right. And offering personalized recommendations. Use language vets reassuring about clients. 53% of pet owners want to hear recommendations from their vet owners and they don't want to be blindsided. We know that that came out of a study that we did from AVMA. They appreciate it. The veterinarian and the hospital managers and the vet techs, they are the most trusted resource for anything to do with your pet.
And so we need to work with our vet provider networks and the vet community to be able to have that open dialogue, talk about some of the costs that you can expect to spend. So just so you know, a first year pet ownership for a cat can range from about a $1,000 to $2,500. Dogs even more. Talk about those different courses of treatments and what people can expect and to some degree put together a plan of care when they're at that young age, or even if they then have some sort of acute need and a high ticket surprise, that's the ever time to say, “Well, let's make this just a onetime occurrence so that you're not caught off guard again.”
Andy Roark:
Yeah, that totally makes sense to me. So sign posting early on. I think that makes a lot of sense. I'm going to link to the lifetime of care study that you referenced. So you were on last time we talked about the $45,000 cat. And still I think that's such a powerful study just because you say that $45,000 cat and it blows people's minds and you can say, “Oh no, over the life of an animal, especially an animal that has some health problems, we can get up into these extremely high numbers.”
Jonathan Wainberg:
It's interesting, and it is. And I think in one of the interviews with one of the publications, we talked about a dog or $55,000. You say, “Lifetime care of a dog.” Someone says, “That's a very nice car.” And not to be crass about it, 'cause I take my dog over a $55,000 car any day of the week.
Andy Roark:
Of course.
Jonathan Wainberg:
She probably can't get me where I need to get to, but when you think about… She's a miniature poodle, I can't-
Andy Roark:
[inaudible 00:09:27] that small. Yeah, I get.
Jonathan Wainberg:
No, yeah, no, I don't think so. And pretty much now that she's 12, I'm spending more time carrying her than she is walk… But what I'd say is I think about that example, and it's an interesting example and I'd like your point of view on this. I go back to, well you have a $55,000 car, let's use that as an example. Well yeah, you got to provide that car with the right amount of maintenance. You don't just go to the shop or change the oil, you know, you don't change it… And then when you get an accident, you finally take care of it. No, you have to throughout that lifetime provide that care. And I know that that is something that our industry really tries to work with our patients on whatever it is, wellness and routine visits.
Well, in this study, and we didn't really get into it, but part of me is convinced that to some degree your pet within some standard deviation, it's going to cost the same amount. The question is, it's over how many years, right. So your pet is going to live longer if you give them that good care over the course of that life and they're going to be happier and healthier and a better companion and part of that family. And that that's something that really stuck out to me when I was looking deeper into the numbers and thinking about it with my own experience.
Andy Roark:
Yeah. I've gone back and forth on this. I really do think that we need to get these numbers out in front of people, right. For them to… How many of our pet owners have the realization of what it costs to have a pet, like, as the time that they're seeing a quote for an emergency procedure or something like that, and that's not how we want people to learn. And then I think part of it's, I'm not callous, I believe the human animal bond. And you see that the health benefits and the wellness benefits of having pets and things, we need to figure out ways to make this affordable so that people will continue to have pets and they're not a luxury. But it's always that balance.
Jonathan Wainberg:
You're absolutely right. Just having these numbers of the study in front of me, right. 38% of cat owners thought they were ready for a pet expense, but they weren't, right. And so if you think about that, that's 60% basically, 62% didn't, right. And that's a big, big number. And it's not dissimilar in the canine space, right, and so we got to keep banging this drum because the more we talk about it, the more people are going to be prepared and the more they'll be more proactive. Because the last thing you want to do is have to, you know, when you're dealing with the stress of an emergency of your family dog, your family cat, even in the equine space, the last thing you want to be thinking about is making a choice between cost or care, right. You want to be prepared upfront for that. And that's where being educated and educating your pet parent clients in the veterinary industry is so critical.
Andy Roark:
Yeah, I'm not surprised by the number as far as number of people who think that they're prepared and then they're not. I really think that there's a perception problem about veterinary care and what it costs. I think people have got anchored in their mind, you know, cost from 20 years ago and I go, man, there's been significant changes in where we are. So I see pet owners all the time that seem to be just caught by that. I guess that goes back to my earlier question when I talked about setting expectations and things. It's just something I think about. I think people don't get frustrated as much about things that they're not surprised by as they do when they're caught off guard, meaning what they expect to pay. If they expect to pay what it costs. They're generally okay, and it's a frustration and a challenge, but we hope to get the emotion is when they expect to pay much less than what it turns out to be.
