Meet Addie Luff of Luff Dental

Today we’d like to introduce you to Addie Luff.

Hi Addie, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstories.
I was born and raised in Arkansas and moved to Kansas City in 2015 for dental school. While in dental school, I met my husband (who is not a dentist) and we got married in 2019. We have three fur babies and most recently our family grew by one more with the addition of a little girl in August of 2022.

As a kid, I always knew I wanted to go into the medical field. Science and math were always my favorite subjects in school and I wanted to have a career where I got to help people. My dad is a dentist and when I was 14 I began working in his office. I started out learning the insurance and front office side of things before I moved on to assist him on cases. During my time working at his is when I decided I wanted to become a dentist. I loved the connection that you got to make with patients and that you could make a real impact on their life. It was a tough road to get to dental school, with lots of studying and working to have perfect grades. I was lucky to have an amazing support group of friends and family. Getting into dental school was such a relief. Four years of hard work led to me moving to Kansas City for dental school. Once I moved to KC, I instantly fell in love with the area and could see myself being here for the long term. Fast forward another four years and I was graduating from dental school and beginning my first job. My first job came with a huge learning curve. You learn so much in dental school, but nothing can quite prepare you for working in the real world. I began my career in corporate dentistry.

It was a great learning experience, but ultimately not for me. I knew I wanted to be the type of dentist with who I got to make a real connection with my patients. Getting to know my patients and understanding their goals and providing personalized treatment is what I wanted, but just wasn’t able to do in a corporate environment. So, in August 2020, I started my own dental office, Luff Dental. While corporate dentistry wasn’t for me, it helped me get a vision for exactly how I wanted to practice dentistry and how I wanted my office to feel for patients. No part of this was or has been easy, but I have loved getting to create an office environment that people enjoy coming into! I have used that as the basis for growing Luff Dental. We are two years in at this point and I have the most amazing patients who are truly more like family to me. I feel so grateful to be part of an amazing community that is supportive of small businesses.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Getting to this point in my career has been anything but smooth. I started my office in August 2020. Arguably not the best timing. We were in the middle of a pandemic and I started an office with ZERO patients at a time when people were scared to go to the dentist because there were so many unknowns with Covid. On top of that, I knew nothing about running a business. There are so. many things that dental school prepares you for in your career, but how to run a practice is not one of them.

So I quickly got to work learning as much as I could about running a business and finding a team of people who are much smarter than me in this area to help me. I am still growing the office and learning daily how to be a better employer. Thankfully even on the toughest of days, I have a wonderful team at the office and an amazing husband at home who supports me. The process of starting my own office has been so incredibly rewarding and worth all of the hard work.

As you know, we’re big fans of Luff Dental. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?
I am the owner and general dentist in Lee’s Summit, MO at Luff Dental. I provide comprehensive care for patients to help them achieve their smile goals. I am most proud of the environment that I have created at my office. Dentistry is quickly being dominated by corporate offices that are more focused on the volume of patients they can see versus creating relationships with patients. My goal is that from the second you walk into Luff Dental, it feels like a family. I see patients of all ages and provide comprehensive dentistry for the entire family. I love that I get to know families and watch as their kids grow and become adults and start their careers and families.

I have a wonderful team that is fun and personable and work so hard to make sure patients have the best experience.

I love that owning my own office allows me the time to sit down and actually get to know my patients and create a personalized treatment plan to help them achieve their smile goals while alleviating any anxieties they may have about being at the dentist. I am aware that a majority of people have a lot of anxiety surrounding the dentist. But my goal is to calm those fears and create a fun experience for the patient.

Have you learned any interesting or important lessons due to the Covid-19 Crisis?
Starting a business in the middle of Covid has taught me so much. It’s never easy to start a dental office from scratch, especially in the middle of a pandemic. There were many times at the beginning that I was worried we wouldn’t make it simply because getting patients was so difficult.

The biggest takeaway that I have gotten from the past few years is that hard work and patience are key. But I have seen how that hard work and patience have paid off. I have not sacrificed the family feeling at my office and having the opportunity to create meaningful relationships with my patients has made every day feel so rewarding.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.luffdental.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/luffdentaldds
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/LuffDental

Image Credits
Crimson Media