Andrew Dick: Hello, and welcome to the Healthcare Real Estate Advisor podcast. I’m Andrew Dick, an attorney at Hall Render, the largest healthcare focused law firm in the country. Today we’re talking to Yoni Kirschner. He is the founder of 1Konnection, which is a senior housing marketplace, a bit of a unique marketplace for buyers and sellers, which we’re going to talk about a little bit later. We’re going to talk about his background, and how he decided to come up with this idea, and then launch a company. So Yoni, thanks for joining me.

Yoni Kirschner: It’s a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me.

Andrew Dick: You bet. So let’s talk about your background. What did you do after high school? Did you go to college? What did your education look like? And then what did you do as your first job?

Yoni Kirschner: Oh, first job, that starts way before the end of high school. But no, I’ve been working ever since I was probably 12 years old is when I really had my first job. It was in waitering. Starting out in high school, I was really always trying to do something more outside of school, since I was never really too fond of school, and I never really excelled too well at that. Did okay, but got by, and always found a way to get by. Throughout high school, did waitering and then went to college at the University of Illinois at Champaign. While I was there, actually started my first business called Chicago Kosher Dinner, which was a kosher food delivery service at downtown Chicago. Kind of like Grubhub, before Grubhub since that was probably like 2011. Then as I was there, I was doing door-to-door sales, selling roofing and siding, getting up on 30-foot roofs, checking up hail, and wind damage, and all that fun stuff.

And then after I graduated from college, getting a degree in consumer economics and finance, I really didn’t know what I wanted to do probably as most people coming out of college. And I ended up getting connected to someone who worked at this company called Omnicare Pharmacy. I hadn’t heard of it. Apparently, my aunt even worked there, I had no idea. And I got a job offer from there doing sales. And the day I actually signed my contract with them was the day they got purchased by CVS Health. So immediately went into working for a Fortune 5 company, which was pretty interesting.

Andrew Dick: And so talk about that role. It sounds like you were pretty successful in your sales role and hit a number of milestones working for that company. Talk about that just for a little bit.

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, definitely. So it was funny, one of my first weeks there was a national sales conference, and someone came up and introduced themselves to me. It was like a VP or exec at the company. And they’re like, “Hey, nice to meet you. What territory do you have?” And I told them, Chicago and the Chicagoland area, and they laughed, and they said, “Good luck with that.” And for me, I always find motivation in someone telling me I can’t do something or something’s impossible to do. And that, just right off the bat, I was like, “All right, here we go. Let’s get after it.” And in the first year I was there, I ended up being one of the top five sales rep in the country, selling pharmacy services, nursing home-owners, and operators across the country.

And then I got promoted to one of the youngest regional sales managers in the country, won one of 15 awards that were given out at the National Sales Conference for collaboration across the entire company. I was always someone that was really focused on, I’m not just here to do something for myself, but I’m here to help others win, because why would I pass up on the opportunity? It doesn’t always need to be for me, but if there’s an opportunity to help someone else, why not get after, and why not do that for someone that can actually be beneficial? So that was kind of my year and a half, two years at Omnicare CVS Health. It’s pretty exciting.

Andrew Dick: And so after that, you worked for another pharmacy company. Talk about that. What kind of work?

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, so it was similar. I’m not someone that likes being limited in many ways since I’m someone that always strives to be the best version of myself. So, while I was at CVS Health, being at such a large company, there’s obviously a lot of red tape that goes into being with someone that’s so big. And I felt like I had kind of maxed out for where I was in my life kind of early on, 22, 23. My potential there, and I was stopping my personal growth and professional growth. So I went to a smaller pharmacy to be their head of sales. I doubled them in a year after they hadn’t really grown in four, selling over $8 million in new business in one year. And from there, I felt like I had kind of accomplished this next cycle of really proving out that I could sell at a higher dollar value, and these more complex sales, and really complete that flow of doing those types of sales for a company, and growing it.

Andrew Dick: Got it. And then you came up with an idea and-

Yoni Kirschner: I came up with an idea.

Andrew Dick: Talk about that, because even though you were selling to skilled nursing operators, your current company is a little bit outside of what you were doing.

