{"id":17092,"date":"2023-10-11T20:13:14","date_gmt":"2023-10-11T20:13:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mysourcefunding.com\/leadership\/how-oral-care-startup-flaus-wants-to-make-flossing-accessible-to-everyone\/"},"modified":"2023-10-11T20:13:16","modified_gmt":"2023-10-11T20:13:16","slug":"how-oral-care-startup-flaus-wants-to-make-flossing-accessible-to-everyone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mysourcefunding.com\/?p=17092","title":{"rendered":"How Oral Care Startup Flaus Wants To Make Flossing Accessible To Everyone"},"content":{"rendered":"
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One of the unsung applications of assistive technology is oral hygiene.<\/p>\n

As is the case with exercise and weight, society has this obsession with maintaining perfectly straight and pearly white teeth, replete with the healthiest gums. From a health perspective, these all are good ideals. It\u2019s good to have healthy teeth and gums. By the same token, however, striving for idealism isn\u2019t always realistic. For many people with disabilities, myself very much included, to have the healthiest teeth and gums may literally not be possible. I once read somewhere that people with cerebral palsy have the worst dental health. This is largely because brushing one\u2019s teeth oftentimes be an exercise in futility and frustration due to the motor skills involved in getting a toothbrush in and around the mouth. Less \u201ccareful\u201d brushing leads to not-so-clean teeth and leads to a host of icky situations such as gingivitis and periodontal disease.<\/p>\n

The salient point here is simply that no matter the desire to have healthy teeth, and to ward off the stigmas surrounding bad oral health, the reality is not everyone can care for their teeth in the correct way. In other words, this issue is not as much about laziness than it is about sheer function and ability. The same goes for flossing. No matter how much someone may want<\/em> to do it, many times it\u2019s just untenable to do so.<\/p>\n

Enter Samantha Coxe and her team at Flaus.<\/p>\n

On the company\u2019s website, its product is easy to grasp: it\u2019s an electric flosser that\u2019s \u201clike an electric toothbrush, but for flossing.\u201d Flaus bills itself as a money-and time-saving solution to manual flossing, one that\u2019s environmentally friendly, easy to use, and helps build healthy dental habits. The device utilizes 18,000 sonic vibrations and has three speed options, an ergonomic handle, and recyclable floss heads. Moreover, Flaus is waterproof, portable, and has the approval of \u201cover 200 dental professionals\u201d participating in the company\u2019s ambassador program. Flaus costs $119 for a one-time purchase. A subscription lowers the price to $99 and includes the shipment of 90 floss heads to users\u2019 doorstep every three months. That\u2019s an accessibility aid unto itself, insofar as it\u2019s cheaper and saves a disabled person from logistical and\/or physical barriers in getting to a brick-and-mortar store to buy replacement heads.<\/p>\n

In an interview with me conducted last week via videoconference, Coxe explained the impetus for starting Flaus came during her time practicing mergers and acquisitions law in New York. She told me about a dentist appointment caused her to \u201cvigorously\u201d start flossing the week before, despite being a faithful brusher. With a hefty bill in tow, Coxe began talking to friends and colleagues about flossing and decided to look for an electric flosser to make it easier and expedite the process. To her surprise, no such thing existed on the market. It was then when Coxe had her \u201clightbulb moment\u201d that would eventually bore Flaus.<\/p>\n

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\u201cFlossing is a massive pain point for almost every single person,\u201d she said. \u201cOf course, there are some people who love flossing every day, but over 70% of Americans do not floss daily. The pain points are unanimous across the board: it takes too long, it\u2019s difficult to do, it\u2019s painful, it\u2019s gross, and it\u2019s wasteful. That was really the moment that I realized that I had stumbled upon a massive market opportunity. Something that excited me the most was, up until this point, flossing is such a unsexy category in such an unsexy space. That got me excited about all the opportunities for innovation on the product side and the brand side.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coxe incubated Flaus for a year-and-a-half during the pandemic, all while still working at one of the most prestigious law firms in the nation in Skadden Arps. She went through approximately 250, 3D-printed prototypes, all of which involved Coxe \u201crunning around putting it as many people\u2019s mouths\u201d as she possibly could. In April 2021, she started an Indiegogo campaign to see if her idea could gain traction in the market. She knew, though, she couldn\u2019t work on Flaus while also doing her duties practicing law. She resigned from the practice and launched the campaign. Coxe decided to devote all her time and energy on Flaus.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like I\u2019ve been attached to this oral care rocketship ever since [leaving law],\u201d Coxe said of working on Flaus. \u201cIt\u2019s been an incredible journey\u2014and a total 180 [turn] from being a lawyer, especially as someone with no engineering background and no dental background.\u201d<\/p>\n

