From navigating the halls of Abbott Laboratories and Knoll Pharmaceutical Company to pioneering his path as an independent medical device sales rep, Bruce Brown’s career journey challenges traditional sales wisdom. In this episode, he reveals the innovative strategies that helped him thrive in both worlds – including an ingenious FedEx tactic that changed his pharmaceutical sales game.
Bruce opens up about the real rewards and challenges of transitioning to 1099 medical device sales, offering a no-nonsense look at building surgeon relationships and handling industry hurdles. His candid insights cover everything from managing non-payment issues to adapting to generational shifts among doctors, providing listeners with actionable strategies for success in the medical sales field.
Whether you’re a pharmaceutical rep considering medical devices or a sales professional looking to go independent, Bruce’s two decades of experience offer a practical blueprint for making the leap. He shares specific resources, proven approaches for product innovation, and the mindset shifts needed to thrive in today’s evolving healthcare landscape.
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Episode Transcript:
00:07 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Hello and welcome to the Medical Sales Podcast. I’m your host, Samuel, founder of a revolutionary medical sales training and mentorship program called the Medical Sales Career Builder, and I’m also host of the Medical Sales Podcast. In this podcast, I interview top medical sales reps and leading medical sales executives across the entire world. It doesn’t matter what medical sales industry from medical device to pharmaceutical, to genetic testing and diagnostic lab you name it you will learn how to either break into the industry, be a top 10% performer within your role or climb the corporate ladder. Welcome to the Medical Sales Podcast and remember, I am a medical sales expert, sharing my own opinion about this amazing industry and how it can change your life. Hello and welcome to the Medical Sales Podcast. I’m your host, Samuel, and today we have with us another special guest, and he goes by the name of Bruce Brown.
01:07
Bruce is someone you have to listen to because he started out in one space pharma to be specific and then transitioned into the medical device space as a 1099 rep and, 20 years later, successfully been able to craft himself an enterprise medical device 1099 life. Here’s the reality 1099 is a growing opportunity in medical device sales. It’s always been there, but now that people are able to have so many resources and be so efficient and so capable just them because of all the resources online. It’s allowing people to really become 1099 reps early on in their careers, enterprise themselves and show up. They want to show up powerfully in the medical sales role.
01:50
This is the kind of episode that’s going to give you some insight into how to make that happen. So, for someone that wants to get into medical sales, or you’re in medical sales and you’re thinking how do I get more autonomy, independence and how do I do my own thing with saying this space, this is an episode you have to listen to. As always, we do our best to bring you guests that are doing things differently in the medical space, and I really do hope you enjoy this episode. You’re a distributor for Biopro, correct? Ok? How many? How many distributors does Biopro have?
02:18 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Good question. I couldn’t tell you. I don’t know.
02:20 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
OK, OK.
02:25 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
But you’re their sole distributor. You don’t sell for anyone else, just BioPro. Oh no, I’ve got many different lines and over the years that was one thing I was going to kind of get to. I mentioned the ultrasonic osteotome, my sonics. I was a distributor there. They wanted to hire me direct to be a direct employee and you know, frankly, with that comes a lot of the different rules, regulations, restrictions, different things, reporting, and I just wasn’t. I wasn’t going to do it. I had been independent too long and you know, having worked in pharmaceutical sales for 20 years, I’ve got a pretty good idea what the corporate world’s like and I was like you know, I’m just going to be my own guy, sorry.
02:58 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
That’s so interesting, okay, so hold on so. So right now you are an independent sales rep distributor for BioPro and many other companies. You have your own LLC, or you are your own LLC, but you come from the 20 years in the pharma world. So let’s go back, man.
03:19 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
We got to know.
03:22 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
So you know, gosh, 20 years, that’s that, that’s significant. And what I mean is it seems to go for 20 years in the farm world to the medical medical device. I mean that’s, I haven’t. I don’t see that type of transition that late in the game. Uh, often, and the people that attempted, they’re not successful. So you were so awesome.
03:41 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
So that’s why you should say that, because I remember talking with people and interviewing and doing different things. Like you know you’ll never be able to do that Like you’ll, you’ll never be taken seriously, right. And I’m like for decades I’d be around hospitals or clinics or what that I’d see these guys running around in scrubs that weren’t doctors and they go into surgery and OK, whatever I mean I could do that, but you know you got to really kind of stalk your doctor. Whatever I mean I could do that, but you know you’ve got to really kind of stalk your doctor and unless you’re across the red line, in surgery in a facility.
04:10
A lot of times you have no access. You can go walk up and cold, call a doctor’s office and give the card and the receptionist is like, well, he’s seeing patients, I know, but I’d like to set the point. Well, he doesn’t see reps, so you’d have to figure out where he was and be able to approach him or her, whoever it may be. Right, little goofy things, like one thing that I’ve learned and it’s so funny, like the FedEx envelope. Ok, and this is this is. It sounds ridiculous, but I can’t tell you how many surgeries I’ve booked over the years with this, but I can’t tell you how many surgeries I’ve booked over the years with this. You get a FedEx envelope like that. You put a note in there with a technique guide for a surgical procedure, your business card and a handwritten note, and then you put something like you know, dr Smith, personal and confidential, do not open.
05:04 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
And you’d be amazed how often that will get to the doctor’s desk and he’ll open it. And then you’re going to go talk to the doctor’s desk and he’ll open it, and then you’re giving pearls away. So you.
05:11 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
You put on the envelope conflict. Wait, say it again personal confidential. Personal confidential on the, on the letter, on the envelope, like right here, because you know it’d be blank.
