133. Building Relationships Before Move-In Using STAY

Host Amber Bardon sits down with Carmen Fronczak, Chief Revenue Officer at Friendship Village, President of FV Ventures, and CEO of STAY, alongside Brett Arndt, Founder and CEO of Experience Fresh and Co-founder of STAY.

Together they discuss how a culture of innovation led Friendship Village to create STAY, a platform designed to engage older adults while they're still living at home. Rather than waiting until prospects are actively searching for senior living, STAY helps providers build meaningful relationships years earlier through technology that offers real value including AI assistance, technology support, wellness resources, safety features, and social engagement.

The conversation also explores:

•  Why innovation begins with organizational culture 
•  Creating value before the sales process begins 
•  Turning waitlists into membership programs 
•  Building trust with future residents 
•  The importance of CRM integration and workflow efficiency 
•  How consumer expectations are reshaping senior living 
•  What's next for technology supporting aging in place 

Whether you're a CEO, sales leader, marketer, or technology executive, this episode offers practical insights into creating stronger connections with future residents while positioning your organization for long-term success.

More About STAY:

Over years of visiting hundreds of communities and attending dozens of senior living conferences, we found one challenge keeps coming up: prospect engagement. 

Working closely with communities, we see firsthand how difficult it can be to keep prospects connected, informed, and confident as they move through the decision journey. 

STAY is the first prospect engagement app designed specifically to help senior living communities stay meaningfully connected with prospects between the first conversation and move-in.

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• Additional marketing material is linked HERE

More About Parasol Alliance:

Parasol Alliance is a full-service technology partner exclusively serving the senior living industry. We help senior living organizations transform their technology culture through strategic planning, managed IT services, cybersecurity, infrastructure, business systems optimization, resident technology support, and innovation consulting.

Learn more at www.parasolalliance.com and explore more episodes of Raising Tech at www.raisingtechpodcast.com.

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Transcript

Amber Bardon: [00:00:00] Welcome to Raising Tech podcast. I'm your host, Amber Bardon, and today our guests are Carmen Fronczak, who is the chief revenue officer at Friendship Village in St. Louis, and she is also the president of FV Ventures and CEO of STAY. So many different hats that she wears.

And we also have Brett Arndt, who is the founder and CEO of Experience Fresh, and a co-founder and board member of STAY. Welcome to the show. 

Brett Arndt: Thanks for having us. 

Amber Bardon: That was an impressive list of credentials. So why don't you tell me what you guys actually do? Carmen, do you wanna start? 

Carmen Fronczak: Sure. Um, so my day job anyway is chief revenue officer of Friendship Village in St.

Louis. We have two large life plan communities, um, serving about 1,400 residents on a daily basis, 1000 [00:01:00] employees. Just hit over 100 million in revenue this year, so excited for that. I've been here for 13 years. My other job and maybe more fun job or exciting job is president of FV Ventures. And FV Ventures is unique to Friendship Village in the fact that our organization and board, we wanna continuously invest back into everything that we're doing and making sure we're positioning Friendship Village for the future.

So FV Ventures is simply just an area where we make investments in new te- technology such as STAY. Look at new campuses, new services, whatever it might be. So I'm kind of always looking at sort of what's the future at Friendship Village. And then lastly, um, co-founder with, uh, Brett and also my board chair James Steele in the company STAY app.

Amber Bardon: Wow. , The FV Ventures is so unique. I haven't heard of that from a senior living organization before. How did you guys come up with that? 

Carmen Fronczak: Yeah, I, [00:02:00] I mean, you won't find a lot of non-profit senior living organizations that want to be that progressive thinking, that forward thinking. Certainly not to create a position solely devoted to looking at the future and what's the next thing that we need to do, and more importantly take money and invest it in that.

So I have a really, um, forward-thinking board, and I also have a CEO who likes to be first invest at everything. So very lucky, very fortunate for that. And, um, I think you'll continue to see Friendship Village do a lot of great things in the future because we are taking the time, energy, effort, money, uh, into focusing on that.

That 

Amber Bardon: sounds, that sounds like a fun job. It is. Sounds, sound, something that s- sounds exciting to come to work every day. Well Brett, tell us a little bit about you. 

Brett Arndt: Yeah, I, uh, I have one title. Um, the, uh, I've been able to, to work with Carmen. I, I will say something on Carmen, [00:03:00] and Carmen and I are friends, uh, in the in- initially in the industry and have been working together closely for almost four years now.