And now they say, I'm wildly unprepared. And also I think all of us have had this problem of when pet owners feel like they don't have any options, they don't know how they're going to pay for this, suddenly it becomes a much more dire and emotional situation. And so I think that that's sort of where I was going earlier on when I was saying how do we normalize this? So let me circle back around to that and just sort of say, how do we normalize financial planning or even borrowing money for care as like, “Hey, this is a thing that happens.” I think a lot of people are still surprised that there are companies like CareCredit that exists for this purpose. How do we let people know about that ahead of time and make that sort of a more normal part of the conversation?
Jonathan Wainberg:
Yeah. We've tried to make it as easy as possible. We're accepting in about 85% of the vet practices in the US and so it's been around a long time CareCredit's been through all the cycles, it's something that is trusted and we have an incredible amount of network with millions of cardholders just in the veterinary space. I think… Listen, we believe that when someone gets a puppy or adopts a rescue, they should be presented with options of insurance, right for us Pets Best and as well as finance. And I think you're spot on about expectations and surprises and being scared off by stuff. So it's so important to talk about this upfront to get people to enroll. So it's a great tool. It works… And the great thing about CareCredit is it doesn't only work in the veterinarian channel, it works in other areas. So a lot of people actually have the CareCredit card in their pocket but may not know that it's accepted in that vet practice 'cause maybe they took it out for their kid's orthodontistry or if they had a laser surgery on their eyes, and that card has that inter-flexibility.
And the great thing about CareCredit is that unlike a lot of these buy now pay later products, it's something that you could reuse. It's a dedicated line of credit. We're a regulated bank, we have all the reserves, you know that we're here. We've been in the industry for 27 years. You know that you have that support. So by us having both Pets Best and CareCredit, you have different choices on how you can manage and prepare for those decisions. But ultimately, the thing I also want to point out, because I know we got a lot of vet professionals in your audience, I think that's our main target audience in this forum is it's also good business for the practice. You don't want to be taking on debts, your job and thank God it is your job and we're so lucky to have an industry where people are so passionate about caring for our animals and all the trials and tribulations that go with that.
But your job is not to be a bank. Your job is not to be a financing solution and you don't want to have receivables from clients. ‘Cause imagine how much harder that conversation is if they owe you money. How much harder it's for your cash flow and for your practices' financials if you're not getting that money. Whereas if CareCredit has it, you get it in that short amount of time. You don't have to damage or have those tough conversations with your clients on bad debts and stuff like that. We don't like to have those conversations either, but that is our job. We ultimately, if it comes to that, which we hope it isn't, but then we also have programs and practices to help people that perhaps could manage that in a more efficient way.
So I think that's also super important for people to think through as we go through a more challenging economic period. It's not just the owner or pet parent, it's also the practice. And all of you in the profession need to make sure that you're taken care of yourself as well. And this is one easy way to do it because I come from a family of doctors, I could say this, right. I've been blessed to have people in my family that are so passionate and it's in human health, but passionate about their clients. But you talk to them about the business part of that element and thankfully, to some degree, it's a secondary part because we need them focusing on the clinical part, and you shouldn't have that be a worry.
Andy Roark:
Well, the optics of vets shaking people down for debt is awful. I mean, it does not look good. It doesn't feel good in a world of social media where people can see your practice and your practice brand is out there and you want people to buy it and trust you. It looks awful and it feels awful for us to be like, “Hey, where's that money that you owe us?” You don't want any part of this. So that's a big part of it. The other part of it for me is staying in that optics vein and we look at social media and the way of the world these days.
I think if we're going to continue to be a trusted resource and to be able to stand out there and say, “Hey, we care about your pets and we value your pets.” We've got to continue to find ways to make care accessible and at least to give people options. So we say, “Hey, we're trying our best. We're giving people options on how they can make this possible.” We just don't want to have the image of people who say, “Yeah, we love your pets like family. You owe us this money and you better come up with cash in hand.” That's not who we are and none of us want it. And so I look a lot at that and say, “I don't want that in our future.”