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, it definitely was. It was pretty funny. I kept going to larger conferences. As I got to that role within the smaller pharmacy where I was more high up, I obviously had more of a national reach on the capability to establish national relationships. So as I was going through that and going to larger conferences, I network with all the owners and operators of senior housing and healthcare real estate. Then he’d always ask me, “Hey, Yoni, do you know anyone selling a nursing home in New York?” Or whoever it was, right? X, Y, or Z doesn’t really make a difference. And I said, “Huh, why the hell are they asking me? I have nothing to do with this type of sales. Maybe there’s something here.” That kind of started the journey of 1Konnection.

Andrew Dick: And so, talk about 1Konnection, because it’s a very interesting platform. There are a number of different sales platforms for real estate in general. But this is a very focused online marketplace for buyers and sellers of senior housing. Talk about the vision and how it works.

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah. So before I even get into that, I think there’s a few key things I realized that really led to the foundation of 1Konnection. When you look at our industry as a whole, as I’m sure you’ve experienced and many other vendors in the industry, and even myself as a pharmacy sales rep, the only way I was successful at selling pharmacy services was because I was so persistent. The number of meetings that I had where people literally just met with me because they said You wouldn’t stop calling us, was astounding, and it was a lot. And these are multimillion dollar decisions. And when I was going through that process, I realized that why are these people meeting with me just because I’m persistent with a decision like this that actually affects the quality of people’s lives?

And the reason was, because these decision makers in our industry are so, I guess, overcome with 30 times a day. They get new vendors reaching out for something, whatever it is. And their main focus is improving the quality of lives of their residents and their patients. And they don’t have time to deal with vendors and make these educated purchasing decisions. So really, the whole concept of 1Konnection was to build this online marketplace for decision makers in our industry, to have them gain the capability and empower them with access and resources to make the best decisions for them with transparency that doesn’t exist. And right now, if you look at our industry, the same way I was successful in pharmacy sales, it’s all offline. It’s all word-of-mouth networking. But you look outside of healthcare and senior housing, and there’s so many other industries that have been more technology adapt, and more innovative, and actually utilizing that technology to improve the greater outcomes of the industries.

And I think senior housing and healthcare real estate, even though there’s so much technology and innovation between products and services, I think the industry as a whole is still lacking from innovation and technology. So when you look at 1Konnection, and what we set out to do, and what it was like to found it, the concept was if we can get everyone in one place, empower them with the tools and resources they need to be successful, that can actually create this greater ecosystem of success, improving the quality of care for residents, and also decreasing cost for the decision makers and actually creating this greater value for everyone in healthcare. So I know that long-winded answer to not actually, but…

Andrew Dick: No, that background was helpful. But talk about who is the target market for 1Konnection? Is it just senior housing? Does it go beyond that? Talk about the type of buyer and seller, and how it works. Go into a little bit more detail.

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah. So it goes beyond just senior housing, it’s healthcare, real estate. It’s really everything that encompasses that. The second thing I found to go back one step and I’ll come back with you, was that these deals have to be done confidential. You’re dealing with people’s lives and they can’t be listed on a real marketplace. So if we’re able to aggregate everyone by giving them access to what they wanted, which are these senior housing acquisition deals for buying and selling nursing homes, senior housing, answering that question, they came to me with, “Do you know anyone buying or selling?” We have the capability to build out this ecosystem of vendors that really supports their needs. So now instead of the vendors chasing after them like I was, they actually have the power to choose the vendors at the time they need them. And so the way we did that, the first step was let’s get everyone on the same page by giving them access to these deals.

So we created this acquisition marketplace for buyers and sellers, brokers of senior housing, healthcare, real estate, whether it’s assisted livings, we’re just getting into medical office building and starting to explore that since that really completes the whole thing. But behavioral health, everything from A to Z within healthcare, which at the end of the day, you would end up having the need for some sort of vendors for quality of services, for residents, or patients. So that’s kind of where we’re at today, is connecting these buyers, sellers, and brokers for these acquisition opportunities. And as we’ve been doing that, we’ve been seeing kind of this hypothesis, if you’d like to call it, or experiment of this ecosystem of vendors building itself naturally. We have owners and operators of senior housing, healthcare real estate saying, “Hey, 1Konnection, do you guys have vendors for X, Y, or Z?” And we have vendors coming and saying, “Hey, instead of pounding on doors endlessly and just networking to the people we need, you guys have access to everyone we need, and who they are, and what they need. Can you start making those introductions?”