05:19 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Oh, you know you purposely get a fedex envelope and then you put personal confidential and you put your marketing material in it. Yep, and so you’d leave this with the front office, or you’d actually mail it, or what I’d leave it with the front office and you know, probably I don’t know two out of three.
05:36 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
We’d get thrown away four to five, but every once in a while you get a phone call. It’d be like this Wow, you’re driving like and you’re who. Wow, you’re driving like and you’re who.
05:44 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Oh, hold on, hold on, let me take some notes. So do you have a letter like in there that says hey, reach out to me this way, or, you know, do you explain? Okay, so you explain everything? Oh, for sure, yeah.
05:53 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
You know I’m a rep for this company, this company. I understand this is a procedure you do.
06:07
I’d like to be able to stop and present this to to you. Yeah, that is cool. I mean, gosh, please share more what? What are some other tricks of the trade, please? Um, well, again, that whole like uh, again, one of the beautiful things about when I had the my sonics line was is that this ultrasonic osteotel would bill out it between fifteen hundred two thousand dollars a case. I’d make, uh, depending on the place fifteen, 15 to 30% of that. But it was disposable, okay. So I would do an in-service to I don’t know 20, 50 people, whatever. I’d get the cart there, I’d get the machine in there, I’d make sure it was all up and running so I wouldn’t have to be at every case, which was mailbox money. And I’ll tell you, if you talk to some of these guys that do total joints and all that and you’re like, well, you don’t have to be at the case, that doesn’t make any sense they go yeah, it’s mailbox money. Dude, it’s the best thing ever. You don’t have to be at every single case. So if you can get a disposable item on the shelf in Buffalo General or Erie County Medical Center or wherever your place is, or Rochester and I had this in every facility from about Syracuse down to Pittsburgh, pennsylvania, and I mean they would restock.
07:08
I do, I go attend cases, but here’s my point. I would have an open ticket because I could go attend any case I wanted to. And a lot of times you don’t have access to these facilities unless you have a surgeon. It’s like no, you’re not just allowed to come in here and walk around and I don’t shake hands, introduce yourself. So I had this open-ended ticket. Well, I’m just doing inventory, I’m just making sure the cart, you know, whatever excuse it be. So I just go wander around a hospital all day and figure out, okay, that guy uses I introduce myself. Oh, just bump into him, you know. And yeah, it was so cool because, again, I just had a patch that very few other reps would have.
07:47 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
And that was very cool and you chalk it off to. I’m just checking inventory.
07:51 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Inventory got to make sure the machine’s working properly. We may have had a recall. I want to make sure that that lot number’s that, whatever it may be yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah.
07:59 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Yeah, that is cool. You said you had three, though. Oh the.
08:03 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
FedEx thing was one. Yeah, just at the sink selling.
08:11 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
What’s the at the sink selling what’s that?
08:13 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Well, you bump into them like you’re scrubbing in, right? Oh yeah, doc, I’m over in room four, just like that, and you’d have to start this conversation up with a doctor. So a complete fabrication. But who cares? We’ll put it this way If I had a surgery at 11 o’clock in the morning and I got to the surgery center at 7.30 or 8 in the morning, that would be a pretty unmitigated waste of time. Well, which is more efficient? You being in the facility, the locker room, the wherever it may be, where all the surgeons are, or are you out there knocking on doors leaving business cards? No, you got to go to where they are and that’s what I call behind the red line. Um, and again, I can’t tell you how many times and, and you know, sometimes it wouldn’t go well.
09:04
There was a guy, guy in Niagara Falls once, who you know. I’m just chatting with the guy. I knew exactly who he was and I kind of targeted him and he freaks out. I mean he is screaming and effing, swearing and he’s a facility manager. This guy is talking to me. He’s like, yeah, he was at the sink.
09:24
I didn’t like walk into his room and I’ve had that happen with me where there’s one tall, athletic, attractive blonde woman that comes to mind. She was in wound care and she would just wander into people’s rooms all the time and I’d say to the circuit well, she’s not in on this case. She’s not supposed to be here because I can see what’s going to happen. She’s going to distract the doctor, she’s going to talk to him about all the stuff from. You know how much snow we had today to the price of gas, lord knows what.
09:50
And a lot of times doctors are like, oh yeah, it’s okay, she can stay, you know. So you know, everybody’s got their unique uh attributes to be able to sell and you just have to know what they are, capitalized on it. But not having um, something in there again a disposable on the shelf and I still do that with the BioPro occasionally BioPro’s got some very, very good disposable osteotomy guides that are used for first ray, first metatarsal modifications, if you will, resecting bone and doing things like that. And I have to go to the facility and count and make sure that nothing’s expired or what have you. And if I want to run around, then I’ll go run around.
10:31 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Wow, wow, man, that’s cool. Ok, so I want to explore a couple of things. Sure, so talk to me about this 20 year pharma career. You know where. Take us to the beginning, when you started in pharma, what you specialized in, how far did you take it? Did you stay a sales rep? Did you transition to different, more specialty pharma? Did you get into leadership? And really, what happened where you said I am now taking this to medical device sales? Go ahead.
11:04 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Well, what happened was I got fired from Abbott Laboratories circa 2008, 2009. After about a decade with them, they acquired a company that I worked for called Knoll Pharmaceutical Company.
11:08 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
How far did you get in that 10-year career?
11:11 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
You stayed a rep or you got no, they had asked me to become a manager and the beauty, especially back in the day, of being an outside sales rep before we I mean, everything was like paper. You didn’t have laptops or whatever, circa, you know, 1990 was that you were just independent. I mean, you go out and drive around your car and you’d have a list of targets and you find new people. It was all you, you do your thing, yeah. Well, yeah, and this is probably not the best, but it’s truthful.