Jonathan Wainberg:
No. And as that lifetime of care study showed and our a AVMA study that we partnered with the AVMA with, the veterinarian and the staff of the veterinarians are the most trusted resource and that relationship is everything. And you don't want anything coming in between that. Obviously we're fortunate to have those in the profession that are so dedicated to the space. But if there's something that can take away from any tension in that relationship, and we know that finance is not an easy conversation to have, but doing it early and then putting the… I wouldn't say the burden, right, 'cause it's our job, but at least removing that burden from you on that sort of financing and receivable side to a company that specializes in it makes sense. And it's almost, in my opinion, not worth the while to get into it. And there's just too much receivables in that space that it's just almost self-inflicted pain. I hate to say it.
Andy Roark:
Yeah, no, I get that. When you look into your crystal ball, Jonathan, you look ahead five years, what, what's patient care finance look like? What's different in five years than it is today? Are you predicting significant increases to the number of people who have pet insurance? Are there different financial products that we're not seeing yet or we're just starting to see, help me see the future of this?
Jonathan Wainberg:
Yeah, listen, I think pet insurance penetration is going to increase in the US. We're about 3% now in the US, but that's still very small. Is it going to get to the levels where in the UK it's 25% and in parts of the continent, even higher, European continent even higher? No, I don't think so because I think there's major cultural differences between the insurance experience, not necessarily pet insurance, but just general insurance experience in the US versus Europe and socialized medicine and stuff like that. And I know in Sweden there's certain pet kind of responsibilities that the government puts on as a pet owner that makes insurance something that's a lot stickier, making it claims automation. So you're making it quicker, making it easier for medical records to be uploaded. I think the other part of that is the app experience and the online experience very digitally native, which we know in our industry, and it is probably not where we stand out as being the most technologically advanced in our practice management systems and so on.
So working together with some of those partners to make that easier. I do also see, I don't think credit's going away. I think there's a place for both. And what I'm thinking is I think there's going to be a place where those two products work even more closely together, right. And how you can reduce the out-of-pocket experience in the short term while you're waiting to be reimbursed or even quicker reimbursement even at the time of care are things that, hey, how do we go and operationalize that and commercialize that as something that that's very important. So it's going to play a bigger role, and so these financial tools are going to continue to be prevalent.
Andy Roark:
Yeah. You got me thinking about what's possible. That's interesting. That's what I wanted. So I'm going to go ahead in the show notes. Guys, I'm going to link to the pet lifetime of care study that we referenced a couple of times. I'm going to link to the AVMA CareCredit collaboration, the Language of Care, which has got some really interesting things about setting expectations when talking to pet owners about finance and money, which I like a lot. Jonathan, for people who want more information, they're like, “Hey, I want to understand third party payments more. I want to understand Pets Best pet insurance, what resources do you like for them?
Jonathan Wainberg:
Of course, I'd say carecredit.com is a great place to start. You'll see there's a toggle that you can either choose as a patient or as a provider, right. And then there's sub sites on the industry, so obviously you click on the veterinarian space. You can also find a link there to Pets Best, but you go to petsbest.com directly also, to look more into insurance and how that works. What I can tell you is that people that have CareCredit and people that have Pets Best, we know for a fact that they have a better compliance of care for their pets than those that don't.
And so it is an important thing out there. We all have the same goal. We're all aligned here in A, making sure that your clients and your patients have that compliance of care and the best care and the best lifetime that they can, we want to help provide on the financial side that flexibility and that safety net that can enable them to do that. And so it all comes back to preparation, communication, and that relationship that you guys have is our strongest resource.
Andy Roark:
Yeah. No, that totally makes sense. Jonathan, thank you so much for being here, guys. I'll put links to the show notes for all these things down below. Take care of yourselves, everybody. We'll talk to you soon.
And that's it, guys. That's what I got for you. I hope you enjoyed it. I hope you got something out of it. Thanks to Jonathan for being here with us guys. Guys, I always enjoy these high level conversations, sort of predicting the future and looking at trends inside the industry. If you do, stick around. We're back every week. Come check out some more episodes. This is a Monday episode. I have another Uncharted Vet episode with the one and only practice management goddess Stephanie Goss coming out on Wednesday. I'd love to see you there. Take care everybody. Talk to you later. Bye.