So, um, we, uh, uh, there is... Carmen, you said it really well That Friendship Village, uh, really has that desire to be first and best. Uh, and it is in... It's not just in the DNA of the team and the culture, but you feel it when you walk on any one of the campuses. Like, it is amazing. From the technology you guys are adopting, uh, it- I've never heard of a venture fund, uh, connected to, uh, to a CCRC, so it's just really cool to see that.

Um, and it's been fun to be a little bit along for the journey. Um, so Amber, my, uh, I'll give you the, the short version. Stop me if it gets, if the short version gets too long. Um, but- Oh ... uh, my, my my background, uh, actually, uh, before, uh, Experience Fresh or EXF as you'll, uh, hear us refer to, uh, the agency as, [00:04:00] uh, was in early stage startups.

Fell in love with advertising, uh, really the idea of, of creating authentic connection and trust in the digital space. Uh, launched, uh, Experience Fresh as a consultancy in 2011, and then in 2019, back half of 2019, early 2020, relaunched it as an agency. Uh, and we want... Really, a- as a launch agency, we want to do three things great.

Uh, a lot of agencies were trying to be really wide and not deep, and that's really been the DNA to who we are, uh, and we've been able to maintain that. So as an agency, uh, we focus on strategy, both brand and go-to-market. We have full creative in-house. I'm in our 125-year-old office here in downtown St. Louis.

Uh, full service creative in-house, and we also have what we call a DX, a digital experience team in-house. Uh, we've acquired three other boutique agencies and rolled them into EXF, uh, which [00:05:00] allows us, uh, to do a few things. One, allows us to create maximum efficiencies for the clients that we're serving and the problems we're solving, uh, and allows us to do it in a way that, uh, really, uh, takes us speed to market faster than any other agency.

So we're really proud of that work. Uh, we're proud of the, the tools we've built, the IP that we've built, and we kind of fell in love with the senior living industry, uh, a bit by accident. I, I feel like I hear a lot of that- That 

Amber Bardon: happens, yeah ... 

Brett Arndt: from a lot of people. It does. And, uh, and we started to actually initially serve, uh, at the, uh, provider space.

Uh, and as we were working across providers, uh, really saw an amazing opportunity to come into an industry that from a, a marketing aspect and a digital aspect was a bit behind the curve. Uh, so we brought in a lot of different methodologies from our work in D2C and e-com to our work with B2B2C, and, uh, and have had a, a really wild ride over the past five [00:06:00] years, uh, serving hundreds of communities from coast to coast.

Uh, and really focusing on not just creating amazing brand experiences, but focusing on, on really, uh, sustaining occupancy. As every agency will talk about, uh, our methodology is different. Um, we're sustaining occupancy, but we're also, uh, really focusing on not, not just driving the right leads, but the financially qualified leads that are adding to the, the overall LTV of the portfolio.

Um, and I can get more into that later 

Amber Bardon: Excellent. So Carmen, you said that Friendship Village wants to be first and best. Is that... That's the word you, word you used? 

Carmen Fronczak: Yes. 

Amber Bardon: How do you, how do you do that? What does that mean? And I'm curious how did that lead to the creation of STAY? 

Carmen Fronczak: Sure. Yeah, I think, um, when I think about Friendship Village, um, again, because we are so fortunate to have the resources to continue to push forward, um, to [00:07:00] continue to make the commitment to invest in people, positions, technology, you name it, um, I think that that helps us con- you know, to continue to be the best.

For instance, when I think about technology adoption, there are so many different technology entrepreneurs or new tech that has been launched that have shown up at Friendship Village's door and said, "Hey, I need a place to test this out. Will you be first?" And our answer is absolutely always yes. Um, and most of the time that technology has allowed us to deliver better service to our residents than we would have.

I think that also looks like even when occupancy was down, you know, after 2020 or during that time period of 20- to 2020 to 2022, our board being willing to still make the investments they needed to reposition our [00:08:00] campuses, make the investments in marketing and sales so that we could continue to push occupancy forward.

Again, I think it all starts from the leadership level and really being able to take a risk to continue to be the best. I think it, it takes that. My boss is certainly that. My board's that. Our whole team is that. Um, yeah, so I th- I think that's, that's where it starts with. STAY, um, is one of those examples.

So, uh, about two years ago we made a focused effort to get off of our campuses. We were, you know, teetering in the mid-90s of occupancy and really pushing revenue to the top of where it was going to go. And so we wanted to find a way to monetize our wait list, to grow off of our campuses. And I don't mean just in the care spaces.