11:47
I’m very transparent. You know, I would be able to work my schedule over a period of week where I knew that Friday, if I really was aggressive during the week, by 1 o’clock on Friday I’m on the golf course Because I made all my calls, I was hitting all my targets, I had everything under control and I kind of earned that time. If you will. The flip side of that, too, was it was something that was always interesting. We always had, I don’t know, two and a half, three weeks or whatever it was, for vacation time and having two small kids or what have you. You know I really wasn’t into taking two weeks off and going to the Florida Keys or whatever it might be, so I would work right through vacation and people would say, well, why didn’t you just take the day Keys or whatever it might be? So I would work right through vacation and people would say, well, why?
12:28
didn’t you just take the day off or go to the movies or whatever it’s like, because I’m a commissioned sales rep and I now have bonus time to go out there and make more calls than the other guy and make more money. What were you selling at Averitt Laboratories? Oh, all kinds of different things. The one drug that was the ultimate, I don’t know moneymaker was a drug called Synthroid, lipothorax and sodium for thyroid disorders, either hypo or hyperthyroidism. And when you talk about disease states and you see all the advertising which I’m not real fond of on TV these days, that was a disease state that’s not really very dramatic. You know there’s blood pressure and cardiac meds and psychotic meds and all the pain, all the different things that are out there, and I sold a bunch of those things too. I sold a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor called subutramine, meridia. But back to Synthroid.
13:25
But Synthroid was a drug that was dosed in micrograms. Okay, most drugs are milligrams, but micrograms and drugs like Coumadin, dijoxan, synthroid are narrow therapeutic index drugs. They have a very narrow window. It has to be very, very precise dose. Long story short, the drug went off patent and Abbott was just thinking like, oh, this is just going to be, we’re just going to lose so much money. But what have you? And it was probably one of the most amazing things, because when a drug goes off patent, I mean you lose 90% of your revenue. It’s just, the drug’s gone, it’s generic, cheap generic. Well, if you were on, for example, Samuel 100 micrograms and you’re a generic manufacturer and you’ve got a window of something in the neighborhood at 10 percent high or 10 percent low on that 100 microgram target, you’re probably not going to put more drug in there, you’re going to put less to make money. Why would you put more drug? It makes no sense. So if you cut the dose down to 50, the point is the generic drugs just weren’t working as well as Synthroid.
14:30
And I would go to Dr Smith and say well, I’ll tell you what, dr Smith, you need to keep your patients on Synthroid. Well, why? Because they’re generic. And I go because they’re not going to be the same. Mark my words. And I would use this example. If you had a male doctor, I would say say, your wife’s on Synthroid and she gets swapped out of the pharmacy and goes to a generic and all of a sudden she’s a little lethargic, cognitively she’s not quite there, but she’s compliant. She’s taken a medication, she’s not getting the same dose and that sales pitch worked. I’m telling you doctors would see the patients change. They were not the same and I’m like, dude, that’s because they’re not on the branded drug. You got to keep them on the branded drug and it was amazing, initially the market share dropped but then it would back up and it continued to be this I mean multi, multi, multi-million dollar product. And very, very seldom can that happen? Because if you had, I sold ACE inhibitors and calcium channel blockers and all kinds of different things. Because if you had I sold ACE inhibitors and calcium channel blockers and all kinds of different things, it just wouldn’t happen.
15:32
One other thing that I guess I grew up or saw was the Sackler family and the whole opioid thing. Yeah, all those people would literally buy doctors’ business. Yeah, it was so corrupt. I remember once raising my hand in a meeting in Chicago and saying, well, if we incentivize Dr Jones to put 10 patients on this drug and then track them, and then we send him and or his office manager, which happens to be his wife, to Los Angeles for a meeting, okay, aren’t we kind of buying business? I mean, I got like literally hauled out, paid to count pills and buy lunch, you don’t? I mean? This is the narrative. Wow, it was an amazing day, yeah, and it was just. I knew that it was just not professional or immoral or corrupt, right, but I went along with it. I got paid and, yeah, the bonus checks that used to roll in from some of those things were amazing, because I had ib, ibuprofen and hydrochlorone.
16:28
A drug called vicodin has a seed you made a killing, yeah, and vicoprofen, okay, oh gosh, yeah, and this is something too, my god, that I got asked to go to a meeting. It was in new york and they’re like brown, what are you doing, man? Your market share is just off the charts. And I go, well, I’m telling doctors the advantages of the ibuprofen versus acetaminophen when it comes to people who are addicts or diverted, and like, what are you talking about? Well, if you had a doctor that was a huge opioid prescriber and I came in and started talking to you about the safety efficacy of this drug and and then I tell him this message, which just blew their minds, I said you’ve got 75.5 milligrams of hydrochloroquine and 200, 400, whatever it was of ibuprofen.
17:16
That’s very effective. That’s a big dose, okay for pain relief and if someone comes in and tells you it’s not working, I would bet 9 out of 10 times they’re diverting. Okay, they’re selling it, they’re snorting it, because when you snort ibuprofen it doesn’t do anything. You snort, uh ibuprofen, it burns, it’s it’s. You shoot it up, it burns it. They had it was a wildly different side effect if you’re using it off label or out of indication and I told that story to these manager guys. They’re like God man, we can’t. We can’t tell doctors that I go well, why not? Because it’s not on the label, it’s not indicated.
