How Honeydew is Reinventing Telehealth for Skincare

David Futoran is cofounder and CEO of Honeydew, a skin health platform called Honeydew that helps people struggling with acne and other skin conditions get effective treatments and expert guidance from licensed dermatologists. Prior to founding Honeydew in 2022, David was the Head of Product and Growth at Somatix, an AI-powered remote monitoring service that uses a wearable device to help senior citizens live longer and more independent lives. He holds degrees in Biology and Healthcare Management from the University of Pennsylvania, where he also wrote a masters course and served as President of the Wharton Undergraduate Healthcare Club.

Key Takeaways:

• David’s personal decade-long struggle with severe cystic acne and the difficulties he faced getting access to effective care inspired him to partner with a nationally renowned dermatologist named Dr. Joel Spitz to cofound Honeydew.
• Unlike other telederm startups that sell commoditized topical treatments for mild acne cases, Honeydew is laser-focused on democratizing access to Accutane to treat patients with moderate to severe acne who have the most acute need.
• After launching in New York, Honeydew overcame multiple operational and regulatory hurdles to expand nationally, and is now licensed across all 50 states.
• This scale has also allowed Honeydew to lock in exclusive supplier partnerships that already made it the lowest-cost provider of Accutane in the United States.
• While Honeydew’s best-performing acquisition channel has been Google given the company’s ability to target specific high-intent search queries related to acne treatment, they’ve also had more recent success with paid ads on Meta and Reddit and with UGC content generated by microinfluencers on TikTok.
• Looking forward, Honeydew is excited to go beyond acute acne treatment to offer lifetime skincare, expand to additional skin conditions like eczema and psoriasis, and use AI to improve diagnostics, streamline support, and cut operational costs.

David Futoran:

• Website: https://www.honeydewcare.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-futoran/
• X: https://x.com/davidfutoran

Phil Carter:

• Website: https://www.philgcarter.com
• Substack: https://philgcarter.substack.com
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/philgcarter
• X: https://x.com/philgcarter

Podcast Production by Podders: https://podders.io

Chapters

• 3:53 How David’s personal struggle with acne led him to found Honeydew
• 5:53 Dr. Joel Spitz’s role as Honeydew’s Chief Medical Officer
• 8:23 How Honeydew stacks up against other telehealth platforms
• 10:26 What’s so special about Accutane as a treatment for acne
• 15:57 Honeydew’s path to becoming a nationwide telederm platform
• 19:02 Scaling a service that relies on human care and physical products
• 22:02 How partnerships have helped fuel Honeydew’s early growth
• 25:29 Honeydew’s reliance on organic vs. paid acquisition channels
• 27:27 Why Google, Meta, and Reddit are good channels for Honeydew
• 29:30 Honeydew’s experiments partnering with TikTok influencers
• 32:06 How Honeydew uses AI tools to scale online advertising
• 33:55 Optimizing onboarding to deliver value to patients as fast as possible
• 36:53 How Honeydew’s growth strategy will change as the company scales
• 40:22 The impacts AI will have on telehealth services
• 44:14 Lightning round