So as we look at the greater vision of 1Konnection and where we’re going, it’s really to build out those next stages, and create this one-stop shop marketplace for decision makers in the industry, really giving them the resources they need to make the best decisions possible from acquisitions to operations.

Andrew Dick: Okay. So let’s take an example. We have an owner of an assisted living facility interested in selling. You’re right, it’s important to be discreet about the opportunity. What would they do? Would they create an account on 1Konnection, and describe their property, upload some photos? How does that work?

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, so a lot of times the owners come to us with brokers representing them, which is great. We love working with brokers, since it just makes a little more… It makes the process a little more simple, because obviously, if you bring in the more educated parties, they know what to do and how to do it from the start, which obviously increases certainty of execution. So an assisted living owner might have a broker representing to them. They come to the platform, they give us high level overviews of the business, and we kind of operate like a matchmaker, like a Tinder or a dating app, if anyone knows those types of references. But it’s really, we keep these opportunities confidential, which is the core piece of this. It’s really more of a matchmaking platform, algorithm involved.

They give us a high level overview. We kind of put in certain fields as vague, and we match that up. Then if we have a buyer come in, the buyer comes in, enters their buying criteria. They give us company profile background, so we actually can start improving the quality of buyers. And then we match that to the potential buyers. We say, “Hey, buyers, we found you a new opportunity. Are you interested?” And we get them connected. And that’s kind of how we’ve been working to date. And as we look at the next stages, actually in the next few weeks, we’re launching an app and full platform from the feedback we got in the past year. And this is really a platform to empower the users. So how do we surround the technology and tools that actually helps them increase efficiency to get more deals done faster?

Andrew Dick: So let’s go back to our example, the assisted living facility owner operator, they have a broker. How does 1Konnection get paid? How does the broker get paid in the deal? Because I think that those are the questions that come up.

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah. So as of today, we take a 1% platform fee. Up to 1% on the buy side, so we don’t take anything from the brokers. It’s really based on a sliding scale. Since we’re not a broker, we’re just a marketplace like any other, so there’s success fees involved. And as we look at building out this next stage of value for users. And as you look at what the opportunity is here, if we could help, whether it’s a vendor or a broker get more deals done, because they have more capacity, they now have more resources, they don’t have to be spread so thin and how they’re spending their time, because they have technology empowering them, then we’re also increasing the value for them. They’re getting more money in their pockets. So we’ll look at with this next stage of evolution, what’s the right way to monetize to keep everyone utilizing the platform. And also help continue driving deal velocity for the industry.

Andrew Dick: Interesting. So talk about… I mean, be even more granular. Is this marketplace for all types of buyers and sellers? Or are you focused on smaller owner operators, or institutional owner operators? I mean talk about who is this focused on. Or is it cover the gamut?

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, so it’s been interesting. It’s been a pretty long journey to get here. And you kind of see in startups who the early adopters are, and it’s really the people that are smaller to mid-size people, that are more willing to take chance, take risks. And then at the end of the day, after you prove it out with those people, then the larger institutional players who do things the way they’ve always done them, now start to say, “Huh, what’s going on over there? Looks like something might be happening.” And then they start to come. So when we started building 1Konnection, it was really the small and medium sized players. Over the past year, we’ve actually got some of the largest industry brokers on the platform. We went from kind of maybe a 50 million a year in total deal volume in 2020, to last year we had over two and a half billion dollars, and total deals come through the platform.

And we grew from 1000 to 6,000 users pretty quickly in just a year for just someone having an idea of being a pretty bootstrap team. So it’s really for everyone across the gamut, whether they’re owner operators at a small mom and pop, I’ve had those conversations, or some of the largest players in the industry. But the core audience, if you think about our industry as a whole, the largest players, and I think why they are the kind of the latter adopters, is those people already have access to everything they would need. And not just that, but they also have the resources to manage all of that. The people that really need marketplaces are the people that don’t have access. It’s the people that aren’t on the same playing field. They don’t have teams that can go do acquisitions or optimize operations. So it’s really for the small to medium players to start that don’t have access, that don’t have the resources, that don’t have the time to be as efficient as the people that have it mailed down to the team.