17:52 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
I go well, I don’t have to tell you, but it’s worth it Bruce, was Mr Rogue Today, that would just after the Sunshine Act, that just would not fly. Oh, it’s not going to. You’d be gone before you got to your cart.
18:10 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
And it was bizarre too. And I remember in that day, the opioid days, depending on what state you’re in, like New York you wouldn’t be able to have it, but in Pennsylvania you could sample things like that. They give you scheduled drugs. And I remember one time I go out to my car and there’s this dude kind of like stalking me. He’s like yo drug man, what you got in the bag, man, I go, I got nothing. Wow, I mean, it’ll make you poop, you’ll go blind. It’s like, oh, come on, man. And he’s chasing me around the car. Oh, wow, that’s crazy. Oh, it happened back in the day, especially if they knew you had narcotics or a scheduled drug or something Easy, wow, Gosh.
18:49 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Okay, so you were living your best life. Ten years. You get laid off. So, by the way, was this layoff? You knew it was coming. Complete surprise what was?
19:01 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
it. I could tell there was kind of some tension. You know I had won every district, regional, national award in the American pharmaceutical business Right, and you know I was credentialed. I mean, I knew at that point if I wanted to stay it I could find a job. Somebody would hire me, there’s no question about it. Um, and back to your point, like getting into the surgical business. I remember this is like it’s scar tissue. It’s almost like there was a little video or promo prior to the bills game about Josh Allen being told he’d never be successful. He’d never be able to. I had that same thing. I was driving back once from a job interview in Pittsburgh, erie, pennsylvania, where I lived, and I remember this guy saying in the meeting he’s going like this I just don’t think you have what it takes. I’m like, dude, I have what it takes.
19:44
Yes, sir, give me a chance. I didn’t get the job and I’m almost in tears, I’m never going to be successful. And I just kept going and going and going. And I remember when it was literally it was like in the Eiffel Tower having a private can-can women dancing show. This was all for the pharmaceutical people. And all I could do was think about that guy, like I want to take a picture and say, dude, I did it, I knew if I stuck with it I could do it. Nobody was going to stop, you know what, what, what was the company that?
20:21 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
like, take us to the moment, like, was it a phone call? Was it like you got the job? Like, take us to the moment of you learning when you first learned you are officially hired at hired medical device sales rep. Take us to that moment. Give it, give us everything.
20:36 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
It was from that guy from BioPro. That’s why I’m so loyal to BioPro, because they were the first ones to put me on as a 1099 rep. Reps typically make half of what the commission is, which is somewhere in the neighborhood of 30% 35%. So it was zero income. But it was an opportunity to be the sales rep or to rep things and it was like, ok, I got to take this with everything I got. I got a full core, full bore part of me and went to training in Michigan, port Hero, michigan, where BioPro is based. It’s a small company, it’s a tiny company, but it really fit exactly what I thought I wanted to do.
21:17
Again, not these. And I’ve been in plenty of spine cases that the three hours, four hours. You know I’m kind of ADHD. I can’t, I can’t focus that long. I mean I can go in for my hour, you know, just a radial fracture, whatever it is, and you know they. And another reason I want to do extremities because you know a hip or a knee is anywhere from, you know, 15, 20, 30 thousand dollars. Sure, my stuff bills out at a few grand, right, so it wasn’t on the screen back then. The way everything now is, with the group per chief organizations and the managed care Sure. And then the these incentives to, to, to do different volumes. When you hit different volumes with different companies for example Stryker, Zimmer, synthes, whatever it may be, arthrex is huge in this area They’d reduce the price, they’d give you volume discount. So there’s very little incentive from a financial standpoint for them to want to frankly screw around with something like BioPro. For them to want to frankly screw around with something like BioPro.
22:16
I used to rep a company called Skeletal Dynamics down in Miami and it’s a very good company. There’s no question about it. They have some of the best innovative products from a guy named George Orbe. George Orbe, instead of a dorsal volar plate or dorsal distal radio plate, he would go volar and it wouldn’t be as proud, it wouldn’t ride. I could go get a bunch of like saw bones and show you plates and screws. But that was a fantastic company. They had all kinds of different things. They had a radial head. That was a fascinating case. I worked for a company called the Condensis that had an intramedullary cage, so a proximal humerus reduction. Instead of just slapping a plate on from the exterior, they drill in the cage, would expand intramedullarily and then they would take screws and fix it from there, which was really bizarre. Yeah, fantastic surgeon that used to be here and again COVID blew up a lot of things, but he said the heck with Western New York, paul Patterson, who actually put a plate in my ulna right there.
23:27 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Wow. So you sold for a company whose product you were you had inside you.
23:33 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
I don’t know whose plate it was. No, it wasn’t okay, because that’s kind of and that’s another problem really with with um, the medical sales business in some ways is that there are so many things that are you know, hey, I’ve had doctors go it’s plates and screws man, I could give it no difference, just whatever, just pick one, yeah, yeah unless you’ve got something that’s really innovative or unique Right.
23:57 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
What’s the real difference? Yeah, you know, that’s that’s why the medical sales rep is so important, right? Because every physician and surgeon I talk to, they all say the same thing and they say it boils down to my relationship with the rep, because all these products I kind of look at them the same. So if the rep is amazing, if they’re there when I need them, if they’re, if they, if they can be that right-hand man or woman to me the way I need them to be, then I’m going with that product. So I hear that a lot.
