Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to P Brendon Lundberg. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

P Brendon, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. To kick things off, we’d love to hear about things you or your brand do that diverge from the industry standard.

When people ask what I do, I tell them I founded a business that is changing the way chronic pain is understood and treated. Typically, that generates a response asking what that means and giving me an opportunity to share more.

Everything we do at Radiant Pain Relief Centres is different from the industry standard: from the therapeutic approach, to the science that underlies it, to the clinical experience, and the business model. Everything is different.

The Radiant Pain Relief approach is based upon the most modern pain science (which is primarily neuroscience). We use a novel, FDA-cleared technology that allows us to create lasting pain relief for nearly all types of chronic pain, without drugs, needles surgery or side effects.

While we feel pain in the tissue, modern pain science tells us that the origin of pain is not the tissue, but rather the nervous system – specially the brain. In acute pain, such as an injury, feeling pain is protective. The brain creates pain to alert us of a problem, to inform us of danger, and remind us to take it easy while we heal. But when pain becomes chronic, the brain becomes wired to expect and perpetuate pain. Typically the tissue is healed. So rather than masking the pain with drugs, or trying to fix it at the tissue site. Our approach uses dynamic, artificial nerve signals delivered via skin surface electrodes, to give the brain new information. This process along with the principle of neuroplasticity (the brains ability to learn and change), we can restore the brain back to a more normal perception of pain.

The result for most of our clients is significant, even total pain relief, which lasts, without the risks and complications of other procedures. It is safe, and consistently effective.

To create the best and longest lasting results, the client has to come in for a daily treatment session typically for 2-3 weeks. This also gives us a unique opportunity to build relationships, educate, and support while they are present in our spa-like clinic. All of this is a stark contrast to the medical-industrial approach of drugs, needles or surgical approaches.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Early in my career, I worked for several start-up/early stage companies, half of which went on to become very successful. Those environment were very fun, the energy is infectious, despite the hard work. I learned business in this environment, not in some mega corporation of which I was just small, replaceable cog, and I loved it. It reminded me of another passion I have, being in a band – taping into creativity, collaboration, and a DIY – problem solving, team environment. I knew that I wanted to start a business of my own, preferably one that had the ability to also make the world a better place. When I founded Radiant Pain Relief Centres, I had no idea the challenges I would face.

Starting a business is rarely easy, but Radiant had a number of particular challenges that make the journey uniquely arduous. Pain is a very human condition, perhaps the single biggest human common denominator. It is both literal and metaphoric, and the way it plays and weaves into peoples lives is very fascinating. So pioneering a totally new technology/approach, based upon emerging science, delivered through a novel, direct to consumer business model that operates outside of the confines and controls of the medical establishment has proven to be very difficult. Neither consumers nor most medical professionals understood what we’re doing. This reality was made more challenging being chronically under capitalized, make it a lot harder to win hearts and minds, and to create the social proof necessary for mass adoption and a viral movement.

In my MBA program I remember learning that truly innovative companies have a hard go, because either no one else has done what they’re doing because it so unique no one else has thought of it, which is rare. Or no one else had done it because there just isn’t a market. Based upon the fact that there are an estimated 100 million people in the US in chronic pain, the impact of failed approaches like opioids there is definitely a market. Based upon, the clinical success that we’ve seen since day one, and consistently since we started in 2014, I remain certain that we have the combination of factors to disrupt the industry and build the safest, most consistently effective solution to the enormous and complicated problem of chronic pain.

However, it is like the adage that you can something quality, you can have something affordably, and you can have something quickly, but you can only have two of those at one time. We won’t sacrifice the quality and mission of what we’re doiing, and unfortunately we have not had the capital to operate on scale other than modestly, so the one we’ve had to give up is doing it quickly. But nearly 10 years in, we’ve survived some near catastrophic events, including COVID, which forced us to close and brought an end to a capitalization strategy that I had in the works of taking the company public through a SEC-approved RegA public offering. We we forced to make a significant pivot and in fact, while still very much a start-up, I was forced to essentially now orchestrate a turn around.

Ahead of the SEC submission process to do the RegA offering, I wrote a book, which became and Amazon best seller. “Inc.” magazine, wrote a review about it, calling the book, “a manifesto, and an epic example of how to create a movement”. (https://www.inc.com/benjamin-p-hardy/this-new-book-is-a-compelling-case-study-of-a-manifesto-bold-mission.html) We have yet to achieve that movement, but it does feel like, after 10 years of hard work, we are starting to build it.

