Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Healthy Enterprise Podcast. Thank you for joining me again if you've, been here before. If you have not, welcome, and I hope you enjoy this episode. Today, I'm gonna be speaking with Trace Voshell.
Heath Fletcher:He is the chief revenue officer at GoGoMeds. It's a digital pharmacy, so to speak, transforming how patients access medications. And with his background in scaling pharmacy and sales, Trace has led growth at GoGoMeds while keeping patient care front and center. So let's meet Trace. Trace, thank you so much for joining me today for our episode.
Heath Fletcher:I'm looking forward to hearing more about GoGoMeds. I've been looking into it. But let's start with, you know, like introducing yourself and your role and a little bit about the company.
Trace Voshell:Yeah, for sure. Well, thanks for having me. I was excited to get the note and join you today. So, I'm Trace Voshell. I am the chief Revenue Officer here at GoGoMeds.
Trace Voshell:So a little bit about me. I'm born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio, which is where well, I'm sitting across the river to am in Kentucky at our pharmacy. But I spent my career as as a baseball player, and I I thought that was gonna be my life. But, you know, it ends up that less than 1% end end up doing that. So, after baseball ended for me, I landed in pharmacy actually, at Humana.
Trace Voshell:So I started with with a big company. At the time, my wife now, who's my girlfriend, we were looking for where we're gonna land. She was in Cleveland. I was in Cincinnati. So we just applied and said whoever gets the best job first, that's where we're going.
Heath Fletcher:Whoever gets the job wins.
Trace Voshell:I got offer at Humana in Cincinnati here, and and she moved down here, and and kind of the rest is history. So I got hired as, in customer service, quite honestly. So I started as a patient care coordinator, which means I was on the phone for eight to ten hours a day taking calls, understanding kinda how the pharmacy operations work, understanding drugs, understanding copays, patient assistance, scheduling orders to a house, scheduling order to a doctor's offices, and everything in between. So that's really where I cut my teeth in pharmacy. As you can imagine, going from playing baseball in front of people to sitting at a desk chair for ten hours a day was driving me insane.
Trace Voshell:You cool? Yeah. It was it was not easy. A lot of frustration. So what happened is at the time, there was a really, really small team, probably not sales if you consider it more promotion Mhmm.
Trace Voshell:At Humana for the specialty pharmacy. And I I approached them, and I just asked to say, hey. Can I go on a field ride and see what you guys are all about? And did it, loved it, and, said, hey. I I wanna be a part of this.
Trace Voshell:And I got lucky at the time. The girl who was living here in Cincinnati was looking to move to Florida, we were expanding to Florida. So I got added as the fourth person at the time.
Heath Fletcher:Oh, wow. Good time.
Trace Voshell:Stayed there for ten years. So over those ten years, I moved from, you know, patient care coordinator when I started to, outside sales executive, and I covered all of Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, all over the place. And as we continue to grow and grow the team, I was fortunate enough to work with good people who gave me opportunities, and and I jumped into a national sales, director. I did a lot of training for people. And then as we continue to expand, then I jumped into oncology director.
Trace Voshell:So that's where I ended at Humana's, helped build them out as a team. I think when I left, there's about 80. So 80 sales representatives with an inside team in oncology division from four when I started. I was the OG when I left. I was the last of those four to to stay there, so I had the most tenure.
Trace Voshell:But just like anything new when your time was running out and it was time to do something different, and GoGoMeds reached out at the time. So I went from handling crazy expensive medications through specialty pharmacy into low cost generic medications at a cash pay rate over here. So, it's been a great journey, man. What I've what I've loved about it is just experience every end of pharmacy, you know, from the top of it to the bottom of it and anywhere in between. Just having that outreach to patients, understand work with employers now, manufacturers, patient assistance program, like, just getting to see everything that pharmacy has to offer and work with people that make the operations of it go or the funding of it go.
Trace Voshell:Just it's it's been amazing. Didn't didn't think it was gonna be my career path, but I'm glad it has been.
Heath Fletcher:There you are. You never know where where things are gonna lead you. Right? And and pharmacy is a it's a complex environment too.
Trace Voshell:Oh, boy. Yeah. Oh, boy, is it.
Heath Fletcher:And people, you know, people listening or who who even work with pharmaceutical companies or in within in in some sort of relationship with them. It's it's even complicated for them. So
Trace Voshell:Man. Yeah. I mean, think about yourself getting a prescription. Right? You know, anyone who gets a prescription and goes to a pharmacy counter and has to understand, you know, why my co pays this rate.
Trace Voshell:But if I ask for cash, it's this rate or what a deductible is and how do I I mean, the the system's rigged in certain points to not understand it, unfortunately, and I think there's a lot of steps being made in that. But, yeah, from I mean, working in pharmacy is complicated enough and then you get to the end user. There's points of it that are just downright sad, honestly. So there's there's a lot of good in pharmacy to make people healthy and provide treatments to better life or change outcomes, but there's a lot of frustrations in it too. Mhmm.
Heath Fletcher:And interestingly, you started at the patient end of things, sort of understanding their problems and their obstacles and challenges with all that as well. And you even had your own personal experience with it as well. Right?
Trace Voshell:I did. Yeah. So I, you know, getting to work with people, you know, one, I I feel like I have a background of empathy. I think it was just the way I was raised. So to to be on the phone calling these people and having to state copays and seeing it on the computer screen before I had to pick up a phone, one, that was hard enough to do.
Trace Voshell:I'd rather stand in against a guy throwing 98 miles an hour than make that phone call. So that was that was tough. Yeah. But then myself, I was you know, when I started working at Humana, was diagnosed with stage three c, cancer as well. So I did go through my own battle.
Trace Voshell:You know, I went through the entire process, and and I had great physicians. I had great nursing
Heath Fletcher:Yeah.
Trace Voshell:Everything. So and I'm lucky I'm past ten years of remission now. So it was a fight, but it was one that I'm, you know, fortunate to have come out on the other side of. But, you I know, get to look at those bills. You know?