We have home health, private duty hospice, those types of care services. But really, how could we start to serve seniors in the community outside of our walls and in their homes before they moved, you know, move into [00:09:00] Friendship Village? So we created a few different programs, and we've done that. Um, we have something called Early Advantage.

We have something Life Care at Home, and a senior concierge service. Won't get into all the details of all of that, but what we wanted to do was be able to do that efficiently, efficiently and do it the best that we could. So we thought, why not create a piece of technology that would allow us to power these concierge services to empower seniors to stay in their home as long as possible?

And so we started on that path. Um, I'm certainly not a tech entrepreneur. This, uh, piece of technology, STAY app, went through about five iterations, three different app developers, you name it. Um, and I will really tell you, until I got in a room with Brett and, you know, I was asking him to partner with me on the marketing side to sort of launch this technology for Friendship Village.

Again, never thinking we were gonna scale it nationally yet. Um, you know, he really pushed me and tested me and poked some holes [00:10:00] in it. And, um, about the same time, my board chair at Friendship Village, he's a tech entrepreneur, and he came alongside Brett and I and said like, "Why don't I get involved?" And so the three of us spent many hours, many late nights, uh, lots of different things on really tweaking the initial version of STAY, which was just for Friendship Village, just to allow us to communicate with our members off our campuses, to how can we create values for seniors all over the country, and how can we create values for senior living operators all over the country?

And so it kinda went from A to Z. And finally, uh, this March, we've launched it and it's live 

Amber Bardon: Wow. So that's just recently in the last two months. 

Carmen Fronczak: Yes. Yes Yeah. It's not- We... I mean, we were piloting it before that on, with our members and our, uh, prospective residents. But yeah, launching it, um, was really around March, right, Brett?

Brett Arndt: Yeah. I think it was, uh, right around at the NIC [00:11:00] Conference- Yes ... which was, yeah. 

Carmen Fronczak: Mm. 

Brett Arndt: Yeah. And it was one of those things when we launched it, you know, when you're, anytime you're deploying new technology product, uh, or especially into the industry, there, there's nothing like Stay that exists in the industry, right?

And, and Carmel was touching on this. There is amazing resident engagement platforms. There's amazing work that agencies do to really engage prospects. But where the, the journey has traditionally started is when that prospect or that resident decision maker, as we talk about in the agency world and marketing space, is actively looking and they need to solve a problem and they're in...

They're looking at, you know, one of the multiple care types, right? And what Stay, the problem that Stay addressed right out of the gate was: What if we created something that was above string, like way top of funnel? Like, what if before someone, two years, three years before they were looking [00:12:00] to make that move or to make the decision to even tour, what if we were providing value?

And what if we were creating and meeting the actual needs so that seniors could stay in home until they were ready to move into a community? So, uh, you know, we'll, we'll get into the product itself, but it really addresses those big themes that we know seniors wrestle with and seniors need, right?

Combating loneliness and security, having safety and having community, uh, and really being able to do that all while being connected to a community and also being connected to their loved ones. 

Amber Bardon: I'm, I'm curious, this is a question for both of you, how ... And, and we'll get back to the staff because I wanna go down that path, but another thing that keeps going through my mind while both of you are talking is how do you build this culture of innovation into your work cultures?

How do you constantly come up with new ideas and strategize and, you know, build that [00:13:00] into, um, your day-to-day when people sometimes get so bogged down by running the day-to-day to come up with these kind of innovative ideas like this and it, it find those opportunities? 

Brett Arndt: Yeah, Carmen, let's ... I mean, we'll, we can tag team this.

I, I think that from us on the agency side, we t- we talk a lot about who we are as an agency, right? That, that we are ... We're built to solve really big problems in very select industries, highly regulated, highly, you know, restrictions, um, and we do it by being wrapped in a branding and marketing firm, right?

Like, that's kind of how we talk. So that is, you know, we might ... Right now there's a team on the other side of this glass that is working on building, you know, product. It's working on partnering with our operators and with our providers to really create the, uh, really a maximum and more efficient way to address the needs of seniors.

You know, we, from a ... Again, [00:14:00] from, from my side of the room and then ultimately as, as it translates into our work, Carmen and I's work together, is we talk about our, our job as an agency and, and even our mission statement is we connect people to brands that make life better. That's, that's what we do. That's who we are.

