The Heart-Led Business Show

Pill Reduces Alcohol Cravings? with Jonathan Hunt Glassman

• Tom Jackobs | Jonathan Hunt-Glassman • Season 1 • Episode 128

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Jonathan Hunt-Glassman knows what it’s like when alcohol takes control of your life. That struggle became the seed of Oar Health, a company helping over 70,000 people drink less or quit entirely.

Before founding Oar, Jonathan was transforming healthcare from the inside at Humana, Optum, and Bain. But it was his personal journey that taught him how to build a heart-led, mission-driven business that actually works.

In this episode of The Heart-Led Business Show, Jonathan shares how he turned his challenges into solutions, the lessons he’s learned scaling a business without compromising mission or members, and a free resource for anyone curious about smarter ways to drink less.

🎧 Watch the full episode now!

👉 Don’t forget to like, share, and leave a review. Your support helps others discover this inspiring conversation!

📌Key Takeaways
✔️The little-known medication that can curb alcohol cravings and why it’s rarely discussed.
✔️Jonathan’s personal journey with alcohol and how it fueled a purpose-driven business mission.
✔️Why leaving your job abruptly may do more harm than good.
✔️The real story behind today’s alcohol trends
✔️Strategies for aligning purpose with profit when the stakes are high.

📌About the Guest
Jonathan Hunt-Glassman, CEO and Founder of Oar Health, is a healthcare entrepreneur transforming alcohol use disorder treatment. Drawing from his personal experience with alcohol misuse, he founded Oar Health to provide private, convenient access to medication and support for individuals looking to drink less.

📌Additional Resources
✔️Website: www.oarhealth.com
✔️LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/jhuntglassman
www.linkedin.com/company/oarhealth
✔️Instagram: www.instagram.com/OarHealth
✔️Facebook: www.facebook.com/OarHealth
✔️TikTok: www.tiktok.com/@oar_health
✔️Take the Oar Health Assessment: https://start.oarhealth.com/signup/step-1
✔️Schedule a 15-minute Free Discovery Call: https://calendly.com/jhg_oar/1-1-with-jonathan

✨ Explore the Dialogue’s Treasures: Tap HERE https://tinyurl.com/jonathan-hunt-glassman to delve into our conversation.

✨Up Next: Andrew Grinbaum, a 5x entrepreneur, MBA professor, and ICF-certified coach who helps CEOs grow purpose-driven, multimillion-dollar businesses with clarity, heart, and freedom.

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Teasers & Announcements:

Speaker:

Welcome to The Heart-Led Business Show, where compassion meets commerce and leaders lead with love. Join your host, Tom Jackobs, as he delves into the insightful conversations with visionary business leaders who defy the status quo, putting humanity first and profit second. From heartfelt strategies to inspiring stories, this podcast is your compass in the world of conscious capitalism. So buckle up and let your heart guide your business journey.

Tom Jackobs:

Welcome back to the Heart-Led Business Show. Today, we have a guest that's one of those rare CEOs who's looked at America's drinking habits and said, yeah, I think we can do better. Jonathan Hunt Glassman is the co-founder of Oar Health, where more than 50,000 people have gotten smart, simple support to drink less or quit without the drama. Before that, he was busy fixing healthcare from the inside at Humana, Optum and Bain, Jonathan breaches heart and actual solutions, which is absolutely refreshing. So welcome to the show, Jonathan.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Thank you for having me.

Tom Jackobs:

I am really excited to jump into this topic because I know that there's a huge issue and I think a lot of people are recognizing that alcohol probably is not like the best thing for them in the world and I'm always interested in how people combine business and a passion and solving solutions like that. So I'm so excited to have that conversation with you today and see all about your business. But before we do that, I always like to ask the first question, which is, what's your definition of a heart-led business?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Mine is that it's a business that was created and is sustained to make something in the world better. That doesn't mean that profitability and other sorts of economic return can't be an important secondary goal, but it's not the reason I got into this. It's not the reason that most heart-led entrepreneurs I know started their businesses. And then even beyond that founding moment, I think heart-led businesses. Come back to that mission motivation in the moments that matter most, especially when the decisions are hard, it kind of serves as the tiebreaker or the North star.