Trace Voshell:My fiance and my wife now. So we we sat down. We looked at those bills. We're like, how is this how is this what health care is?
Heath Fletcher:How is
Trace Voshell:this You know what I mean? Yeah. How do people how do
Heath Fletcher:people yeah. It's overwhelming. The the disease in itself is overwhelming without having to think about ahead. You know, what is gonna what am I gonna be faced with when this is when I'm done with this part of it? And can can also be a a hindrance, really to actually get the the procedure done or getting the meds.
Heath Fletcher:Right?
Trace Voshell:Well, it is. As I say, it holds a lot of people back. There's lot of phone calls I made to people just said, hey. I'm just gonna stop therapy now, and it's not with their doctors knowing. It's just for them to say, am I gonna eat, or am I gonna take this medication?
Trace Voshell:And then you have the other side where it's just like people go into so much debt saying I have to do this, and then their loved ones are left to deal with that. You know? And it's not what they want. They don't wanna put people in that position, but it happens. It happens all the time.
Heath Fletcher:So where you are today Yeah. What does GogoMeds provide? Because it provides some some relief to that. Right?
Trace Voshell:It it really does. Yeah. So where we came up, is a little different than where we're at today. So GogoMeds came up in the telemedicine space. So we actually cut our teeth supporting some of the big guys that you would see commercials for on TV.
Trace Voshell:So we would white label the experience. We would create the custom packaging and then ship everything out to the door and and create their pharmacy experience. As we grew, and recognize the buying power that we had on generic medications at the volume that we purchased them, we saw what was going on in the news with the inflation from PBMs on generic medications or medications in general. Mhmm. And sat down and and company ownership here at the time looked, and they said, we can be a solution to this.
Trace Voshell:Like, this is this is crazy. So that's when they pulled me in actually and said, hey. We wanna do this. We wanna do it right, and we want your help. So what we started to do is go directly to employers, the brokers that work with the employers and say, hey.
Trace Voshell:Let us look at your claims files of what you're spending on these medications, and let us see what we can do for you. And in doing that, what we found is that on these generic medications that most people look at and they're like, what's a $10 drug? How much cheaper could it be? Well, if it's a $10 drug and you have a thousand employees and I can get it to you for 3 or $4, you know, that's quite a bit of savings on one side item itself. So Yeah.
Trace Voshell:You know, we're we've been able to save our employer groups, you know, anywhere from 80 life groups to, you know, a couple thousand lives, you know, over a $100,000 on generic medication spend that they didn't know was possible. So and the cool thing about that is is you're saving the company that money, and then up front, their members are paying zero for the drug now. They're actually assuming the entire payment for the drug because we save them that much money, and the the employee at the front end is paying zero for it. So now they're getting a $0 medication. So Now that becomes I mean
Heath Fletcher:That's becomes a a benefit to
Trace Voshell:It does. It's a new benefit. And, I mean, so for the employer, it's a recruitment tool. It's a retention tool. It's employee satisfaction tool.
Trace Voshell:And then on the front end, especially when you start working with some of these, you know, fabrication shops or whatever, They're not making a ton of money. Yeah. So if they're on a handful of drugs and each drug's costing $10 and they're spending $80.90 bucks a month, well, if they can get that for zero, that's that's new bills they can pay. So, I mean, there's there's a lot of benefit to not only the employer, but to the employee too.
Heath Fletcher:Wow. That must feel, really good to be Yeah. In in this position of the of the cycle. It
Trace Voshell:is really cool. It's it's cool to, one, pull back the curtain on some of the things that happen that shouldn't be that are being worked on. It's cool to meet some of the people in the industry that have new solutions outside of what I do, and and I have partners now that that do the same thing with specialty drugs or brand products, and then I can be the generic piece of it. But to know that you are doing something that's right by a person too at the end of the day to say, hey. You know, now I don't have to worry about driving to the pharmacy after work and spending gas money, and then Right.
Trace Voshell:I've gotta, you know, pay this bill for pharmacy and everything else that goes with it. It's rewarding. It really is. So I've I've I've enjoyed doing it, and it's it's good to work with people who appreciate it too.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. That's great. Yeah. How do you work telemedicine into this? How does that work into the system?
Trace Voshell:So with the employer groups, it doesn't as So telemedicine's its own stand alone. So think of telemedicine as the groups that you would see commercials on TV for kind of, like, different lifestyle therapeutic areas, you know, whether that'd be sexual dysfunction or longevity or weight loss or any of those. We'll work with them to say, hey. What's your plan of approach for marketing to the, you know, your consumer? And then how can we build a pharmacy platform for you to make it a more appealing way to go about health care than your traditional method?
Trace Voshell:And then we just build out that pharmacy platform.
Heath Fletcher:Oh, I see. And so you're actually and you're assisting with that that, the marketing of that and the and the distribution of that?
Trace Voshell:We'll we'll help consult a little bit and say, here's what we found for some of our other groups that work. But inevitably, really, the marketing kinda comes to them and how they wanna approach their target market, you know, whether it's a handful of states or national or whatever the case is. We really just go about saying, here's how the pharmacy flow can work best for you and then best for your end user to say, hey. It's still affordable versus what I could do if I went to primary care physician and got diagnosed and, you know, a drug went here. So we give them that advantage when it comes to a pharmacy component.
Trace Voshell:And then we can white label a website so they can order product or, you know, the end package. If you got something from Amazon, we could make it look the same, but with their brand on it. Yep.
Heath Fletcher:And so then that gives them a something different to present to their to their clients at the at the front at the front end. Wow. That's really that's very interesting. Wow.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yep. Exactly. And then and then to to top it off, we do veterinary medicine too. So we actually take care of
Heath Fletcher:Oh, wow. No kidding.
Trace Voshell:So and that's pretty cool. Yeah. If you go into our website and if you were to build a profile, there's a toggle that you can switch over to your your pets, and you can add your pets and their medicines too. So we can actually source pet products at a cheaper rate too. So everyone loves their dogs and and their cats, so we said, you know what?