Um, and so, you know, that is that connection, right? Is that we're connecting seniors who are one of the most vulnerable classes of people, and we're connecting them to brands, to operators, to communities, and all the way upstream to technology that's making their lives better. So I think Amber, it

Something that we've been impressed with and, and how Carmen's done such an amazing job with this, and, and Carmen would never share this so I can, right? Like, you know, they're at near 100% occupancy. Her sales team, they have probably the lowest churn of sales staff in any community or operator that we've met.

And when you walk in, right, you, you obviously you can see that when you walk into communities, whether it's Teri, her CEO, Carmen walking in, [00:15:00] that there is this true sense of community, and there's this true p- culture that you can feel when you walk in. But then when it goes to the staff, right, where the staff are empowered to be able to make decisions that are ultimately impacting the benefit and good of the residents they serve, it's a, it's a really, really

It's a really powerful thing to experience, but it's also a really tangible thing to experience when you're walking in their buildings 

Carmen Fronczak: Yeah, and I 

Brett Arndt: think- And- Go 

Carmen Fronczak: ahead ... 

Brett Arndt: Carmen does it with really cool ideas, so that's, that's the other- ... you know, that's the other, uh, fun aspect. Or, or a really stupid 

Amber Bardon: one. Well, well it is a challenge.

You, you don't normally think of senior living as, you know... I mean, like you said, Carmen, there's always new innovators coming into senior living from outside the industry, but you don't necessarily think of like a CCRC being an innovator. Mm-hmm. So, you know, I, I am, I'm curious to hear from you on how you...

that's been built into your culture. 

Carmen Fronczak: Yeah. I, um, I think, yeah, back to your question. I do agree that sometimes coming in with a new idea every week for your team, um, or for everyone around you can be [00:16:00] exhausting. So certainly I try to pick and choose my crazy ideas to share with everyone, um, so that I'm not overwhelming them with all of them.

But I've found just making sure I've really carefully and thoughtfully, you know, planned out the why we're doing this new thing, the how, you know, w- who is it gonna impact, who is it gonna help? And really being able to have a solid story around then I can usually get our whole team to rally around and, and get on board.

The, the reason, or I think a lot of times how we come up with these new ideas and innovation, for me anyway, is just being out and being amongst our peers and like getting out of this office and out of this campus. And going around the country and seeing all the amazing things all the other senior living operators are doing.

Meeting, um, other vendors, providers like Brett and technology companies, and just having these awesome conversations, um, [00:17:00] really help me. We'll go to lunch, and he and I will just do what I call like a brain explosion around senior living and geek out on like, "What if we could do this and that?" And, you know, just have these really fun conversations. But obviously I have to filter that down and come back and decide which ones to do or not do.

Amber Bardon: Okay, let's get back into the Stay app. I kind of took us down another path for a second 'cause I was just thinking of all those, uh, you know, ideas going through my head as you guys were speaking. So Brett, tell us, tell us more about the app 

Brett Arndt: Well, the easiest way to tell you is to show you. So the, if for all viewers and for you guys, so if you download in the App Store, whether it's Google or Android, Stay App, right?

So this is, this is what the app looks like. The, uh, so there's a few elements to the app, and, and there's some significance to the strategy behind how we built it [00:18:00] and how we're deploying it into the market. So, uh, traditionally, what, what we've seen is a really great technology that comes into the market as one sales strategy, and that strategy is to go to operators, knock on the doors of sales and marketing leaders, to knock on the doors of C-suite and say, "Hey, here's new technology.

It's really great, I promise. Here's why. Here's how it's gonna add value to either your residents or your prospects," however that might look. Uh, we didn't wanna negate that, right? Because the tool does that. It adds really, really strong value at a unbelievable tran- transparent price point, and it allows you to engage with a prospect for $5 a month, right?

So they're on the app, they're engaging with the tools from reminders to assistance to IT support to community events, and it is the ul- it will be the, the probably the most affordable and economical way for you to stay engaged and top of mind [00:19:00] with a prospect. But what we want to do is we want to say, "What would it look like if we built a D2C strategy that followed along with that in each of the markets that we're launching the app with the, really with operators that are forward-thinking?"

So, uh, two examples right now. We are onboarding three operators, uh, in different markets, East Coast, Southeast, and kind of Mi- Mid-America. And we have a supporting direct-to-consumer strategy that's launching alongside with the app. So if you are an operator, uh, call it Operator X, you have primarily, you have 30 communities.