Tom Jackobs:

Yes. That's so true. I've had those profit type of businesses where, it was just about the money. I was just collecting a paycheck or whatever, but when things got tough, it's so easy to bail on that versus when your heart's in it, then your heart's in it and you don't wanna bail on your heart'cause it, that hurts a lot more. So tell us a little bit about the business And your journey in starting this particular business.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Well, your intro is dead on in that I've spent most of my career in larger, more traditional healthcare organizations. Um, but in parallel to that professional path, I was struggling myself with alcohol misuse for most of my adult life. I was one of those 28 million Americans who have alcohol use disorder, for me

Tom Jackobs:

Wow.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

That looked like binge drinking in high school and college, becoming a pattern of drinking in my 20's and then starting to experience multi-day binges and withdrawal symptoms on the back end of those in my late 20's and early 30's, as I saw a lot of my peers actually put excessive alcohol use behind them in their lives. I sought help in a lot of the places that first come to mind. Alcoholics Anonymous, primary care, individual psychotherapy, the emergency room and all of those were helpful in their own way, but none put a dent in the drinking until I had the good fortune to be recommended. Safe, effective prescription medication that is dramatically underutilized across the country and across the world. I had great results with that medication, but it also raised some real questions about why it had taken so much hunting, especially for someone who worked quite adjacent to the Issue in question. Considered myself a very

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Warm connected healthcare consumer, and it was that dissatisfaction with how long it had taken me, how long had it taken others that led to us starting more health where we make it simple and convenient to get access to medication, proven to help people drink less or quit, and then get ongoing expert advice to make the most out of the medication and to make progress towards one's goals.

Tom Jackobs:

Wow, that, that's amazing and clearly it was built out of passion. What was the kind of the inciting moment for you to say, I need to leave my day-to-day, comfy day-to-day life, or corporate job and start a new business'cause that's, that's hard to do.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

It, it was a decision that I weighed. And, you know, to some degree, uh, was tormented by because I really liked my, my job in Humana at the time. The tipping point was the experiences of the first few customers who used, Oar health, because I was still working my full-time job when we built the prototype.

Tom Jackobs:

Good.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Generalizing from my own experience to the existence of an opportunity was not particularly difficult. You can do a little desktop research and see of those 28 million people with alcohol use disorder, 2 or 3% are prescribed any medication to help them drink less. So on paper at least, there was an obvious opportunity, but that really wasn't enough for me to take the plunge. It was more talking to those first few folks who found help through the particular way that we tried to address the issue. You know, going back to that balance between like building a financially successful business and mission, those early, although anecdotal examples, spoke a bit to both. They suggested that we really could build a business here. Acquiring customers is a pretty fundamental challenge for any business and, their stories echoing, but each in their own way being a little different than my own, what they'd done previously, the relief or excitement or hope and expectancy that they were able to find the early results they were getting in the first few weeks and months on the medication and interacting with our experts.

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

It was enough. Uh, was it the most robust data set in the world? No, but it was enough to get me to, take the leap and say, I think there's something here. Let's find out more.

Tom Jackobs:

Okay. So from the moment that you had the idea and you were still working at Humana, and then how long did it take for you to, or what type of runway did you have before you quit the day job and went all in?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Yeah, it took us probably about from idea to first customer. It was probably close to 2 years. The first of that just thinking about it, talking to people about it the second getting more serious. I found a path to launch that worked for me. You know, I think each entrepreneur perspective, entrepreneur's path is gonna be different. Um, because I was really happy and successful in my traditional career. I was very risk-averse as I came to this new venture. And so the

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Path that worked for me was linking of with a incubator of new businesses that helped contribute some of the resources, some of the human capital necessary to building the minimally viable product or first version of the product. Had less equity in the resulting company than some entrepreneurs who did it all themselves. But it was the right solution for me. It was also a good fit for a healthcare business. You cannot just start shipping people, pharmaceuticals from your apartment. It would be very illegal. There were, just built in things that had to be done that required money and resources if we were gonna do it responsibly.