Trace Voshell:We can probably help the, the furry ones out too.
Heath Fletcher:That's actually I was just talking to somebody yesterday who, works in a company that does dog DNA tests.
Trace Voshell:Oh, yeah?
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. Yeah. So the dog gets a DNA test, and then it gives veterinarians insight into what types of problems that particular blend of breed could actually have some health issues. And then it's almost like preventative or looking ahead at at what kind of things to expect for the pet owner and the vet clinic too. Cool.
Trace Voshell:Wish we'd had that with our golden retriever because he had just about everyone, so it'd have been good to have a test like that. So
Heath Fletcher:It's great. And and also too because sometimes you think you have a golden retriever, but you actually have a blend of a few things. And so there the health brand, some breeds have a have some weaknesses over others. And so Yep. That was interesting.
Heath Fletcher:So, yeah, the vet veterinarian world is huge. I mean, 45% of households have a dog.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. And grow in The US. Yeah. 100%.
Trace Voshell:I'm sure.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. That's was that a new was that a new product?
Trace Voshell:It it's slightly newer. So it's probably just a little bit before we started doing the employer group outreach was when we came on to veterinary medications. Mhmm. So, yeah, probably a little bit newer. Telemedicine definitely being the oldest.
Trace Voshell:And then really when I came on, it was the focus became, hey. Let's help these employer groups. And then with my background, I actually asked, because direct primary care is such a huge thing or concierge medicine now. Yeah. And I asked, I said, hey.
Trace Voshell:Have we ever considered working directly with these direct primary care groups? Because with my background in working with these guys, they leave the hospital system because, a, they wanna get back to actual patient care. Yeah. And instead of seeing a couple thousand of patients by contract, now they're cutting it down to say, hey. I'm gonna take three, four hundred patients total.
Trace Voshell:So then they can actually spend time in the room and caring for their patients. But what they leave behind is that downstairs pharmacy inside of a hospital or or whatever the case is. And now they're kinda reduced to saying, hey. Now I've gotta send it to CVS or Walgreens or whatever your local pharmacy is. Hope the patient goes there, knows how to get it for the best price, hope it's in stock, all of that.
Trace Voshell:So I said, hey. We could actually go there and build them a digital experience where they just plug it on their website, patient created a profile, go in and order it at a rate that they make. Right. And then they have their own pharmacy experience instead of having to build one in house. So we've actually started doing that with some direct primary care groups too, which has been which has been really neat and adds a benefit to their practice now.
Heath Fletcher:Isn't that interesting? That's a great approach, actually. Yeah.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. It was it was pretty cool. It was, it was an idea that I had, and it was one of those risks that you're like, okay. I'm either gonna I'm either gonna sound real smart or real dumb with this one. But when I started going to these doctors, they're like, this sounds fantastic.
Trace Voshell:Because, I mean, what it comes to is they get a smaller space.
Heath Fletcher:Mhmm.
Trace Voshell:And if they wanna have any kind of pharmacy, they've gotta carve out space to hold the product. They've gotta hire people to manage it. They've gotta order the product, do inventory. It becomes an expense. You know?
Trace Voshell:I said, hey. You could you could have all of the benefits of that, but not have to have the space, the extra people, brand it to your own practice here, and then make the cost whatever you wanna make it. It's still lower than what they would pay with their insurance.
Heath Fletcher:Right.
Trace Voshell:Ship it out, and then you create a new revenue stream to your practice too.
Heath Fletcher:Right. Exactly. Yeah. So well and
Trace Voshell:Lot of of cool things you can do with generic meds when they're at a cash rate.
Heath Fletcher:So Yeah. Absolutely. And and then and patients feel like they have more control over their decisions and what they can do actually as well. Right? Their options.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. That's great.
Trace Voshell:Yep. When you bring transparency into it, for sure, to say, hey. Here's what we can get it for you at, or you can go check what your price is gonna be, you know, at CVS or whatever the case would be.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. And then you can actually make that comparison. Yeah. Mhmm. Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:Where do the products actually come from?
Trace Voshell:So we work directly with partners for a wholesaling. So we work directly with them, and then we house them because we are a pharmacy. Right. So, yeah, that's exactly what we do.
Heath Fletcher:And then do you do compounding and and mixing in We
Trace Voshell:have a compound we have a compounding arm. So where I sit today is our commercially available products. So here in Arizona, focus on commercial products Yeah. Which are what we order through our wholesalers and then stock and ship when the prescription comes in. We do have a compounding facility right up the road in Cincinnati to where we do, compounded medications.
Trace Voshell:So, you know, when the weight loss boom was here, we were doing the weight loss meds, skin care products, kinda name it. If we get a request in, we can formulate it, or if it's something that we make kind of off the shelf, we can we can add it as a benefit to a telemedicine practice or for a walk in patient too.
Heath Fletcher:Right. Right.
Trace Voshell:Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:That's cool. And do you guys package them custom package too for for for doctors as well? Is that what you said? Mhmm.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. We do custom packaging. So if you had if, let's just say that I had Nike come in, right, and I'm representing Nike Pharmacy, we could we could build the box for them. We could stamp their logo on the pill vial itself.
Trace Voshell:So create that custom experience to say, hey. Yeah. I'm a consumer of them, and it's you know, now it's kind of end to end. So, yep, we'll work with anyone. We can do your basic packaging, if they're a startup company and just say, hey.
Trace Voshell:You don't wanna pay extra. Let's get out the door, build your brand, and then we'll add some some customization. Or we can we have we have affiliates of ours that we work with that put confetti in the box. So we have people downstairs on the line right now that are pulling boxes, dropping confetti in there with their pills, and they open it, and it's a party. So yep.
Heath Fletcher:Just get them make make them burst into the air.