Uh, they're pr- primarily centrally located, call it in the Southeast. What we're actually doing is we're coming alongside of you, and we're running a parallel direct-to-consumer strategy for prospects or for users to download the app and then directly link it to your community. Uh, so that's something, again, you're talking about innovation.

The product itself is innovative, [00:20:00] but the way that we're connecting with really your potential residents, uh, is, and we're doing that at a, it's not at an additional cost to our operators. Uh, so it's something that allows us, and part of this is because of our partnership, Carmen and I, right? We kind of have the technology of Stay App, but then, uh, we, you know, we're, we're wrapping it in the marketing agency of EXF.

And, uh, and part of the reason is because we have such a, we have a significant historical media management and spend in the direct-to-consumer space. So we know as an agency how to target the right audiences- Uh, in a way that is really driving the, the, the traffic that these operators wanna be engaging with and interacting with.

Um, so that's, that's a way, Amber, that's, uh, that's really exciting to be able to actually build something that's adding a ton of value to seniors. But how do we actually connect it into their hands, right? Like, that's... And we are, I mean, well, uh, you know, right now, right, in the era of [00:21:00] AI and vibe code, right, like people are producing technology every day, and they're producing tools every day, but how do you actually connect those?

Uh, so we have something i- you know, in this, right, that is adding not just value to a senior to be able to stay and age in place until they're ready to move into a community, um, but it's adding immense value at the operator really from day one of download. 

Carmen Fronczak: Amber, from the senior living operator side, I will say it's so great to have something to offer our prospects that's actually of value to them.

It's just... not just a marketing tool or tactic for me, but I'm giving them something free or complimentary, um, that they can walk away from every appointment, or I can follow up with, or I can use as a call to action at the end of an event, or I can use in a direct mail piece. Go down the list of, "Here is something I actually wanna give you," versus, "Please just come see me for this, you know, meeting," or whatever.

I look back when I was [00:22:00] actually selling senior living, and I wish I had something to always give my prospect to walk away with that was valuable. Um, so I love that piece of it, that the core essential functions of it are very, very valuable to the senior. We found in our pilot groups and in our initial onboardings of, um, partners that are using it, not every senior's gonna use every function on it, but there's enough value that they're probably gonna use one, um, or there will be something they will use, whether that's the AI assistant or whether that's the daily check-in with their trusted contact.

Um, my stepdad uses it, and the IT helpdesk is his best friend. So he is the dad that always has the remote that's not working, or I can't get my iPad to sync up with my iPhone, or whatever that might be. And so the Stay app solves that problem for him, and he's not calling me when I'm at work all day long, so I love it.

Amber Bardon: I'm [00:23:00] curious, are you running into any barriers with, with the tech adoption side? Uh, you know, I s- I talk to residents at all the communities I go to, and it's, it's such a wide spectrum of the tech usage of the residents and, and prospective residents. So, you know, are they all eager to use the app? Do you run into any barriers on that end, and how have you addressed that?

Brett Arndt: Yeah. I mean, Carmen, I think that, you know, we've done extensive, uh, we've done extensive focus groups. Uh, actually one of the first team members to join Stay, uh, was a product designer and, uh, who focuses on, like, UI, UX at a deep core methodology. So a lot of times, Amber, uh, people will build amazing technology and at its core the technology is...

can solve a great, a, you know, a great problem. Um, but if the, the user doesn't know how to use it, and if the icons aren't the right size and the typeface isn't the right size and the overall user interface isn't serving them, then it's just not [00:24:00] adopted. Um, so for us, that was something early on and, and as Carmen was saying, we, uh, and I'm gonna use the, the we pronoun here in the sense of Stay, right?

We are extremely fortunate to be backed by a venture fund because what we haven't had to do is rush to market. And when you can do it and you have the opportunity to do something like this smart and to do it really paced out well, because we have so many operators that trust what we've been doing, both with Carmen in her role as a CRO and her reputation that she's built for Friendship Village and at Friendship Village.

Then you integrate that with the just mound of data that we have from the agency side with the tens of millions in media that we've managed and the hundreds of communities that we've supported. When you kind of blend those together and you go to a, a few operators that you, that you know and trust and say, "Hey, let's, let's try this out, and then we want your feedback," right?

We really wanna hear how it's working, and we really [00:25:00] wanna see what do you need. And some of those early things that they need are like, "Hey, we need training." Great, right? We have, we hired a CS team right off the gate, right? Uh, you know, we need, uh, co-branded materials done, right? So when they're walking away, as Carmen's saying, uh, you're not just receiving a- another trifold that talks about why your community is better.