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah. That's one, very responsible anyway, to take 2 years of a transition to get everything all lined up. And that's very similar to my experience as well, in terms of leaving a corporate job and starting a new business. It took a year and a half, 2 years to do that. I think a lot of entrepreneurs, especially in the heart-led space or purpose led entrepreneurs they hear those Instagram, like the hustle porn and they're, it's all about, oh, burn the bridges. Just go all in. Everybody, don't worry about it. It will work out. Just grind, grind, grind. I think that's so irresponsible and just such bad advice Even if you know exactly what you have and you have a lot of money backing you, there still needs to be a good pathway and thoughtfulness before, starting a new business if you wanna be successful. Yeah, and I think you're under less stress as well at least the stress of the financial stress anyway, that you have a paycheck coming in already and so you can take a few more risks. To have the time or the energy to really fully think about the program and the product that you want to get out. And so that the flow happens, I think a lot better than if you're under stress to make money and support your business and support your family. And then it's like, oh, all these ideas just they don't happen. What was it like for you in terms of working with an incubator organization? Because I haven't spoken to anybody that has, has done that, and I'm just very curious about how that worked.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

For me, it was a great fit. Um, You know, In that, while I had a personal connection to the problem, a vision of sorts of the solution and some subject matter expertise within the industry. There were things where I had real limitations, software engineering and design, and a bit of the discipline that I think is important in a startup of really sanding down the next step, the next prototype to the smallest thing that can be tested. I was used to, you know, working in these big, sprawling corporations that had developed systems and products over decades and that can be a limitation in a new business. It can come from a very good place of wanting to offer the fullest most robust. Reality is you're probably never gonna get there unless you test components of the full vision first. So I found it to be a really positive experience. I think like in any other critical relationship, you've gotta find the right fit. Where kind of the incubator, the entrepreneur have both the complimentary skills that I described, but also common values and strength with the business terms to make sense. Get excited about the concept and, don't look quite clearly enough at who's contributing what and who's getting what out of it. That was not my experience. I think I had a very fair and positive experience. But just like any other part of the startup or business ecosystem there are different types of of incubators out there.

Tom Jackobs:

Exactly. Yeah I was like watching Shark Tank in terms of what type of offers they, they tend to give out and how the entrepreneurs just kind of either take it, don't, or have that discussion. It's always interesting to see the emotions that come up during that time. Tell me a little bit about the product'cause first of all it's a medication, but you've wrapped it into a whole program as well. Tell me about how that works and how your clients are getting some great results.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Yeah, so members at Oar Health are prescribed medication that makes it easier to drink less or quit the frontline recommended medication for the treatment of alcohol use disorder is called Naltrexone, and the way that it works Is it cools off from alcohol. So if we do have a drink, it's easier to stay with our limits and then when we're not drinking fewer cravings and or just for alcohol are often experience. And then what we try to wrap around that are tools to be successful with the medication. This is not as simple as taking a pill for hair loss or erectile dysfunction. And so, through ongoing access to medical professionals, certified health coaches, other members who are going through their own journeys, and then personalized digital check-ins at milestones throughout the journey which are helping people think about what are practical strategies relative to the medication itself should be taking this every day? Should I be targeting it high risk occasions? And then also all of the complimentary habit changes and sources of support that can be useful in this journey to drink less or quit That may look like things that are other forms of treatment, like therapy or counseling. But it might also be things like changing your environment by buying a bunch of non-alcoholic beverages that you like or changing your habits by finding something to do at 5:00 PM in the afternoon that doesn't revolve around alcohol.

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah. That that's great. And so it, it's a membership program that they get that support. Is it additive to the other type of support that's out there, like the alcohol anonymous and the rehab centers and things like that?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

It depends who you ask, but I would say definitely yes. We think Alcoholics Anonymous and medication is a great combination. Medication can go to work, biochemically on some of the underpinnings of addiction. The reinforcement and reward cycle in our brain that makes it difficult to stop or limit use of a substance we know is hurting us and pure support, like AA at the same time can provide connection, community accountability, positive reinforcement. There's a long complex, not necessarily friendly history here between AA and the use of medication, but I think if you go back to first principles, it's a great combination and we see that in our members we have some who just take the medication and track their progress on their own. And then we have others who combine the medication with AA or small recovery or modernization management.