24:22
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25:28 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
the guy just mentioned paul patterson when he was leaving, uh, buffalo, I I made sure to get a meeting with him because I wanted to stay in touch with him. We became kind of friends and, in a nutshell, he and another guy in Erie, pennsylvania, who’s retired from surgery, john Lubon. They’re both probably nationally known guys. Both of them said in short terms that, brown, you’re one of the best reps I ever had. I’m like me what he said you would show up, you would, you’d be able to answer any question I ever had. The trays were there, the implants were there and everything went smoothly. And it’s like, well, that’s my job, because, yeah, but you know, and I know that a lot, of people can’t do that.
26:08 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
How many people do this?
26:09 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Yeah, and it was a real compliment. And yeah, but it was a real compliment and I kind of looked at the mirror one time. It’s like you know, you’ve done a good job and you’ve been successful and it was very humbling for those two guys to say that without me like trying to like you know my good or my core Right.
26:29 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
They brought it up. So very rewarding and share what you can, Bruce, but I think it’s important that people understand why, even what you did, going from something like a big pharma structure to this 1099 where you’ve got to eat what you kill. So, on that note, let’s talk about the lifestyle that’s afforded you and, like I said, share what you can, but what kind of money can someone that hears this and says you know what I’m gonna, I’m gonna, I’m gonna try what he tried? What can they anticipate if they do it right and they find the right product and they and they connect with the right companies as a 1099, what type of money are we talking about? What kind of lifestyle can we expect to have if we do it right?
27:11 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
well, Well, if you’re 1099, for sure, in my opinion, you’ve got to have half a dozen different companies that you rep and that can be a real problem. If you’re repping two companies and believe me, I got into this and got into some real problems that have competing devices. If you’re selling distal radio plates, um, in a place like buffalo new york, where I mean, whoever the rep is it may be the guy out of rochester right now uh, he’s still the skeletal, skeletal dynamics rep I mean there are so many broken wrists from people falling.
27:46
I mean I used to be able to, like, predict the weather, like, oh boy, I’m gonna make a lot of money next week okay, I mean, like in the middle of july you’re not going to have slip and falls, but this time of year, I mean you’re busy man, so it’s kind of an odd thing, seasonal like that you can predict there’s going to be trauma. But I would say that if you had a distal radio plate that bills out for $4,000, you as the rep are going to make a commission somewhere 15 to 30%. So you couple a couple, you rep, you cover a couple of those cases. Then you have some podiatry or whatever. I mean I was going to surgery probably about four to five days a week and then again I had the thing, the disposable, on the shelf. So, depending on how many different companies you do that math, 15 to 30%. On small things like, again, hips and knees, they’re going to be 15, 20, 30 grand, all right. But those bigger companies pardon me, you’re going to be a direct hire, you’re not going to be a 1099 guy.
28:48
So the smaller, independent companies look for distributors that have experience. That’s where you got to be aggressive and go out and you know via something like independent companies. Look for distributors that have experience. That’s where you got to be aggressive and go out and you know via something like you know, linkedin or different sites out there. I mean, you know medical sales podcast. You can. You can simply connect with people better now than you probably ever could. Sure should be able to say hey look, I’m experienced, I’m credentialing this area can we get and meet and talk about? Do you need a rep in the area? And that’s kind of what happened there, especially in the mid-2000s, early 2010s. We’ll say I got in touch with so many different distributors that were so busy that they couldn’t cover cases. They’re calling me like hey, dude, can you take this case? Yeah, I’d be happy to take the case.
29:35 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
But if we were to put a number on it right and for the people listening right now that are maybe they’re in pharma or maybe they’re in a W-2 position and they’re thinking you know, I don’t like my W-2 medical device sales position or I don’t like my pharma or biotech or medical supplies physician and I want to be I keep hearing about these 1099 guys what, based on your experience, what salary and it’s not salary because it’s a commission, but what average can you look forward to? If you do it powerfully, you do it well, you start strong and you do all that, you make all the right initial steps, what can you hope to earn?
30:10 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
that makes you say damn you know, this is something I should really consider, I’d say easily something in the neighborhood of about a hundred grand, a hundred thousand dollars a year. I was just doing some quick math right there. Again, you just have to have the volume to be able to do it, and, in my opinion, experience says that in order to have that volume, you need to have multiple lines. And I’ll say something here that this is actually very, very important to whoever may be watching this. This is something that I never really would have thought as bad as it is, but there’s some real slimy cats out there. There’s some real SOBs in this business. What I mean by that?
30:51
is In this business you’re referring to Surgical sales.
30:53 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Okay, okay, go ahead. Business, and what I mean by that is, if this business you’re referring to, surgical sales, okay, okay, go ahead where, for example, there was a guy who solicited me or we got in touch and everything was fine.
31:04 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
I’m covering paces cases for him. Down in rural pennsylvania again, I had family at the time parents in erie, pennsylvania. They’re older. It would give me an opportunity to go visit my family and go catch up with people. Long, long story short, it’d be like well yeah, where’s the commission check?
31:18 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
We haven’t gotten that?
31:19 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
My wife’s kind of the finance gal? Well, yeah, that case was six weeks ago and you got the purchase order and the purchase order is the key to getting paid. If you don’t get a purchase order number and you put it on your paper and you put it in the file or you email it or whatever. And still in the medical world, so much stuff is still on paper. It’s amazing, um, and, like you know, I call them up. Yeah, what’s up with that? But long story short, some guys would just, frankly, screw you.
31:45 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
They wouldn’t, they don’t care, and so what was the pushback? But I mean, once you’re screwed, aren’t they scared for their business, aren’t they? Well, well, you’re not going to continue working for them Like how does that work?