Uh, you're receiving that, but then you also have this tool and technology called Stay App that you actually want them to receive the best care possible until they're ready to move in. That trust that's being built between a, a community and a resident or a resident decision-maker, right? Which we all know the data points to that, you know, being older children, specifically daughters of seniors.

Like, when we have those and we take all those data points into consideration and then build the levels of support, uh, it's something that, uh, that really kind of creates this amazing, uh, tool. And not just amazing tool and technology, but the way that it's serving and the way that it's being activated

Amber Bardon: earlier, Carmen, you said something [00:26:00] about how tech vendors historically come knocking at the door of Friendship Village asking to, to try new products, and I think anybody listening to this podcast is in the same boat. We're con- we're constantly being inundated with new apps, new vendors, new AI companions.

There's just something every single day coming out. So what would you say to operators who are thinking, I... Why do I need another app? What, what does this do for them that's different? 

Carmen Fronczak: Yeah, I would say they probably have a resident engagement app. They might even have their own custom community app. But what I'm pretty sure they don't have is an app that's a prospect engagement tool or an app to get their brand out there and build trust with the seniors that they want to much earlier than they would have.

So we could all go tomorrow and buy a ad in something or, uh, you know, a local publication, whatever it might be, and, and hope that I reach the audience that I want. [00:27:00] But what the Stay app does is it actually lets you reach the perfect audience that you need to have. It lets you build your brand trust.

It's perfect for the individuals that aren't ready to move in. They're never gonna move in, as they say, but when, if and when they do, um, need something, they're gonna, you know, connect with your brand. For us, again, we have home and community based services such as home health, hospice, private duty, concierge services, so it's gonna drive downstream revenue also to our ancillary businesses.

So I think that's another huge part for us and, and another reason why to do it. But yeah, to those operators that would say, "I don't want another piece of technology," or, "I don't want my sales team to have to take on one other thing," and, and I share that sentiment. Like, I feel like I'm asking so much of my sales team as it is today, all the different pieces that have come out.

But I can share with you they are so excited about this, and they're so excited to have something of value to give to our prospects and a way to build a relationship [00:28:00] with them that they wouldn't have. So 

Brett Arndt: And I'll, uh, you know, because, uh, you know, Carmen's not next to me so she can't kick me under the table.

Um, but I think what's, uh, what's really unique, uh, that Carmen's done is she's integrating this into a membership program. Um, so that's, that's on the roadmap, right? As any good technology, right? There's how are we integrating, you know, what's the future roadmap look like? And I would say, Amber, you know, we've, we've deployed integrations with Hubso- HubSpot.

We're deploying, uh, integrations with all leading CRMs, with all marketing automation platforms. We're, uh, we, you know, eventually we're gonna be rolling this across other agencies. I'll slow play that one though, just 'cause- ... you know, we wanna. Um, but, uh, but we have, um, but what I love is the, is really the membership initiative, right?

And, and Carmen, you know, I'd love to tee you up to talk a little bit about how you've monetized waitlists in the past, and how, you know, we're actually, as we've rolled this out, you know, we have operators say, "Hey, can you actually help us [00:29:00] set up a membership program along with the app?" Um, because I mean, Carmen, you

I mean, how much ... I mean, the revenue you've generated for Friendship Village membership program is ex- I mean, it's extensive. 

Carmen Fronczak: Yeah. Um, in the last fiscal year anyway, it added about $10 million in revenue for us. Um, now we of course have an entrance fee component and a monthly service fee at Friendship Village, so that wouldn't look the same or, you know, for every single operator.

But w- what we did is we took a very squishy waitlist with a few hundred people like we all have, and we decided to Create a way where you could only be on the wait list if you wanna be a member of Friendship Village, and being a member meant that you have to pay to be a member. So there's a couple different tiers of it, but essentially they pay an entrance fee and a monthly fee, and they get access to our campuses similar to a country club or their gym or their favorite restaurant or wherever that might be.

Does a couple of things for us. It gets them [00:30:00] very comfortable with our campuses. It shortens the sale cycle. They're sitting at home thinking they're not ready yet, but all of a sudden they become ready sooner. Um, and these memberships, like I said, have added a lot of revenue for us, but more importantly, yes, my wait list is smaller today, but I know who's moving here, and they're gonna move here for sure.