Tom Jackobs:

Nice. Alright, awesome. And what are, how about the, the GLP ones? Um, And I've actually experienced that myself in terms of being on tirzepatide that the cravings aren't really there either. Are you investigating the use of those as well?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Yeah, we're excited to follow the evidence in this area. There's certainly strong anecdotal data that people experience less craving or enjoyment or consumption of alcohol. One randomized controlled trial with a small number of people that also has very positive results. More risk to understand exactly who it works for. And importantly to make progress towards a potential FDA indication insurance coverage but I'm optimistic. Based on talking to a lot of people who report experiences like yours, both those who've struggled with alcohol and not. And I can say we definitely need more tools on the shelf in terms of helping people drink less or quit. There are three products approved in the United States or indicated in the United States for the treatment of alcohol issues. That's not a lot. So we could use more options so that we can help each person find the toolkit that fits them best.

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah. Well that's, that's cool. And I, I've heard too that alcohol usage is actually on the decline in the US. Is that true That the alcohol companies are actually, suffering. They're actually diversifying into like cannabis and other substances as well, which like, okay, you guys just never quit.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Yeah. That is definitely what the research indicates is that, about half of Americans don't drink which can be surprising if you see how pervasive it is in the culture, not least because of advertising. And that can be a double-edged sword for folks like me who struggled with alcohol.

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

On the good side, it can be very positive message to see that not everybody is drinking. Fewer people are drinking, perhaps even more so among younger generations. On the other hand, it can be frustrating to see that there are people who are able to take it or leave it or cut back as much as they want without too much hard work.

Tom Jackobs:

That, It's so refreshing too.'cause it's a poison and it has so many detrimental effects to our bodies in general. But let's talk a little more about your business side of it and how you've been able to balance having a heart-led and a purpose led business and still be, accountable to your shareholders, your investors, yourself and making a profit. How do you find that balance?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

I try to remind myself that ultimately we're all in together, so we should spend probably about 80% of our time finding things that work for everybody, members, the clinicians and other professionals who work on the platform, the employees and shareholders of the company. Ultimately in the long run, good things are gonna be generated for all of those people. If we can reach folks who are struggling, engage them in our offering and make that offering work for them such that they see better health and well-being and become our best advocates. Now, it still leads the the 20% where there are more direct trade offs. We went through a really acute example of that when there was a global shortage of the frontline medication that I was describing before. We'd figure out how to manage that. Part of the answer was increasing price, which is a more distributive decision, but part of it was also working with members and offering them a discount if they had plenty of medication on hand and wanted to delay their next shipment. based on experience, I'm not, naive enough to say there's always a win-win-win solution.

Tom Jackobs:

Now, when you were giving your definition of a heart-led business, you said that heart-led business, you come back to the mission and that North star when things get difficult, what type of issues have come up since you started the business that really tested that for you?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

I think, what do we do about not enough pills on hand, or at least the risk of not enough tablets in the market was about as tough as it

Tom Jackobs:

That's crazy.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

And,

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Probably the hardest decision was how close, how many new members do you let in, while increasing the risk that you are literally not gonna have enough medication in the market to go around? Purely profit maximizing and say, let's run the buffer down to zero. Where, coming back to why we get into this in the first place is helpful. Because if you got it into the first place because you wanna increase people's access, to a medication that can help them and support them along that full journey, then of course you're not gonna do anything that, leaving people without a medication that they come to benefit from and rely upon. And so we made the difficult decision to scale down and at times turn off marketing entirely which was certainly detrimental to key business metrics as you can imagine, but felt like the right thing to do to take care of the members that we already had.

Tom Jackobs:

Uh, Remind me again, how long has a business been going?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

We served our first membering January, 2021, so right about 5 years.

Tom Jackobs:

And you're already at what? 70,000 members?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

We've cumulatively served about 70,000 people. Yes.