31:56 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Out of respect, I’m not going to mention a couple of names, but there are two guys that come to mind who were just I don’t know what. They thought they were going to get by by screwing you over, by not paying you Because one. I’m not going to continue to do this. I mean you owe me thousands of dollars. I mean you owe me thousands of dollars, right?
32:14 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
And two where it’s going to get out Right.
32:19 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
I want to make sure that reputation is going to establish itself and I would call the company and say, look, you’ve got this guy who’s not paying the reps. Like, hey, that’s, you know, it’s independent distributor. Sorry, we can’t buy it. And that’s about the feedback you’d get. Do you realize the bad PR that they’re getting Right? Get, like, do you realize the bad pr that they’re getting right? The doctors aren’t happy. I mean, I would.
32:38
I I had doctors literally sample, like begging me, asking brown, can you come to cover this case? But it’s like no, I can’t. Well, why not? Just because the guy’s not paying me. Right, I would love to, and I actually did a couple times. I went to a number of cases and I just knew I wasn’t getting it paid. But again, it gave me an excuse to be behind the red line, be with the doctor, telling the doctor how much I respect and appreciate him or her, or what have you. It’s a fascinating thing, though You’d better be prepared for what I would call the slimy guy, the guy that does not pay you because they’re out. It’s a bizarre thing. I never thought about it that way, but it’s true.
33:18 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
This is, this is enlightening. So you know, and we’re not.
33:22 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
That’s something that I, if I was coaching or counseling or trying to talk to somebody about it, you’d better do some background check. If you’re going into a room with surgery with a doctor that you’ve never been in with before, okay, you’d better do some homework on that doctor, right, right, of course, of course. Here’s well, here’s, here’s like an example that I give all the time that people are like really I go. If I’m going into surgery with some dude that went to University of Guadalajara, I’m going to have a perfect case Like why is that? Because he’s been exposed to the worst conditions in a third world atmosphere. He’s got me in the United States at a first class facility. No matter what happens, it’s going to be a great case, I guarantee you. Conversely, if you go into surgery and I had this happen I’ll cast a little shade. Rochester. Rochester is a tough place to work. One guy he went to HHS and he was the most credentialed and he was the most respected. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Those guys can be the biggest pain in the than you can ever imagine, because everybody’s put them on a pedestal and kissed the rear end from day one and they’re the best and they’re perfect.
34:35
I remember vividly this one case quick story, if I can. It was. It was like an ulnar plane, like the one that’s well, it’s no longer in my arm, but, um, it was, uh, seven screws, okay, and in the tray you’d have like five millimeter, four millimeter, three millimeter, whatever, and I could see what’s happening. The guys okay, I’ll take the five, the five, well, there are only six screws. It’s a seven hole plate. He goes and he asked for again like the seventh, five millimeter screws. And I’m standing there with a laser pointer. And that’s something that’s very, very well respected if you have a laser pointer, instead of poking or saying no, this way laser pointers ask permission to bring it through. He turns to me. You come into my room, he’s got a mascot. You’re unprepared, I don’t. It’s just. It’s just going to this rant, this petulant little rant where midfsl reason of a non-weight-bearing bone if you use a 5-millimeter, a 6-millimeter, it doesn’t matter whatever.
35:31
It’s not going to matter, but I will never forget that it made scar tissue because he’s just screaming at me about how incompetent. And you come in unprepared yes, sir, there’s nothing you can say. You come in unprepared yes, sir, there’s nothing you can say. You know. And to that point too, sales reps are frequently just kicked to the curb. Again, I’m going to sound misogynistic, but in and around medical and surgical facilities there’s a majority of females over males. Okay, and a lot of times I’m sure that some of these scrub tacks and circulators and people that are in surgery think that you know. Well, the guy’s making a few hundred grand and what I, we, you know, and you, you can be the the victim of a lot of um, hate practice. Yeah, a lot of assumption.
36:19
Yeah, yeah, and and it’s like um, I can’t tell you the number of times that stuff like that happened, where they’re just going to go after you because it’s a sales run, like, ok, whatever, I mean, you just got to have blinders on, smile and be professional and just go forward. Because, at the end of the day, if you alienate someone like that and I had a couple of things happen like that, accused of different things, that that’s not true. Now you’re. Now you’re infringing on my character, my reputation and, depending on how much of a fight you want to put up, it’s easier just to take the hits and walk away, but it’s, that’s a. There’s more drama in surgery than I could have ever imagined. It really can be dramatic, it really is.
37:05 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
No, no, no. I appreciate all your everything you’re sharing with us. So let you know we’re going to bring this to a close, but I want to ask you a question before we do so. You know, like I said, there’s a lot of people listening. Our audience are made up of people that want to get into medical sales, people that are in medical sales and people that are leading the way like VPs, ceos, managers, and then also people that are the customer. So think of your scrub techs, your physicians, your surgeons, your C-suites that manage hospitals and the like. When you consider all those people listening, let’s say they’re all thinking about a career transition. They’re just trying to figure out where they want to go and they stumble upon the brilliant words of Bruce. How would you describe why someone should?
37:59 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
entertain going the 1099 route, or why someone should not? The independence, and that’s probably the biggest word. And yeah, you know, in today’s world it’s kind of interesting right now with with our new presidents. You know he’s going after DEI and different things like that. You know, I’m a capitalist. I don’t care whether you’re black or white or pink or green, he or she or she male, I believe in meritocracy. Ok, I’m kind of a conservative, libertarian, a conservatarian, and I could see a lot of this stuff coming on the horizon, the political correct classes and all the different things. The corporate world was kind of shoveling down my throat. I was like, you know, I can do all this stuff and be independent. And it’s extremely rewarding too when you get into surgery and you’ve got a competitor or somebody there and they start to complain about corporate, oh, the corporate, this corporate. That’s like I don’t have to deal with that. You know I’m, I’m my, me, so it’s, it’s, it’s very liberating, it’s very um, um yeah liberating is probably the best word.