Andrew Dick: Very interesting. And congratulations on the growth, that’s tremendous over just a short period of time. Talk about the team, Yoni. I mean, I know that you started out really on your own, founding the company with this idea, have grown the business. Talk about what the 1Konnection Team is today. What does it look like?

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, we’re pretty scrappy. Right now, it’s myself, head of sales customer success. And we’ve got a small outsource development team that we’ve been managing that’s actually been over in Ukraine since the start of everything going on. But we’ve been pretty scrappy. What I really try to do, I think, as an entrepreneur, is be pretty self-aware, and surround myself when in areas of weaknesses, or areas of people, areas of opportunity where I can bring in someone that’s more strategic, has more experience to supplement our growth. So it’s really been about finding some of these core pieces, whether they be advisors, or just friends, or whatever it might be, and consultants and surrounding us with a larger team of people that are highly skilled in what they do.

Andrew Dick: As we wrap up here, let’s talk about a couple things. Where do you see 1Konnection going in 2023? You’ve had tremendous growth as we talked about. Any key goals this year or milestones that you’re looking forward to?

Yoni Kirschner: Definitely. I think what we did last year with no established brand, no marketing was pretty incredible, really proved out here that there is a need for this. And people ask me, “Does anyone actually look for nursing homes or assisted livings online? And are these vendors interested?” And we saw that with over 500 vendors on our wait list, and thousands of owner operators signing up, and thousands of deals coming through the platform, there is a need. And that was really the goal of 2022. Is there something here? And with that growth we established, yes, the goals of 2023 are really to optimize now. Now we have everyone we’ve seen what works, what doesn’t work. Now let’s focus on improving quality and taking this to the next level to make all of this value that we’ve seen is potentially there come to reality and fruition.

So I think our goal is for 2023 are pretty simple. It’s to increase deal velocity right on the acquisition side and start getting into helping those vendors and the owner operators connect, whether it’s on the acquisitions or the vendor procurement of the actual operations, really starting to prove out this ecosystem and answering that next question of, “Hey, is there a greater marketplace here for the entire industry?” Because if you could lock in that piece, you have the opportunity to really revolutionize senior care and healthcare as a whole. Not just within the US but potentially globally, greater than 2023, four or five years down the line for the entire industry as a whole, which is a large opportunity to help a lot of people.

Andrew Dick: Well, I love the vision. I get excited about high growth companies like yours. How about providing some advice to folks who are getting into the healthcare real estate industry? I mean, you were working in a different area of healthcare, stumbled into healthcare real estate. What advice do you have someone who’s new to the industry, and what would you tell them to do?

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, I think one of the most shocking things that I’ve found is, I’ve been selling stuff my whole life. Kind of like I mentioned. When it came to 1Konnection, the willingness of people around you to help like yourself, you were with me from the start. You always offered, “Hey, if there’s anything I can do to help, let me know.” I think it’s, don’t be afraid to ask the people around you for help. There’s so many people in the industry, and while some of it might be skewed by these outliers, I think when you’re talking about the industry as a whole, we’re all here for the same reason. And that’s because we believe in the industry. We want to improve the quality of lives, and we want to help the people around us, because that truly has an effect on real people. And I think a lot of people are bought in on doing that and willing to help each other get there.

So don’t be afraid to ask the people in our industry for help. Everyone will help. Not everyone, never say everyone. But people are willing to help. And that can make a huge difference in getting involved in the industry and kind of help take you from start to something.

Andrew Dick: Well, this has been a great discussion. Yoni, tell the audience where they can learn more about you in 1Konnection.

Yoni Kirschner: Yeah, LinkedIn. Or you can’t visit us@www.1Konnection.com. It’s the number one, in Konnection with the K. We’ve got an exciting launch coming up next week, so come check us out. We’d love to have you on there and happy to connect with you guys if you reach out directly.

Andrew Dick: Well, thanks to our audience for listening to the podcast on your Apple or Android device. Please subscribe to the podcast and leave us feedback. We also publish a healthcare real estate weekly update. If you’d like to subscribe to that, please go to my LinkedIn page and there is a link to subscribe.