Between venture capital funding and the Indiegogo campaign, Flaus has raised over $3.5 million to date.<\/p>\n

A large portion of my conversation with Coxe revolved around her cognizance of the accessibility problems inherent to conventional flossing, as well as the subsequent empathy she has for those in the disability community who, like me, have longstanding problems with flossing well. In essence, Coxe endeavored to make Flaus more accessible (in more ways than one) in a way regular dental floss never was or ever will be. To wit, she told me she had an epiphany early on that Flaus had the potential to be \u201can incredible accessibility tool for those that have a dexterity impairment or a visual impairment.\u201d She shared an anecdote about getting feedback from three Blind people who told her they\u2019d always had problems flossing. The team, Coxe said, has \u201creally leaned into\u201d the accessibility merits of Flaus, saying the disability community is an \u201camazing\u201d group. The team went to such lengths as teaching themselves Braille so as to include it on the packaging. There\u2019s also a QR code that, when scanned, takes users to a how-to video on Flaus that features audio descriptions. Making the product packaging accessible admittedly made the company\u2019s bill of materials rise, but the team were adamant about adhering to their ethos of inclusivity. Coxe called the Blind and low vision community \u201ca huge subset of the population that has been quite honestly overlooked,\u201d adding she relishes the opportunity to connect with them and make them feel represented.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really excited, as we continue to work with different customers in this community, to continue to make Flaus\u2014both from a product perspective, but also from a packaging perspective, as accessible as possible,\u201d Coxe said.<\/p>\n

Asked about the aforementioned stigmas around pristine teeth and gums, Coxe told me Flaus exists to help people \u201cpamper and accessorize and invest in their smiles as much as their teeth skin and hair,\u201d telling me Flaus is uniquely positioned to help revolutionize the beauty space vis-a-vis oral care. Coxe said another goal of Flaus is to help break barriers and shatter stigmas about prioritizing beauty and so-called \u201cproper\u201d dental care. She called the concept of literally everyone having the straightest, whitest teeth \u201ccompletely unrealistic,\u201d likening it to \u201csocietal dysmorphia that one has [in terms of] what we\u2019re supposed to be looking like that\u2019s unobtainable for the average American.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking towards the future, Coxe said she hopes Flaus can help everyone, notably children and the elderly, in using the flosser as a tool towards achieving healthier dental habits. More specifically, the long-term goal for Flaus is to get one in every bathroom in America. Coxe noted a moonshot project for the company is to someday create a device with interchangeable heads such that a person wouldn\u2019t need the clutter of both an electric toothbrush and an electric flosser as discrete devices.<\/p>\n

To Coxe, it\u2019d be an all-in-one product. Again, accessibility unto itself.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so many different ways we [at Flaus] can continue to further push the oral care space to make it more accessible and easier to incorporate in your daily routine,\u201d Coxe said. \u201cParticularly starting with kids\u2014that is really where these habits need to be starting, because it\u2019s scary to think about what this generation\u2019s gum disease and oral health [problems] is going to look like with how much sugar is in our food.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read the full article here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the unsung applications of assistive technology is oral hygiene. As is the case with exercise and weight, society has this obsession with maintaining perfectly straight and pearly white teeth, replete with the healthiest gums. From a health perspective, these all are good ideals. It\u2019s good to have healthy teeth and gums. By the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17093,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-17092","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-leadership"},"yoast_head":"\nHow Oral Care Startup Flaus Wants To Make Flossing Accessible To Everyone | Brandiary<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"One of the unsung applications of assistive technology is oral hygiene. 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