Trace Voshell:Exactly. Yep. It's all about
Heath Fletcher:It's a girl. Yeah. Oh, that's really cool. That's really neat. So tell me about your transition professionally from, you know, how did you how did you make that transition from your previous role into this?
Heath Fletcher:I mean, you're bringing a lot of experience with you from a variety of different perspectives of the industry. So how did you make the transition to GoGoMeds, and where are you at now? What's your professional trajectory?
Trace Voshell:Yeah. The last one's a good question. I don't know if anyone ever any of us ever know that. You know what I mean? So the transition itself, honestly, was, like I told you, going back to to my, the career just kinda coming to an end at Humana.
Trace Voshell:It was I could've stayed there for a longer time, but it's just one of those ones that, you know, you're gonna sit in the same place for a while, and that's just not me. So when I came over here, I did it. And my wife and I talk about this pretty often. It's just like I couldn't really explain to her what I was coming over here to do. I knew it was a good opportunity, but I couldn't really, like, verbalize what I was going to do.
Trace Voshell:So the honest truth is that I've got to where we're at now by failing a lot.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah.
Trace Voshell:And and I tell the, the employees that I have now in sales to be like, hey. You guys are lucky because I found out all the ways we should not do this by just falling on my face.
Heath Fletcher:Good for people that's good for people to hear. Right? Because the expectation is that there is when you see somebody in a in a position or a place of of leadership, you assume that, you know, it was it was smooth.
Trace Voshell:They did it.
Heath Fletcher:Right? No. They did a really great job. Well, it's because he's really smart, and it's because he has this, and he has this education. But, but in all actuality, we're all just failing every other day Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:And, learning from that mistake. Right? So Yeah. That's great that you can you're you're sharing that with with your teams along the way.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. I think it's I don't know if it's, if it's the grit determination or just overall stubbornness that I have, but and a lot of it, honestly, I think going being a baseball player, right, is everyone says it, but you get three hits and 10 at bats and you're a hero. Right? Well, I've I've failed probably more than that three you know, that seven out of 10 times, but we figured out the right way to do it, and that's what's the most important. So, you know, whether it be to start doing different things.
Trace Voshell:So, you know, one thing I do now, there's there's a guy that I've become friends with. His name is Sims Tillerson. He does, does a lot of coaching on, social selling. So what I'll do now is instead of sending an email that's gonna hit a spam box or get deleted or whatever the case is, I'm gonna send you a direct message of a video of myself on LinkedIn. So instead of just saying, hey.
Trace Voshell:I'm gonna be the same DM that you get every day. Now you're gonna see my face. I'm gonna be talking to you. And the response rate is, like, 20% versus a 1% usual return on cold calls. So Yeah.
Trace Voshell:It's just it's just billing being willing to be different and put yourself out there knowing that you are going to fail. Because if you if you have the perception that you're not gonna fail, then you're gonna take those failures hard. But you kinda go into every day saying, hey. I'm probably gonna fail more than I win, but as long as I win the ones that matter, then I'm just gonna keep grinding it out. You know?
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. I mean, yeah, I think you you hit that on the head with the with the baseball analogies. Like, if you didn't if you wrote a test and got 30 out of a 100, that's a fail. Right? I mean
Trace Voshell:Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:You know, like, they and and there's no you cannot you you don't learn as much from the win as you do the fail. The win at the end is actually your ability to overcome the fail and tackle the challenge and find the solution. So then you get the win, which is the reward at the end of that.
Trace Voshell:Absolutely.
Heath Fletcher:So what that's your leadership style then, what would you say is your is your style as far as you take do you borrow that from your from your baseball again?
Trace Voshell:Yeah. I guess you could go back to that. You know, I've so playing baseball for so long and being a catcher, like, you're kind of automatically a leader on the field because you're in position to where you see everything that's developing. Right? So you're kind of the
Heath Fletcher:You get all the signals. Baseball.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. You're given the signals. You're directing traffic of where to go. You're cutting to second, cutting home, you know, whatever the case is.
Trace Voshell:So with professionally, I just think that it's just how I've been my entire life is that I'm kind of seen as a player coach. So even now, like, I do my own sales. So I have chief revenue officer as my title, but I have my own book of business that I'm I'm going after and I'm chasing after. And, yes, I help the the people that work for me and make sure that they're getting what they need as far as development and closing deals and contract reviews or whatever the case is. You know?
Trace Voshell:But I also go out there and I do the same thing. So one of the things that I've always done, whether it's here or in my previous roles, is to say, hey. I'm never gonna ask you to do anything that I wouldn't do myself or I'm not currently doing. Right. I don't think that's reasonable.
Trace Voshell:I've seen a lot of people that have done that. My wife was in pharmaceutical sales. I have friends that have been in sales, and and you just hear these stories, and I've seen them too about people that come in and just have these unrealistic expectations or forget where they came from and just jump into a power seat.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah.
Trace Voshell:And I've just never seen that as a way that was ever gonna work for me. So I think player coach is the way that I'll always be. And and, honestly, I just I don't know if I have any other way about me than just to say, hey. I'm jumping in with you, we're gonna do this together. You know?
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. That was great. I don't know where those fireworks came from.
Trace Voshell:I don't know. I liked it. It made me feel like I was answering that question really well.
Heath Fletcher:It's like, yeah, that was a good answer. I had nothing to do with that. So I don't know what I don't know where that came. I could be totally honest with you. That was great.
Heath Fletcher:Good job. That that was a win, I guess. You got some fireworks. Let's see what else. I think you got a little a happy face or a thumbs up somewhere along there too.
Heath Fletcher:I have no idea.
Trace Voshell:Check it out.
Heath Fletcher:I'll have to find out where I'll know.
Trace Voshell:Do really well if it drops a crown on me or something, then we'll be that'll be sweet. Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:King for a day. Yeah. It's actually it's interesting that you brought up that about the catcher because you don't actually and that's an it's an unassuming place, right, as well. I don't think people realize how much the catcher has to be involved with the big picture of the game. Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:Right? Which is I think what you're doing is you have a big picture of the game now, but you're still you're still in the game. You're still hands on with the ball at the same time. So
Trace Voshell:Yeah. I've always I've always liked it, and it's the same way today. Right? I I like to win. I don't I don't necessarily care about all the recognition.