So, what I am most proud of as it relates to Radiant, is that the clarity of of the life changing/saving work we do as become even more clear. We’re not temporarily masking pain, but supporting our clients through a tremendous transformation based upon our therapy and the care/support experience we create through our clinics. I am also equally proud of the fact that I/we haven’t quit. It hasn’t been easy and I have born a big personal costs in terms of personal sacrifices and risks. But the flip side of that is level of confidence that comes from knowing you can and will figure it out. We are slowly expanding to new markets and moving forward. At this point, I suspect it will be another 5-10 years until Radiant is well known and appreciated for what it is. If that happens, perhaps we’ll be regarded as an overnight success, 15-20 years in the making.

The entrepreneurial journeys is a unique experience. It is one I think everyone should experience. For me, it has made more more confident, genuine, and appreciative. Financial success, if/when it comes, will be nice of course. But the gift of entrepreneurship for me has been how I see the world, problems, and myself.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

My entrepreneurial journey has been replete with opportunities to build resilience. While there have been numerous examples of this the most common thread of resilience is related to finances. When we began, we had a very modest operations but it was profitable from day one. Based upon the proof of concept and my business plan, we secured a $12Million dollar line of credit and backing to acquire the public company that had the rights to the technology we use. They were struggling significantly to figure out how to commercialize the technology and I and our backer believed our direct to consumer clinical model would be better for a variety of reasons. They were also facing some legal challenges, and our acquisition would have solved most of their problems. However, they rejected our offer and instead entered into what became years of law suits and legal mess. Without that acquisition, we did not take the $12Million and I began to seek other paths of capitalization.

I had my own supply agreement directly with the technology inventor/patent holder and the manufacturer. So I moved forward and began start to raise capital. Because Radiant doesn’t own the patents or intellectual property, and because of the legal mess between the public company who previously had the rights to tech and the manufacturer/inventor, I could not raise capital from institutional investors. I was successful raising from angel investors, but it is a slow and tedious way to grow a company. We were chronically under capitalized, robbing Peter to pay Paul, and barely making payroll, while tryig to market, expand, etc. It was a lot of stress..

At one point I met a wealthy individual who loved the concept. He wanted to invest significantly to help us expand nationwide. He had the resources to help us achieve that. But his offer required that I transfer the assets of the company to a new-co of which he would be majority owner and I would be a minor shareholder. All the other investors who had come in up to that point would have been screwed. I passed on that investor but my troubles were far from over, as I continued to bring on more investors, but not at rate or volume enough to really change our futures. We were moving forward but not faster than the burden of having other peoples capital a risk on my shoulders grew and grew.

Having learned that the consumers were more of the early adopters to our novel therapy than doctors or others from the establishment, and seeing that I was successful in raising money from angel investors, despite being slow and smaller amounts of capital, I thought a SEC-approved RegA public offering would allow us to openly solicit, and to raise greater quantities of capital from the exact same audience that we hoped to build a relationship with. Through the RegA, we could simultaneously raise sufficient capital, market, educate, and engage the families and individuals we directly served. I devoted precious dollars to the RegA process – financial audit, lawyer fees, SEC submission costs. etc.

I released by book, which became an Amazon Bestseller, “Inc” magazine wrote a favorable review of it. I went on a virtual publicity road show by doing TV interviews and a very heavy rotation of podcast interviews. Momentum and interest were building. Then COVID hit.

Immediately, we were forced to close the clinics. We had zero revenues. Investors backed away choosing to protect their capital in such an uncertain moment economically and socially. The RegA process came to an abrupt halt without the resources to push it along and in the midst of global uncertainty. Simultaneously, to the future of Radiant become very uncertain and seemingly doomed, my marriage of 23 years also came to an abrupt and painful end.

Almost overnight my world changed. The weight of COVID like a heavy wet blanket over the real injuries of my marriage and the current future state of the company, I felt very overwhelmed. I wondered who I was as a man if my marriage and my business – the two things I cared for the most in the world and which informed my self identity in deep and profound ways were collapsing. It was overwhelming. I stepped down as CEO and turned the reigns of the company over to my largest investor. He put more money in, to keep alive through the next couple of years.

In the summer of 2022, my divorce now being finalized and my heart and energy feeling healthier, I stepped back into the company as CEO. I orchestrated a turn around plan to resolve and restructure debt. I reorganized the cap table, buying out some shareholders who held big pieces of equity but were adding no value. That allowed me to attract a new, enthusiastic and valuable Chief Medical Officer. We rolled out a new go-to-market strategy to allow us to expand in partnership with medical professionals. This model, while another novel aspect of our business, would solve the capital needs for expansion an enroll medical professionals in a way that expanded their clinical offering but with much lower risk and now opportunity costs.