Um, otherwise, I had, you know, like I said, a few hundred people that were on five different communities' wait lists in St. Louis, and they were just waiting to see who called first or whatever might be the right time. Um, so I really, really love what we've, what we've done with that. And again, that's really where STAY, that's...

It, it really was born out of these membership programs and how do we service these people in their homes. Today, I have to raise the flag for a second, uh, we're 100% sold, um, both campuses, everything we do. So I know Nathan was over there working on a social post to get out today, but I don't know that we've ever hit 100% sold in my 13 years of being here, and certainly not at all levels [00:31:00] of care.

So, um, the memberships are a huge piece of that for us, huge funnel. Um, even though we have turnover every single month, it's just feeding right into that, and we have people teed up and ready to go. 

Amber Bardon: Yeah. That's incredible. I, I think we're gonna s- start to see this more as a trend, where we have an operational process, and we're building the tech to support that.

Um- Yes ... you know, I think we're gonna start to see more of that, and the industry is gonna have to look more to that. But then you s- to... I, I think the... when you stated, Brett, that you're integrating it with the CRMs, I think that's gonna be huge as well because people don't wanna have, you know, 20 different passwords, 20 different systems, and they want all these- Yeah

different features, but to have them integrated together I think is really the key to that seamless operational process optimization. 

Brett Arndt: Agree, Brent? Yeah, I mean, that, th- or go ahead, sorry. 

Amber Bardon: Oh, 

Carmen Fronczak: no. I was just gonna say agreed. Just, you know, you don't wanna have to ask, like I said, your sales team to do one more thing or one more place to enter data or all of those types of things.

So I agree, the integration's super important. Go ahead, Brett. [00:32:00] 

Brett Arndt: No, I, I think the, w-what we've started to see, Amber, to what you were saying, is the need for this kind of single dashboard reporting. And, uh, it's something that we were excited about because we, we, we built it at EXF where we kind of have that, you know, full place of truth of being like, okay, here are where my campaigns are performing.

Here's where, you know, integration, you know, insight directly into my, where my CRM is. Like, all of these tools. Uh, what we... You know, what the industry doesn't need is another platform, right? It's not ... It doesn't need, uh, just another dashboard that's just aggregating data, but really, really giving important data points that are really making those educated operational decisions.

Uh, and so it's interesting that something as valuable as Stay, uh, is able to do that, right? It's able to... We're able to build those integrations that show, um, really understanding not just... I think I mentioned this early on, but when we can show and when we can start [00:33:00] to influence the, the actual value that we are creating for a resident before they even step in the door, right?

And we're building that trust, and we're building that relationship, and we're able to take that, take the messages that have been exchanged. We are able to walk in. You know, the care team's able to know right away that, you know, Sherry has X, you know, knows about her family, knows about her eating habits, knows about all these things.

We can-- They can really, as soon as they move in, you know, you're taking months and sometimes years of relational development. We've already started that through a prospect engagement tool, and it's been done through Stay. 

Amber Bardon: Yeah. It's so interesting to think about how you've taken these, these operational challenges and transformed them through technology into you're actually able to solve the problems through, through the app, which is, which is amazing.

So we are almost out of time, but I have one more question I want to ask before we wrap up. As we, as we all know, working in this industry, we've been talking for a [00:34:00] long time about how the customer is changing and how the demographic is changing. And they-- We've been talking about it for a long time, and we're actually starting to see, see it coming.

So I'm just curious, have you thought ahead to how this might evolve or change as the c- as the, the residents get younger, more tech-savvy, um, and including their families? 

Carmen Fronczak: I'll, I'll start, Brett, and then maybe you- Start us off. Go ahead ... you can jump in. Uh, I know we're specifically talking about the app, but I just wanna back up for a second and say certainly as an organization, we are looking at that holistically in a, in a few different ways.

Mm-hmm. So not just with this technology, but with master planning both of our campuses with wellness sort of retreat centers as the focal point of the campus, creating, you know, a customized wellness journey for our future residents, and really just starting to shift the things that we feel like are going to be important to our future customer.

Um, Brett and I have done some work this year where [00:35:00] we featured, um, three 80-year-old women jumping out of an airplane and two gentlemen racing Porsches, right? And it's all about changing the perception of senior living of what it is today and what it's gonna be. So to your point, Amber, I think just like we're focusing with that on our campuses and with the product that we sell, we're gonna have to do that with this app.