38:57
You have a lot of freedom and if um, if you have um the ability, because my wife would work as well, so you know my income would fluctuate the first. You have the ability because my wife would work as well, so my income would fluctuate the first few months. I remember cold calling and going out and trying to find surgery. I mean it took months to get surgeries, I mean it takes a long time. So you better financially be able to balance that and unfortunately that’s one thing that I have not been able to really deal with. If you will trying to get people to work under me a lot of times, because it’s just not a predictable income scale.
39:37
Until it is Right, yeah. And then once you get that one line and you’re repping that one line, like against Skeletal Dynamics, I mean, I don’t know who knows how much money was skeletal dynamics, um, but it was a broadly recognized, unique distal radio plate and they had radio heads but number numbered up, uh, different things, um, but that that’s that’s. That’s an imperative that you get involved with a company that’s got the reputation, that has preferably the product on the shelf and then has some degree of innovation too. Because unfortunately, a lot of the companies you know again, you said you talked to some doctors like, hey, bro, it’s plates and screws, they’re all the same, doesn’t matter. Well, it does. And unfortunately right now, in my opinion, doctors are changing a little bit Our behavior and the doctor’s ability to say look, I’m the doctor, that’s what I want for my patient, I want it and slam the door and walk out.
40:38 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
It’s been severely muted.
40:40 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
And I think the personality just has evolved. I’m baby boomer, I’m batting cleanup 1964. A lot of those older doctors were very I won’t say cocky, but they’re confident demanding. A lot of the newer doctors. I’ll have to show my age millennials at all, whoever. They just don’t have the ability to stand up and confront and say you know, damn it, I’m the doctor.
41:10 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
I got somebody to answer to exactly. They beat that mindset into my head when I was in school and that’s just the way it’s going to be, so the decision’s out of my hands. You need a rope and all these other people. No, it’s a tough thing, um, but, Bruce, you know, listen, you’re making it work. You’re making it work, you’re making it happen. You’re out there and, more importantly, you literally carved out a life of a 1099 representative to the point where this is what sustains you. I think there’s so much misinformation around what it means to be 1099 rep and I and I personally believe that people that are outside the space of medical sales, they just don’t understand what that opportunity actually means, and all the scams out there aren’t helping.
41:49 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
So one thing I was bragging about how I was not a good student in college. Getting out of undergraduate school in 1987, I only had one job offer that paid money and that was to be an assistant manager at a Kaufman’s men’s store. Ok, like I may look good in a suit but I don’t give a. So I started to sell life and disability insurance. I had a series six to 63, worked for Northwestern Mutual Life, arguably the best mutual life and disability company in the country, but that was all 1099. So I had had the exposure for three and a half four years, almost like five years. So I missed a production number and I got kind of the pink slip. And it’s like Brown, you got to go find a real job or whatever. And that’s what I was interviewing. And again I was telling you the story about me driving back and almost in tears when this guy’s telling me you’ll never be able to do it. And it was that stone in my shoe or that little thing in my head. I’m going to prove that guy.
42:42 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
I can do this, yeah, yeah.
42:44 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
That’s awesome. That’s awesome, Bruce Well.
42:46 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Bruce, we’re going to bring this to a close. It’s been amazing hearing you today. We have one more thing to do, though, before I let you go. It’s called the lightning round. Are you ready? Shoot. All right. So you have four questions to answer and you have less than 10 seconds to answer each one, and I’m going to go ahead and start.
43:11 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
So the first question is what is the best book you’ve read in the last six months? The Founding Fathers is a book that talks about the original writing in the United States Adams, jefferson, monroe, hamilton, george Washington.
43:25 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
I have a degree in history, so I’m kind of a history geek, but it’s a fantastic book. That is fantastic. I love it, I love it. Yeah, no, that’s cool. I’m reading the Republic right now and it’s the history of the one-year president God in 1860-something. But I’m a big fan of historical fiction too. So, yeah, that’s cool, but this is a biography or this is fiction. Oh, it’s biography. Yeah, Okay.
43:49 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
I wish I had the book right here. I can show it to you, but I gave it to my daughter.
43:52 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
She’s okay, okay, very cool, all right, and then, um, what is the best TV show or a movie? The?
44:07 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Beekeeper With Statham.
44:07 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Is Statham in that one?
44:08 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
I don’t know what the guy’s name, but it’s a story about this guy that was like dark ops guy and he had a business and he tends to bees. The woman that he was kind of renting from commits suicide because she got scammed on her computer and lost all his money and he goes like Black Hawk down or something and he’s, it’s just. I love it.
44:32 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
I love it. That’s cool. All right, best restaurant we want the best meal. We want the restaurant, the location and the meal.
44:42 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Yes, I can’t remember the name of the restaurant. I just got back from spending a long weekend in Vail, Colorado, and the meal was absolutely incredible. I can’t remember the name of the restaurant.
44:52 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Okay, so that’s not going to work. Bruce, that’s not going to work. So you know, carl’s going to be on you. You got to find the name. We’re going to get back to you on that, because you know. Just so you know, I literally go around the Four Seasons.
45:05 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Is that the Four Seasons? Okay?
45:07 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Is that the Four Seasons? Okay, okay.
45:11 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
We can work with that, all right.