We have expanded to Chicago, which is proving this new model. And have begun conversations with doctors in several new markets and overseas. We have long way to go, but based upon current market interest, I believe it is very realistic that we could have 5+ centers operating by the end of 2024. From there growth should accelerate and become much easier as social proof grows.

It was suggested to me early on that businesses don’t fail, but rather their leadership teams eventually give up. If Radiant had a mission that was less important, perhaps quitting would have been wise. But given the impact we have on people, families, and society, I have felt that quitting was never really an option. It’s been a heavy burden to try to have to figure this out. The failure of my marriage, which happened in large part because of the burden, uncertainty and risk I imposed on our family was a very sad experience. But it, like all pain, is a teacher and while I needed a break from running from running the company, I have chosen to use that pain and all of the struggles I’ve faced through this journey get better. Many chronic pain sufferers face tremendous challenge on their journey to healing. So perhaps it is only fitting that a business that is changing the way chronic pain is understood and treated is equally challenged.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

For me, entrepreneurship has been a journey of personal development and growth. I am sure that I am not alone in why I chose to start a business: wealth creation, autonomy, freedom, prestige, ego, opportunity, social impact, the challenge/thrill. But my “why” definitely evolved over time. If it was only about wealth creation, I should have quit a long time ago. I haven’t become wealthy trying to build Radiant. In fact it’s been real sacrifice which has cost me a lot, including at least in-part my marriage which felt the stress of years of uncertainty and risk, and likely other more immediately lucrative earning opportunities that I could have pursued.

One could argue, that my ego wouldn’t let it go, when many a more rational person would have. I am sure that is true. While there have been times the burden, pressure, uncertainty, and personal liability have felt overwhelming, at each impasse, at each new moment of truth and struggle, I have felt compelled to push forward. Aside from the period during the pandemic, which was the lowest season of my life and required that I take a pause, I have stayed in the ring and keep fighting.

I haven’t always had an appetite for hard things. In fact as a younger man my default was usually to quit when things got hard. I did with jobs. I did it with school I did it with sports and other activities. And I had done it with other “businesses” I tried to start prior. Again had Radiant just been about money, I would have and should quit in the first few two years. But I didn’t and I didn’t because my “why” became greater than me. It became greater than my personal comfort. It became about fighting for people who needed our therapy. To see people who are admittedly suicidal, who have chosen extreme procedures such as amputation, in attempt to rid their body of pain, only to end up with phantom pain, when you see people who’ve resigned their life to a level of nothingness, get their lives back and begin to thrive again, (such as in these TV New clips and Testimonials), you become compelled to push forward. When you have people who are expecting paychecks to provide for their families, you push forward. When you know you have outside investors who have put capital at risk and trust in you, you push forward.

– TV News Clip 1 and 2 are here, they include a dentist/former college basketball player who lost his profession as a dentist because of pain, and VA Nurse who suffered debilitating chronic pain after a double mastectomy https://www.facebook.com/RadiantPainReliefCentres/videos/1139965189473808/

– TV News Clip 3 is here and includes a guy who previously chose to have a leg amputated when nothing else resolved his pain. When that failed he was nearly suicidal until finding relief at Radiant. https://katu.com/news/local/brain-scrambler-therapy-promises-pain-relief-without-opioids

– Testimonials: https://www.radiantpainrelief.com/testimonials/

Like I said I am sure that my ego was part of that, particularly up to the point of the pandemic when the business, my marriage and my ego all died. Since then, in this current phase, of course I am motivated and driven, but my identity is not so tied up in its outcome. It feels looser and freer. I hope Radiant becomes widely successful. I hope it expands and lots of people get a better quality of life. I hope we change society and change healthcare, by changing the way chronic pain is understood and treated. I hope I do eventually become wealthy. But if it died tomorrow. I know that I was a successful entrepreneur because I took an idea and grew into a real thing. That real thing helped people. That real thing was a vehicle for personal growth, learning, and a lot of remarkable experiences that I would not have had otherwise. That real thing was teacher about life, humanity, struggle, triumph, loneliness, compassion, passion, belief, resilience and so much more. My entrepreneurial journey has, without doubt, made me a better human.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.radiantpainrelief.com; https://www.pblartist.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pbrendonlundberg/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendonlundberg
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@radiantpainrelief4433