Tom Jackobs:

That is incredible. For 5 years in business, how did that ramp up happen?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

You know, one of the pleasant surprises was that kind of from day one when we first put up some search engine marketing ads against terms specific to the medication and to the problem, we saw strong signals of interest. Then over time have built a bit of, uh, a layer cake of acquisition strategies, you know, we are very much direct consumer business and that's part of a missions is we think, uh, There's value in reaching people directly who don't know where to turn. So we do that still through search but also through higher funnel outreach, through things like paid social ads, tv, radio and increasingly the things that you don't pay for our members referring their friends and family even some earned media. And I think what we've had going for us is that it's a fundamentally strong message. Did you know there's a medication that can help people drink less or quit? If your listeners' answer to that is no, they're not alone. And so we found that very simple message works across a variety of channels and platforms.

Tom Jackobs:

And now that medication, you've worked with the manufacturers to increase the production, or did they just do that on their own?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

A little bit of both. Um, you know, Certainly the one silver lining of the shortage that I was describing. Is we got a lot smarter about the pharmaceutical supply chain and built system relationships that have been critical to unclogging supply. Can't take credit for all of the worldwide market dynamics, but now do work more directly with manufacturers to ensure a steady supply for our members

Tom Jackobs:

yeah, I'm sure with, that number of people that you've helped, that you're probably one of the bigger customers of that medication in the country.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Um, fair to say.

Tom Jackobs:

That's nice that's pretty sizable for for as many people that it, the potential is there for, so that's incredible. One last question on the heart-led piece. How do you bring that mission and the heart-led basis of the company to the employees. And how do you message that with the employees and make sure that they bring that to them to their work as well?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

Well, Step one, hire people who are going to be naturally inclined to be heart-led. Who's partial motivation for joining the organization is the mission, is the members. But it's of course important for all of us myself, not excluded to be reminded regularly. Why we're in this so one way that we do that is in our weekly all hands standup where we cover a lot of things that we're gonna do over the next week. We also have a standing item for member feedback low lights and highlights, and everyone is encourage to drop right into the meeting agenda what they've heard, whether it's a review on trust pilot. Or an email to the member experience team, or an anonymized dialogue that a coach has had with a member, and we take a look at it and talk about it. And when it's staring you in the face and black and white it, it's pretty hard to ignore it which is important.

Tom Jackobs:

Yeah. No, I love that. I'm gonna steal that and I'm gonna implement that into my, my meetings as well with the all employee meetings. I think that's important to not only celebrate the wins in terms of the great compliments that you get, but also to look at the criticism and see what can be done to improve on both sides. That's great. that's smart. How can people learn more about you and the business and potentially work with Oar Health?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

The best place to start is oarhealth.com. From there, there are a few things people can do. They can learn more about these topics, alcohol use disorder, and the medications that are used to treat it. Folks are interested for themselves. They can begin an assessment right through the website. They can also schedule 15 minutes to talk with me. Just click on the, our story section and schedule a call. I'm happy to chat with anyone who's interested in this personally for a loved one or just generally.

Tom Jackobs:

Awesome. That, that's very generous of you. That's great. And it's oarhealth.com. Is that the metaphor?

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

That is exactly correct. Thank you for the clarification on the spelling. It's important. And yeah, the idea is we wanna offer people a simple tool that can help them navigate outta potentially choppy waters in their life towards a more sustainable path forward.

Tom Jackobs:

Love it. I, I love businesses that have really good deep meanings with their, their names. It's amazing. Jonathan, thank you so much for spending your time with us today. I really do appreciate it. And I know our listeners certainly appreciate your wisdom and the guidance that you've given today as well.

Jonathan Hunt Glassman:

My pleasure. Really nice talking with you, Tom.

Tom Jackobs:

Thank you and thank you listeners for tuning in for today's episode. I hope you got a lot out of it. And if you could do us a favor is make sure you are checking out what Jonathan is doing and we've provided all of those links into the show notes. So make sure you go down there and click on the link and go right to the website and it'll be hassle-free. And while you're down there, if you could give the show a rating and review, that definitely helps spread the word about all the great entrepreneurs that are heart-led and are working to help other people solve the problems that they might have as well. And until next time, lead with your heart.

Speaker 2:

You've been listening to The Heart-Led Business Show, hosted by Tom Jackobs. Join us next time for another inspiring journey into the heart of business.

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