Apparently we’re supposed to replace our toothbrushes every three months, but that fact is rarely at the forefront of the brain, even in the drug store.
Fortunately, Goby is here to save the dental day with a rechargeable, electric toothbrush and toothbrush head subscription service! But with Goby, more than just your mouth gets clean– a portion of each purchase goes toward providing dental care for those in need.
According to the CDC, an alarming number of American adults have some degree of Periodontitis, which can lead to tooth loss, sure, but even more startling, it’s also been connected to heart and lung disease and even stroke. (Feel free to go brush your teeth again and come back.) Brushing well and preventing tartar build up is the key to avoiding it.
Electric toothbrushes are thought to offer a significant improvement in plaque removal over traditional manual brushes, but often they’re too expensive to be practical. Goby is fixing that. Not only does this rechargeable toothbrush rotationally oscillate, just how your teeth, gums, and dentists like it, but it also has a built-in timer so that you brush for the full two minutes dentists recommend. This smart toothbrush will also tell you when it’s time for a new brush head. You can buy the brush for $65 or, if you opt for the customizable brush head subscription service, it’s only $50 for the toothbrush.
Goby, named in honor of the goby fish known as the “dentist of the sea,” was started by Ben Goldberg and Claire Burke who realized most Americans don’t have great access to dental care. “Some 114 million Americans have no dental coverage with 67.7 million under 65 years of age. This is about twice the number of medically uninsured that are under 65 years of age,” Founder and CEO Ben Goldberg explains. “Furthermore, those without dental benefits report higher incidences of other illness; they are 67 percent more likely to have heart disease; 50 percent more likely to have osteoporosis; and 29 percent more likely to have diabetes.”
To help combat this issue, Goby teamed up with New York University’s College of Dentistry’s Global Student Outreach Program to help those with little or no access to dental services. The program “…provides local outreach and clinical outreach services to the under-served both domestically and abroad. Local outreach activities include delivering oral hygiene instruction to children, the elderly, and other vulnerable populations, distributing oral care products, and performing oral screenings,” Goldberg says. A percentage of each sale of a Goby toothbrush goes to support The Global Student Outreach Program and if there’s any doubt what life changing work they do, just watch this video.
So go ahead and polish your pearly-whites with a Goby toothbrush all while helping others achieve oral and overall health. It’s certainly something to smile about.
