Community Highlights: Meet Brian Edwards of Three Two Three Dentistry

Today we’d like to introduce you to Brian Edwards.

Hi Brian, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’ve been in dentistry for over 16 years, but the version of dentistry I practice today looks very different from the one I was originally taught.

Like many dentists early in their careers, I entered a system heavily driven by insurance limitations, production pressure, and reactive treatment. Patients would often come in only once something hurt, and hygienists were frequently viewed as support staff instead of the clinical foundation of long-term health. Over time, I realized that model wasn’t creating the type of care, culture, or impact I wanted to be part of.

My path into ownership also started under extremely difficult circumstances. In my very first startup practice in Laguna Niguel, I was renting rooms from another dentist who ultimately used my DEA information to illegally prescribe drugs. The situation escalated even further when he later became involved in bank robberies and ended up making national headlines. As a young dentist trying to build a career, it was an incredibly stressful and eye-opening experience that forced me to quickly learn the importance of protecting your integrity, your reputation, and the environment you choose to build around yourself.

That experience shaped me more than I realized at the time. It made me understand early on that culture, ethics, leadership, and alignment matter just as much as clinical dentistry itself.

That realization eventually forced me to rethink everything.

I became increasingly passionate about prevention, patient education, and building a practice where hygiene wasn’t an afterthought — it was the center of the entire patient experience. That philosophy eventually led to the evolution and rebrand of my practice into Three Two Three Dentistry, named after ideal healthy gum measurements: 3-2-3. What started as a number became a much bigger idea and movement around elevating preventive care and redefining what modern dentistry can look like.

Today, we operate as a fee-for-service, hygiene-first practice focused on long-term health, advanced diagnostics, Guided Biofilm Therapy (GBT), patient experience, and building a culture where both patients and team members genuinely feel cared for. We’ve intentionally created an environment that prioritizes education, trust, and prevention rather than simply waiting for disease to occur.

One of the most meaningful parts of the journey has been seeing how empowering hygienists and investing deeply into culture changes everything. Our team has become incredibly aligned around a shared mission, and patients feel that difference the moment they walk through the door.

Outside the practice, I’ve also become passionate about sharing these ideas with the profession through podcasts, speaking opportunities, social media, and mentoring other dentists who are trying to build more intentional businesses and healthier cultures. A lot of my content centers around helping practices move away from survival mode and toward systems that support both exceptional patient care and sustainable growth.

At the same time, I’m currently working on developing a flagship future headquarters for Three Two Three Dentistry in Santa Clarita — a project designed to combine elevated clinical care, continuing education, leadership, and community under one roof. It’s one of the biggest and most challenging projects I’ve ever taken on, but also one of the most exciting because it represents where I believe dentistry is heading.

The journey definitely hasn’t been linear. There have been setbacks, hard decisions, financial risks, and moments where rebuilding the vision felt uncomfortable. But looking back, the biggest breakthroughs often came from questioning the traditional model and having the courage to build something more aligned with what I truly believed dentistry could become.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Absolutely not. The road has been anything but smooth, and honestly, many of the hardest moments ended up shaping the philosophy behind the practice we’ve built today.

Early in my career, I rented rooms from a dentist in Laguna Niguel who ultimately ended up using my DEA information illegally to prescribe drugs. The situation escalated even further when he later became involved in bank robberies that made national headlines. As a young dentist trying to establish myself professionally, it was an incredibly stressful and surreal experience. It taught me very early that talent and clinical ability mean nothing if they aren’t paired with integrity, leadership, and the right environment.

As I continued practicing, I was fortunate to work in several very successful offices, but many of them didn’t have long-term room for growth or alignment with the kind of dentistry I envisioned. Eventually I realized that if I wanted to build something centered around prevention, elevated patient experience, culture, and long-term health, I would have to create it myself.

Opening my own practice was another major shift because I quickly learned success was no longer primarily about my hand skills or clinical dentistry. It became about leadership. Building systems. Creating a mission. Finding the right people. Developing a team that genuinely believed in the same standards and values.

I became obsessed with the idea that patients should feel the same level of excellence in their experience as they do in the dentistry itself. Not just great clinical outcomes, but trust, connection, education, hospitality, communication, and consistency. I realized dentistry is ultimately a people business, and culture drives everything.

There were also difficult operational and financial challenges along the way. At one point, I discovered embezzlement happening within the office, which was both financially and emotionally draining. Experiences like that force you to mature quickly as a business owner and become more intentional about systems, accountability, and leadership.

Then COVID hit at one of the worst possible moments for us. We had just completed an expansion into a larger suite, and the month we were supposed to fully launch the new space, the shutdowns happened. On top of that, five out of our ten employees became pregnant around the same time after returning. It created an enormous amount of operational pressure and uncertainty while trying to keep the business alive and support the team through a difficult period.

That season probably pushed my mental and physical health harder than anything else in my career. It forced me to take ownership of my own health, mindset, and leadership habits in a way I never had before. I started investing heavily into coaching, personal development, fitness, structure, and learning from entrepreneurs outside of dentistry. Dan Martell’s coaching and entrepreneurial frameworks had a major influence on how I began thinking about systems, leadership, vision, and building a business intentionally rather than constantly reacting.

At the same time, working with the team at SurfCT helped me realize that branding and patient experience weren’t superficial — they were extensions of the mission itself. Together, we started building a practice identity centered around health, prevention, hygiene, and long-term patient transformation instead of simply treating disease.

Looking back now, many of the hardest moments became turning points. The setbacks forced me to stop thinking like only a clinician and start thinking like a leader, visionary, and culture builder. That shift ultimately became the foundation for what Three Two Three Dentistry is today.

Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Three Two Three Dentistry?
Three Two Three Dentistry was built around a simple but powerful belief: dentistry should focus on creating health, not just treating disease.

The name “Three Two Three” comes from ideal healthy gum pocket measurements, and that philosophy drives everything we do. We are a prevention-first, hygiene-centered, fee-for-service dental practice focused on helping patients achieve long-term oral and overall health through elevated preventive care, advanced technology, patient education, and an exceptional experience.

What truly sets us apart is that hygiene is not treated as a secondary department in our office — it is the foundation of the entire practice. Our hygienists are highly trained clinicians who stay deeply involved in the latest science, technology, systemic health research, and standards of care. We utilize advanced diagnostics, Guided Biofilm Therapy (GBT), digital imaging, airway awareness, salivary testing, and comprehensive patient education to help patients understand not just what is happening in their mouths, but why it matters to their overall health.

We’re also incredibly intentional about the patient experience itself. I became obsessed with the idea that patients should feel the same level of excellence in the experience as they do in the dentistry. From the environment and communication to the way we educate and build trust, every part of the practice is designed to feel elevated, personal, modern, and health-focused rather than cold or transactional.

One thing I’m especially proud of is our in-house VIP Membership Plan. The goal is simple: help patients achieve a healthy bite, no cavities, and gums free of inflammation while making proactive care financially predictable and accessible.

Instead of patients waiting for emergencies or feeling stressed every time dentistry is needed, our membership model allows them to prepay for preventive care through manageable monthly payments. We still help patients maximize any insurance benefits they may have, but the focus shifts away from fear and financial surprises and toward long-term health planning.

We want patients to feel empowered knowing they have a team proactively monitoring their health and helping them avoid bigger problems before they happen. In many ways, it changes the entire relationship patients have with dentistry. Instead of associating dental visits with pain, anxiety, or unexpected bills, they begin to see dentistry as part of maintaining their health and quality of life.

Brand-wise, I’m probably most proud that Three Two Three has evolved into more than just a dental office. It’s becoming a philosophy and movement around elevating prevention, empowering hygienists, creating healthier practice cultures, and challenging the traditional reactive model of dentistry.

We’ve been fortunate to gain attention through podcasts, speaking opportunities, social media, and hosting educational events, including becoming the first West Coast location to host Guided Biofilm Therapy certification training. But what matters most to me is hearing patients say things like, “I’ve never experienced dentistry like this before,” or seeing team members genuinely excited and proud of the environment they work in.

At the end of the day, our mission is simple: create a place where patients feel cared for, educated, respected, and inspired to take ownership of their health — while building a team culture centered around growth, excellence, positivity, and prevention.

Because the reality is: you truly can’t afford not to invest in your health.

Can you talk to us about how you think about risk?
I think entrepreneurship and leadership inherently require risk, but I’ve learned that the biggest risks are often the moments where you decide to trust your vision before the world gives you proof that it will work.

One of the biggest risks I’ve taken started in 2021 when I cold-called the owner of an old 1949 house sitting on top of a hill directly behind the office space I currently lease. Most people would have driven past it and seen an outdated, ramshackle property. I saw the possibility of creating something symbolic — a flagship headquarters that could physically represent everything Three Two Three stands for: prevention, innovation, education, elevated patient experience, and the future of dentistry.

At the time, I had no guarantees the project would even be possible. Since then, it’s been over five years of navigating city approvals, zoning issues, architecture, engineering challenges, financing conversations, and countless obstacles that most people never see behind the scenes. There were many moments where it would have been easier to walk away. But today we finally have a viable approved direction and are now moving into construction documents, which feels incredibly rewarding after such a long process.

That project taught me that meaningful visions usually take far longer, require far more resilience, and demand much more emotional endurance than people initially expect.

Another major risk I took was long before dentistry. Before dental school, I traveled around the world alone for five months with just a backpack. Looking back, that experience probably shaped my mindset more than I realized at the time. It forced me out of comfort, taught me adaptability, confidence, perspective, and helped me realize how much growth happens when you place yourself in unfamiliar environments. I think it gave me a much larger view of possibility and made me less afraid of uncertainty later in life.

More recently, another form of risk has been putting myself publicly out there on social media and podcasts speaking openly about topics that can be uncomfortable within dentistry — especially around insurance dependency, prevention-focused care, practice culture, and the growing tension between dentists and hygienists.

It’s always safer to stay quiet and follow the traditional path. But I felt strongly that many of the frustrations happening in dentistry are symptoms of a larger issue: a system that often financially rewards treating disease more than preventing it. I wanted to advocate for a model where hygienists are empowered, prevention is elevated, and patients receive care centered around long-term health instead of reactive treatment.

When you publicly challenge parts of the status quo, you naturally open yourself up to criticism, misunderstanding, and skepticism. But I’ve learned that if your intentions are rooted in genuinely helping people and improving the profession, those conversations are worth having.

Overall, I don’t think risk-taking means being reckless. To me, it means being willing to move forward despite uncertainty when something deeply aligns with your values and vision. Most of the biggest opportunities in my life came from moments where there was no guarantee of success — only conviction.

Pricing:

• $39.99 Three Two Three Hats available on LinkTree on Instagram
• $39.99 Three Two Three T-Shirts available on LinkTree on Instagram
• VIP Dental Plan starting at $61/mo

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ThreeTwoThree.com
• Instagram: @ThreeTwoThreeDentistry
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/three-two-three-dentistry-santa-clarita-2

Image Credits
Kathy Hale @KathyHalePhotography : Headshots of Dr Brian
Lindsay Schlick @SchlickArt : collage of patient photos