Trace Voshell:Right? Like, what what I do is for the betterment of the company or what I do for my employees is for their betterment. I don't I don't need my name on the on the big screen. But, you know, kind of the same as going back to the catcher is if a pitcher threw a no hitter or a perfect game, they're the one at the podium at the end of the day even though the catcher called the whole game. Right?
Trace Voshell:And that's fine. That's our job. And I think that I've kinda just carried that through life. It's like, I don't care as long as we win. You know what I mean?
Trace Voshell:I think look at that fireworks again.
Heath Fletcher:Boom. It must be the word win. I don't know what
Trace Voshell:it is. Fantastic. Almost keep keep dropping that. But, no, I think a lot of it does. You you spend so much time playing a sport and then developing a personality around it or a work ethic.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. And I think it just naturally translates into what you do. And that's any sport because I've worked with plenty of people that played soccer or whatever, and they relate a lot of their competitive abilities or the reason that they are where they are to being an athlete.
Heath Fletcher:I'm glad you brought up the word big screen because I was gonna ask you about
Trace Voshell:Oh, yeah.
Heath Fletcher:A documentary that you're about to be on. So you actually will be on the big screen, so to speak.
Trace Voshell:I guess, that's true.
Heath Fletcher:I don't know if it'll be in the in a theater near you, but, tell us about the documentary that's been made or being made.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. This was an exciting opportunity. So, last year, for anyone who wants to go out and look for it, there was a documentary that was produced that was called, it's not personal, it's just health care. That documentary focused on health care in general and kind of the things that happened behind the scenes with the carriers and and kind of everything in between. It was fantastic.
Trace Voshell:So they're following up that documentary with a new one that's focused on the PBM industry, pharmacy benefit manager for people who don't know that acronym. And the documentary is gonna be called, side effects may include, and it's really uncovering the hidden cost prescription drugs. So it was an interesting and really cool opportunity for me because my background working for a large PBM owned pharmacy and now being in the cash pay space to say, here's what I've seen. Here's how we're trying to be part of a solution. And I'm not gonna give any kind of details out because I'd love people to go watch the documentary, but there's gonna be some really, really cool people that come on, and talk about some things that everyday consumers probably wouldn't see or understand, but peel back just exactly what these costs, where they come from, how they're being addressed, how we have solutions that are geared towards them.
Trace Voshell:But, also, if you're not willing to make a change, nothing's going to change. No. You know, the big the big insurance companies are not going to change making a profit, raising their premium. Premium equals, you know, profit. Right?
Trace Voshell:They're not gonna change that and keep lying in their pockets unless we do something that's outside the norm. Yeah. So a lot of this documentary is gonna be focused on that. And luckily for us at GoGoMeds, we are a solution in that space. We're really excited to to be asked to be a part of that.
Heath Fletcher:That's really cool. That's good.
Trace Voshell:And Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:And you are, you're one of you're one of the people being interviewed on that?
Trace Voshell:Yeah. So I was one of the producers. Yeah. I was
Heath Fletcher:one of
Trace Voshell:the producers
Heath Fletcher:on that. Too. Wow.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:We were
Trace Voshell:one the producers on it, Cole and myself. So Cole's our CEO, so we were the sort of the producers on the film.
Heath Fletcher:Nice.
Trace Voshell:Went down to Nashville where it was shot and and did the whole hair. First time I've ever worn makeup other than high black and did the interviews and and everything that came with it. So we're excited. That's gonna air. I think it's set to air around September.
Trace Voshell:Great. Anyone at the end of this who follows me on LinkedIn or anything will be dropping some teasers of little interview clips and and parts of the film that'll be be released, but we're excited about it.
Heath Fletcher:That is very exciting. Yeah. There was photos of you on set and Yeah. Surrounded by all that gear and, you know, it's pretty cool, to be in that
Trace Voshell:scenario. School. I did I and they and kind of in the back there, I took a a selfie in the chair of the woman doing my makeup and sent it to my wife. I was like, never thought this would be be going down and
Heath Fletcher:told you ten years ago this would be happening, you wouldn't believe them.
Trace Voshell:I have not worn makeup since. But yeah.
Heath Fletcher:Do you is that do you play a key role in marketing for Gogomets and and making those decisions? Is that part of your role as well?
Trace Voshell:Making the decisions, yes. So we have actually used an outside firm for marketing. So that was one of the areas that we definitely needed to enhance when I came on here. We've we've they've done a fantastic job of building our brand in the telemedicine space since we came about around 2016. Mhmm.
Trace Voshell:But knowing that we wanted to expand that into different verticals, we knew that we need to to have some help. We're a small company. Right? So, I mean, counting everyone across all of our different facilities, including most of the the lift that goes on in the pharmacy from technicians to pharmacists and and everything that happens there. We're only about 250 ish employees.
Heath Fletcher:Right.
Trace Voshell:So we don't have an actual marketing division. So we went out and we found a, a third party firm that helps us now, which has been excellent. So I do sit on that, all of those calls, make those decisions, have weight on what the materials look like, what the strategy is, the LinkedIn post, conference approaches, all of those different things. But we made the decision to kind of farm that out to to experts just because we just don't have the manpower to bring it in house right now.
Heath Fletcher:Leading up to that, were you doing most of that in house?
Trace Voshell:I was. Yeah. Which I don't know if that's good or bad. I think my ideas are good sometimes, but then you're like, I don't know if I really want my name on this. So, no, I was definitely doing the efforts and creating my own pieces.
Trace Voshell:It was one of the things I was actually excited about from coming to from such a large fifty, sixty thousand employee company at, you know, Humana to a smaller one where I could walk down the hall and my compliance officer's there. And I said, hey. Is this compliant? Can I get out there? And they give me a thumbs up in a day.