I think we would be foolish if we didn't say that there's gonna be many more iterations of the app. I hope it continues to grow and build upon itself and get better and better. Um, I think there's a ton of possibilities. One of the hugest things that I wanna see as sort of the next generation of it is more of a social component.

Yeah. We are doing that right now, like curating these social experiences for all of the people that are on the app in St. Louis and creating ways for them to connect and meet up in a safe spot, but we wanna create this sort of safe ecosystem that's a social piece of the app as well. So social isol- isolation [00:36:00] is one of the biggest things that we know seniors face.

So, um, that would be one of my hopes for, you know, future parts of it. Brett, I don't know about you. 

Brett Arndt: No, I, I, I mean, I couldn't agree more. Um, I think the... I think what we're seeing is our, all of our operators that we're supporting in communities, um, really when we... It's experience, right? It's what you were saying, Carmen, right?

Whether it's wellness or hospitality, that they really want an experience. Uh, and they, they wanna be wowed. And, uh, you know, that experience goes all the way down to dining, right? That experience goes all the way to, you know... We're, we're working with operators right now, uh, East Coast, that are, you know, building an entire Nordic spa.

It's, like, really, like, creating this entire experience. Um, I joke with Carmen that, you know, I'm gonna put my deposit down to Friendship Village, uh, early- ... because I I want that experience early. Um, but I- You gotta join the membership. That's right. That's right. [00:37:00] Um, but I think that, I think what we can do with Stay i- is something that really fits to w- what I, what I believe at inherently is that operators want to do what's best for seniors, right?

They want to serve and care for seniors. I... The vast majority, um, that's, that's the mission of who they are and what they do. So if that's true, then the resident journey is just as important. Or I'm sorry, the prospect journey is just as important as the resident journey, right? So those two to three years where they're engaging and where they're caring, and we're, as Carmen was saying, where we're combating loneliness and we're creating community, and we have daily check-ins, and we have...

You know, we're, we're... Right now we're building a wellness marketplace. All of these things, being able to have a single place to be able to create that experience and to care for a senior while they're staying at home before they're ready to move into one of your communities, uh, is just a... It's a [00:38:00] win-win, not just for the industry, but really for the, really the seniors that we serve as an industry.

Amber Bardon: Well, if I think about anything I wanna do in my life, I wanna book a massage or go to a yoga class or something like that, it all starts with the tech. If I go to- Mm-hmm ... a, a website and they don't have an app I can use, it's very annoying. It's like I have to call them? Mm-hmm. Like, what's going on? So, you know, it's interesting that you guys have been the, the leaders in developing that for senior living, 'cause people don't think of senior living as needing that tech piece.

It's still very much like- Mm-hmm ... oh, we have to do in-person tours, and everything's very, you know, in-person focused. And so you're leading with the tech to start, which is just becoming the norm for everything in life. Yeah. Yeah. 

Brett Arndt: Amber, you 

Carmen Fronczak: should join the Stay team, it sounds like. Yeah, I think the tech, I think this, I think the Stay app kind of creates a new entry point for operators into seniors' lives.

Mm-hmm. Like, it's not when they move on your campus, it's when they're still at home. But- Mm-hmm ... you know, you have this very strong relationship with them that we didn't have before. So excited about that, being able [00:39:00] to impact their lives sooner. 

Amber Bardon: Yeah. Well, we're almost out of time, but is there anything we haven't talked about that you want our audience to know, either about your organizations, about the app, about anything in general?

Any, any, any knowledge you wanna drop? 

Carmen Fronczak: I'll leave that to the marketing guy. 

Brett Arndt: No, I mean, I, I think that, uh, you know, I think we're, we're staying really curious right now in, in an industry that's evolving, right? You know, we ... You know, the data shows that, that we have a really big opportunity to make a really big impact, so I think Stay is a reflection of that, right?

As long as we're, we're staying curious in what, what seniors need, and how we can s- we can really serve them and support them, uh, it's gonna be a, a really exciting journey ahead. 

Amber Bardon: Yeah. Well, th- this is amazing. Carmen, I've known you for a while, but I didn't know about any of this part of the work you do.

So I ... It was incredible to hear about it. And Brett- Thank you ... it was incredible to meet you as well. And thank you so [00:40:00] much for coming on the show today. 

Carmen Fronczak: Thank you. Thanks for having me. And I can't wait to have you work with Friendship Village on our technology assessment and roadmap too. 

Amber Bardon: Me too. 

Carmen Fronczak: Okay.