45:12 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Cautious, very pricey. Yes, I’m very familiar with the Four Seasons. They don’t play around, but it is worth it. I haven’t been disappointed yet. All right. Last, question. What is the best experience you’ve had in the last six months?
45:28 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Best experience I’ve had in the last six months Probably just sharing Christmas with my family. My kids are. We’re empty nesters right now. My son’s a paramedic at Pittsburgh. You know he’s a kid that never played a high school sport and wasn’t really. You know he took after me academically. It wasn’t. Bookmark the things he’s been able to accomplish and sit down and listen to stories about my son saving people’s lives. My daughter, she’s here in the Buffalo area. She graduated, not valedictorian but like salutatorian from a local university and she’s bilingual and she’s a force of nature. But just being able to spend time with them over Christmas, a few days, was fantastic.
46:11 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Hey, that’s beautiful, Bruce. Bruce, it’s been a pleasure, man. Where can people find you? Where LinkedIn, I would imagine, linkedin, all right, well, everyone, his LinkedIn will be in the show notes. And again, Bruce, thank you for the time. Thank you for being on the Medical Sales Podcast. You got it, Samuel I appreciate the time and attention.
46:28 – Bruce Brown (Guest)
Cheers Best to you.
46:30 – Samuel Adekinya (Host)
Awesome, and that was Bruce Brown. You know interesting stuff, such a fascinating perspective and experience that Bruce has had. Interesting to see that in this day and age, getting started in medical device sales as a 1099 could seem like just a stepping stone, but it can literally become a career and people are making it more and more of a career each and every day and the skills that they’re getting and the opportunities of being exposed to is just enabling them to do even more in a bigger and more powerful way within the medical sales space, and it’s just so fantastic to see. As I said earlier, if this is something that you’re interested in, if you’re thinking about medical sales or you’re thinking about 1099 in medical sales or just how to make that happen, then you need to be listening to people like Bruce. And if you’re trying to find a way to get access to talk to people like him or get some information on how to make it happen for your own career or what you need to do or a potential program you can engage in that gives it to you, then you need to visit evolveyoursuccesscom, fill out an application and let’s have a conversation.
47:36
As always, we do our best to bring you guests who are doing things differently in the medical sales space. The last thing I’ll say is, if you have not subscribed to this podcast, subscribe so that you can always be in front of all the things that we’re doing to make sure you get the information you need about medical sales. Make sure you tune in next week for another episode of the Medical Sales Podcast. I hope you enjoyed today’s episode program that gets you into the medical technology industry as a sales professional or any type of role for that matter. Become a top performer in your position and masterfully navigate your career to executive level leadership. Check out these programs and learn more at EvolvesAssesscom by visiting our site, filling out an application schedule some time with one of our account executives and allowing us to get you where you need to be. Stay tuned for more awesome content with amazing interviews on the Medical Sales Podcast.
Medical Territory Manager!
I was a Regional Sales Representative for Long-Term Care pharmacy services. I had dreamed of getting into the med sales industry when I went into my career as a nurse, but the pharmacy sales job came to me, and I had just settled. Fortunately, I had a job shakeup that allowed me to determine that now was the time to pursue my original vision.
I absolutely would not have this position without Samuel and the Evolve Your Success community. A lot of people my age would just stop trying, but EYS believed in me.
EYS allowed me to break into the industry in 90-Days after I had been trying on my own for over two years! I had lots of recruiter screenings, and a few interviews with hiring managers, but I was never offered a position.
Before EYS, I didn’t realize I was doing the bare minimum to get hired. I was applying everywhere, hoping to get noticed and waiting. It just wasn’t working! I didn’t know that that was not enough to compete in an industry this sought after, and against people who knew what I didn’t know about the process.
Of course, I had to think hard before making a financial investment that’s reasonably substantial. But when I read the testimonials of real med sales reps on the site and learned that I wasn’t the only one taking a chance on my success, that EYS was sharing that risk also, I knew I had to do it. Though you might be able to cobble together some of the steps of getting a role in med sales from online research on your own, you just can’t know what you don’t know!
The process of going through EYS presents this insider knowledge to the student, as well as giving you a progression of difficulty as you obtain the information, and you begin to master it. Not only that, but they give you access to amazing mentors and instructors, allow you to practice your interview skills, and teach you how to market yourself through social media and your own website! I cannot stress enough that EYS was the factor that made the difference in my successfully landing my dream job! The support, structure, and knowledge gained was invaluable!
I would recommend this course to ANYONE looking to break into medical sales
Thank you so much, EYS! This journey has been life changing and has resulted in the successful culmination of my 18-Year ambition! 
Sports Medicine in Phoenix! I extend so much gratitude to the Evolve Your Success group as I land this role and get ready to pursue my dream job. I am a Physical Therapist who became a little stuck in the profession due to issues with reimbursement and the difficulty for continued growth upwards. I turned to EYS to assist me in learning about the medical sales industry and gain knowledgable mentors who were able to help coach me in this process. I am a strong believer in surrounding yourself with the best and good things will happen. I did work hard, but with the support of my mentors and other colleagues going through a career change, I felt a sense of community and it confirmed my drive to get into this industry. I have already learned so much through the interview process, and feel very blessed to have had the resources this group provided. I have made lifelong friends and I cannot wait to continue to follow others’ journeys to pursue this incredible field. I urge you to give Evolve Your Success a try to gain mentorship, guidance, and support through any career transition.
and am excited to make a difference in patients’ lives as a Pharmaceutical Sales Specialist.
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. I owe this opportunity to Samuel, the program, and the incredible mentors at EYS.