Trace Voshell:We're at a large company. I'm waiting, you know, five months, and then the time's passed.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah.
Trace Voshell:So, that's been great, and that turnaround time's still great using using this third party. But but, yeah, they they took it out of my hands and I'm not I'm not mad about that.
Heath Fletcher:There's well, you're still it you're you're still on it. You're still on on part of it. But Yeah. So, you know, when that that's an interesting point in a in a company's growth is when you actually have that opportunity to hand all of that over to and outsource it. Because once you're doing it in house, when you're doing it in house, it is it's something that everyone has to kind of more or less share the share the share the load.
Heath Fletcher:Right? Mhmm. So it's a interesting point. How how did you come to the conclusion that it was time to make that jump? Because it's a big decision.
Trace Voshell:It is a big decision. It's an investment for sure. So where we kinda came to it was a, just timing around everything. So, you know, between my day, Cole's day, our CEO, when you have a smaller shop like this, our time is kinda spread thin as it is. And then to say, hey.
Trace Voshell:We're not gonna grow without an actual marketing effort, you know, understanding how to do paid LinkedIn ads, understanding how to build your, you know, social media presence over all the other different outlets that you have among just making pieces that a team can carry to a conference. It was a pretty easy decision for us and and kind of a long time coming when we said, okay. Now we have an established sales team. We have to have something that we can arm them with that makes sense to all the different verticals. Because if you're looking now, we have telemedicine, then you have self funded direct primary care and veterinary medicine.
Trace Voshell:You have four or five verticals that you're chasing. Like, you can't just have one piece that tries to blanket all those because they're all so different.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah.
Trace Voshell:And bringing in expertise that's outside that says, hey. We work with people that focus on all of these, and here's what's working already. You can take a longer time internally and and say, well, we just can't make the investment, or you can spend that money to say, let's rely on the experts, know what's working, and then hopefully have a shorter ramp to success.
Heath Fletcher:Right. When you that growth part of the business is is challenging too. And how do you how do you how do you strategically approach when to grow, when to hold, and when to maintain or or proceed with your with your ideas. Because you so you had some big ideas that you came to the table with. How did you as a company decide this is the time to do it?
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Honestly, there's a there's a lot of decisions made there. So when they brought me on, when I interviewed, one of the big questions was is how quickly do you think you could grow a sales team? And I've been very, very fortunate to work with people who have trusted in me, who said that they would follow me, and who pulled through on that. So my answer, not being arrogant, but just being very honest because I knew the people who were behind me, I I said I could do it the second day that I'm here if you wanted me to.
Trace Voshell:So what we did was when I came on, we had discussions. We looked at what what was going on around us with our standing book of business who we were trying to onboard and said, well, let's get this some time. So it's about six months of me just doing sole sales pretty much by myself other than, you know, just general internal leads that we had. And I said, okay. I found my footing now.
Trace Voshell:I know what doesn't work. Now I can implement a team because I feel confident in the fact that we're not just going to be paying people that are not producing. Mhmm. But I can coach them to the point where I know that they can come in and produce. So I think understanding if you are actually making an impact in the market somewhere before deciding to grow is pivotal.
Trace Voshell:Right? If you're just growing to say that you have a sales team of x amount of people, but you're spending money on salaries and on benefits and on everything else, but you're not seeing production from that, you're shooting yourself in the foot. You gotta have a little bit of patience and say, okay. We've just like me, like, I've fallen on my face. I've failed here, but now we're seeing that traction.
Trace Voshell:Now I know what works. Okay. Now I can onboard a couple people, and I say, here's your verticals that you're gonna chase, and here's your verticals that you're gonna chase. And then we can kind of land and expand and say, okay. I can coach you to the point of what not to do, and I know where to be successful, and then you can continue to grow your ideas on top of that.
Trace Voshell:And as those grow and those stick and those land and we continue to grow, then we hire another wave, and you go in waves.
Heath Fletcher:Sounds like a book.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. Don't know.
Heath Fletcher:It might that might be next for you. Right?
Trace Voshell:We'll we'll see. Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:Because sales is in your book. Yeah. Sales is a big is a is a well, it's it's an important part of almost every business. And I think it's also a a difficult component to every business as to finding the right salespeople, you know, having the right sales strategy. You know?
Heath Fletcher:Like, what kind of advice do you have?
Trace Voshell:Well, you know what? I mean, just like kind of what you said is aggressive and patient aren't two words that typically mix together Yeah. Until you get to sales. Like, you have to be aggressive in nature, but you also have to be patient enough to let something work. Yeah.
Trace Voshell:Because I've I've seen it in my career. I I've been guilty of it. And any salesperson that you talk to, if they say one way or, you know, if they don't agree with this, I call them a liar. But if you go in and you have these notions and you're like, I'm gonna be aggressive here, but it's two weeks and it's not working while I'm switching, you haven't given anything enough time. No.
Trace Voshell:But you have to be patient enough to say, this isn't going to work on the first day, but I've gotta just make small tweaks here and there and give this an actual runway to say, okay. Does it work or does it not work? So you gotta remain aggressive, but also patient at the same time. And if anyone keeps switching and switching and switching, it's probably failing and failing and failing, but not giving theirselves enough time to find that right mix. So like I said, when it comes to sales for sure, you have to have that mindset of, hey.
Trace Voshell:I'm gonna wake up every day knowing that I might lose quite a bit, but I'm gonna remain aggressive. I'm gonna remain patient because I believe in what I'm building here, and we'll tweak it. So
Heath Fletcher:And that that constant switching and changing switching and changing and and modifying, I think, comes from a place of almost desperation too where it's like Yeah. That's not working. We gotta try something else. You know? And you just keep you just keep flipping it over, and and it's somewhat dangerous, actually.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Well, and and in sales too, it's a pressure job. Yeah. I think I really do think not that I think every athlete's gonna be the best salesman or, you know, other people aren't capable of it, but I think, honestly, from having the career that I've had, knowing the people that I know is athletes are typically successful with salespeople because we're used to pressure. Right?
Trace Voshell:Like Right. This is a pressure makes sense. Expectations that you're going to produce. And it's just gonna be like, okay. Well, yeah, I'm gonna fail, but I'm going to produce.
Trace Voshell:Like, I'm confident in myself. I'm gonna press through. And it's just like, if you can't take that pressure and knowing that you're going to fail but remain an aggressive, like, that whole mixture that probably not made to be for, you know, in sales. Right. And it's just kinda what it is.
Heath Fletcher:That's a good point. Probably and then also the team the team teamwork mindset too. Right?
Trace Voshell:Absolutely. Yeah. I love working in the team for sure. Yeah. Absolutely.
Trace Voshell:That's why I played team sports. Yeah. I didn't wanna air I didn't wanna air how bad I was on my on my own. I'd rather hide myself among nine other guys in the lineup. Right?
Trace Voshell:So
Heath Fletcher:And then but everyone's really good at their own individual Yeah. Position, place, what they're supposed to be doing, but they know that it doesn't work unless everyone's doing their own thing and work but working together with the same same goals. Right?
Trace Voshell:Well, knowing I think so knowing when to pass that off. Right? Knowing when to make that introduction into a call. So, I mean, I do it all the time. One of the biggest things I believe is that you're you're gonna lose from the beginning if you'd rather come up with your own answer rather than pull another expert in.
Heath Fletcher:Mhmm.
Trace Voshell:Right? So if I have the option to say, hey. I don't know the answer, but let me follow-up with you because I'll walk down and ask my VP of operations the exact answer here. I'm gonna do that instead of saying, well, here's what I think. Yeah.
Trace Voshell:And then I sign a contract and we go into onboard and I'm like, hey, guys. Sorry. I had that wrong. That might be detrimental to their entire process.
Heath Fletcher:Could be that could be a deal breaker. Yeah.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. So if you use your team, that's when you win. Right? It's I mean, just like any sport, the best teams that you see are the guys that mesh the best together. It's not always the most talented.
Trace Voshell:So it's it's a matter of knowing who's a producer and what situation.
Heath Fletcher:Talking about team, what's your what's your culture, your corporate culture, about? And how do you how do you support that and and and reinforce it?
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. So even going back to to Humana, one of the things I was most proud about was the culture that we had built together. Myself and a couple other managers specifically had kind of a different interview process that we had introduced and just said, hey. This is gonna be a part of us building the teams that we wanna have, not necessarily based on someone who has the best piece of paper in front of me, but you're gonna be vetted out first by the team that I already have in place.
Trace Voshell:So we actually started what we would do is during the interview process, we'd look at resumes, and then we'd get a team together that we were managing and said, hey. Here's some resumes. You guys pick five that you think look the best, and then you're gonna interview them first before I even talk to them. Because one, you can look at a resume. You're smart enough to know who could do this job because you're doing it today.
Trace Voshell:And two, I wanna know that if we go to meetings together, if we have calls together, that you guys can mesh and bounce stuff off of each other based on this interview before I talk to them and say, hey. Here's only two. I'm gonna give you guys some choices. So they were making those choices and pairing it down to one or two people, and they they would all say, hey. We don't care who you hire now.
Trace Voshell:We could work with any of these guys, and we built the culture based on that. Coming over here is a lot different because it's not as big of a team, but what's great about this place is that everyone's been here for a while. When you come to a place and you come to a company that people are tenured, there's a reason behind that most of the time. Right? So when I walk down to, you know, our VP of operations who's been here nine or ten years, our director of technology and integration started here as a as an intern out of college and stuck around.
Heath Fletcher:Like Wow.
Trace Voshell:People come and stay, and there's a reason behind that. So you I mean, even now I put a sign on my door that said video recording in progress because they'll be out there walking around the halls, like, talking to each other, laughing, everything. And it gets everyone through the day, but it also lets you know that you can rely and you wanna come to work. So culture is a huge piece of it. If you're not if you're not excited about who the people, you know, that you're working with are, it's gonna be hard to stay motivated in your own job.
Heath Fletcher:Other things you guys do as a company to, I don't know, to continue building that culture, you know, inside the office and out? You know, is there
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. So we'll do company outings here. Yeah. So, I mean, we've got one coming up at a big gaming and go kart place, which my little boys are amped about because they get to go to that.
Trace Voshell:So you get to see everyone outside the office there. We have a ton of people here at this office that are big FC Cincinnati soccer fans and season ticket holders, so they go to games together. Nice. I'm not a video gamer, but I know there's a bunch of the guys who do development here that video game with each other after work. So just like, it's kind of the same as, like, when I played baseball.
Trace Voshell:Right? Like, you had your game, but then afterwards, you're like, alright. We're, you know, we're all going out together. We're going to work out or we're going to the party together. It's kind of the same here.
Trace Voshell:Right. And I think that's what's pushing that the trajectory that we're on as a company is saying, hey. Everyone's on the same pace. Everyone's on the same page here. And even if we get things wrong, you've worked together long enough or you know each other well enough to say, it's fine.
Trace Voshell:We can fix it. Let's just kinda sit down and and see what we gotta go about.
Heath Fletcher:And it's something you have to have, happening at the top because that that trickles down. Right?
Trace Voshell:It does. Yeah. And it's just like anything. Right? Pressure trickles from the top.
Trace Voshell:I mean, success from the top. You know, it's it is. It's top down approach. Toxicity, 100%. Yeah.
Trace Voshell:100%. Yeah. It's unfortunately, I think everyone's felt that is if if you're feeling pressure and, like, you know, any kind of toxic approach, it's usually coming from the top down. And then the person that you might have known or trusted or whatever, they start to change their approach because then the next person up is it's just yeah. Toxicity is is another one that that really comes down heavy.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. Does it ever I was talking to an angel investor, Kevin Scanlon. He said that, you know, they look for strong teams. When they're looking to invest, they'd rather they'd rather invest in a second rate product if it had a first rate team and not the other way around. And so, you know, it's it it is something that I think most companies strive for, but they don't always hit the mark.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Absolutely.
Heath Fletcher:And that's Absolutely. For a variety of reasons, but I think any kind of insight, which I think what you've provided is is really helpful to hear what how you've developed that that culture of culture of success, but also a culture of winning together. Right?
Trace Voshell:Yeah. Yeah. I think I think the other thing that you see a lot too, especially at the top, is going outside. Right? There's a lot of people that'll go outside the organization instead of saying, hey.
Trace Voshell:I'm gonna trust in this talent that we've developed to pull them up and give them a chance.
Heath Fletcher:Right.
Trace Voshell:You know? And then they go outside and just say, hey. Well, this person this person's doing this at this company. Okay. Well, what's their culture like over there?
Trace Voshell:Is there are their processes the same? Like, what do they believe in as far as managing a team goes? Like Mhmm. Because if you come in and you say, hey. This person's done everything on paper.
Trace Voshell:Well, we all know that that doesn't always mesh out to say, okay. Well, paper's one thing, but if you're coming into a new company, we're writing on different paper now. So
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. Good point. How about AI? Are you guys dipping into AI right now? Are you experimenting with that even if it's at the admin level?
Heath Fletcher:Or or Yeah.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. For sure. So I think I think everyone's getting into AI at a certain aspect. Yeah. But one thing I think, especially in sales, that you gotta be careful with AI is is just remaining a a person.
Trace Voshell:AI is gonna have its place. So for us, specifically, if we're looking at the actual operations of the pharmacy, from, you know, reporting structures or on our website for chatbots or anything that we can answer simple questions and kind of automate some processes there, It's got its place for sure. For me in sales, the one thing I kind of caution against is that you're probably the same way. Right? You get on LinkedIn.
Trace Voshell:You get a DM or your email box is flooded, and I can read it right away. It's like, okay. That's that's AI. Like, that's not a real person.
Heath Fletcher:That's not a person.
Trace Voshell:And and you get caught in that, especially from an automation being like, Okay. I gotta get all my numbers up. Yeah. But if you're not coming to me as a real person, guess what's happening? They're deleting your email just like I'm deleting the one that I can tell is not a real person too.
Trace Voshell:So when it comes to sales and actual interaction, you know, b to b or b to c, it's like, hey. You gotta remain yourself. You gotta remain a person and not automate that too heavily because you're gonna lose that personal touch, no one wants to engage with that. But as a company in pharmacy, for sure, there's a lot of AI that we can use in our automation to not only increase the experience, but to really be over drive down the overall cost to fill the drug, which is how we make things cheaper to our end user too.
Heath Fletcher:Right. Right. Awesome. Trace, I don't know what else we can talk about today, but we could probably keep going. I don't know.
Heath Fletcher:But we're we're already in for 45. So do you have any other final thoughts or things you'd like to share? Maybe ways people can reach out and connect with you if they wanna talk to you more, whether it's about working with GoGoMeds or just talking to you.
Trace Voshell:Yeah. For sure. Well, the one thing I'll I'll make a quick one because I read some of the the notes you had sent me about one of the questions you might ask about books that I would recommend.
Heath Fletcher:Oh, yes. By the way, this is the place to do it for sure.
Trace Voshell:Well, I'm not a huge book reader, but I am a huge fan of the show, the office. So I was gonna make a joke and say somehow I managed by Michael Scott and see if anyone picked up on that. So any Office fans listening out there, I'm a huge Office nerd. But, no, you can in touch with me.
Heath Fletcher:I'm on LinkedIn. So
Trace Voshell:you can find me on LinkedIn, Trace Rochelle, GoGoMeds, can follow GoGoMeds on LinkedIn too. If you're interested in working with us, we do direct to consumer as well. So, mean, go to gogomeds.com. You can search our drugs, see what the price is versus what you're paying at your pharmacy today, and we'll ship it straight to your door. If you run a company, and you're interested in seeing what we can do to hopefully save you money on your medications, you can you can shoot me an email.
Trace Voshell:It's t.Boschell@GogoMeds.com, or shoot me a message on LinkedIn. I'll probably return it with one of my little video messages so you'll get to see if it's actually me. And, yeah, if you have a telemedicine company, obviously, we we that's our strong suit too. We can help set you up with a pharmacy platform. But if it comes to generic medications, I'm your guy, and and I'm I'm grateful for the opportunity to be here today and and talk about GoGoMeds and how we're hopefully changing what pharmacy is here in The States to make it more affordable and and transparency a legitimate word anymore.
Heath Fletcher:Yeah. I love it. Thank you. Yeah. I appreciate you, your time, what you're doing over there, and happy to have another conversation again someday about something else you got going on.
Heath Fletcher:But Yeah. Until then, I'm gonna look out for that documentary and see your big smiling face on there, and we'll Yeah. And we'll connect again. So thanks a lot, Trace.
Trace Voshell:I really appreciate your today. Thank you. Appreciate it.
Heath Fletcher:Alright. So that was fun listening to Trace's unique path from baseball to pharmacy leadership and how GoGoMeds is working to really simplify a very complex pharmaceutical system and make medication more affordable for both people, pets, and businesses. So very interesting. They've got a great business and a lot of growth ahead of them. Yeah.
Heath Fletcher:It was also fun to explore the growing role of telemedicine. We hear that a lot almost every other episode, which is interesting. And the importance of company culture and how their leadership is about being both a coach and a teammate. So, again, that baseball analogy comes into play. Trace also gave us a bit of a preview on an upcoming documentary that he's gonna be in that Google Maps was a a producer with.
Heath Fletcher:So fun to look forward to that. Really great episode. Appreciate Trace's time today, and I appreciate your time for listening to us. So thanks for joining us. Stay healthy, and we will see you next time.