Considering a Bosley Transplant Surgery?
Bosley Medical Inc., the corporation that currently owns Hair Club, formerly known as Hair Club for Men, is an international subsidiary of Tokyo-based Aderans Co. Ltd. Aderans, along with Bosley, are easily the world’s leading provider of hair loss solutions. Given this we ask ourselves, how good is the Bosley transplant surgery?
If they are easily the world leader in hair transplants, then the Bosley transplant surgery has to be top-notch, right? Well, consider this. McDonald’s is the world’s leading fast-food restaurant. Thousands of locations, international presence, cheap food. Cool right? Well, when was the last time you had “the most amazing burger of your life” there? People go to McDonald’s because it is easy and fast. If they want an incredible burger, they will go to the family-owned mom-and-pop burger joint with the good reviews on Google. They won’t be going to Mickey D’s. However, at least someone going to McDonald’s knows what they’re in for. That’s not always the case with Bosley as we’ll find out.
So, is a Bosley transplant surgery easy and cheap? Well, that’s definitely not the case either. As with all hair transplants, the cost of the transplant depends on a number of different factors, such as the patient’s individual needs, the location of the clinic, and of course the skill and expertise of the surgeon performing the procedure. So, is a Bosley transplant surgery even worth it? Well first let’s take a good look at the Bosley Medical company as a whole.
Bosley Medical and Its Past
In 1974, Doctor Larry Lee Bosley founded Bosley Medical and since then, Bosley has become one of the biggest names in the hair restoration industry. Dr. Bosley carried out his first hair transplant surgery procedure in 1963. During his famed career, Bosley performed over 32,500 hair restoration procedures. After retiring, Dr. Bosley passed away in 2016. Sounds like an accomplished career with a solid legacy right? Well, not exactly. Things seem great from the outside looking in. However, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows at Bosley.
Bosley Hair Transplant Lawsuits
Bosley Medical has been a target of many lawsuits and legal actions over the years. For example, in 2005 a former patient of Bosley Medical, Michael Steven Kremer, registered bosleymedical.com and bosleymedicalvilolations.com and then sent a letter to Doctor Bosley himself demanding that Bosley contact him regarding his botched hair transplant. Bosley Medical ignored Mr. Kremer’s request and instead filed a trademark infringement suit against him.
Mr. Kremer’s two websites were not commercially based and not uploaded with the intent to make money. There were no advertainments located on them nor did Mr. Kremer try to sell any goods or services. BosleyMedical.com, which has since been taken down, went into explicit detail about all of the medical violations that the founder of Bosley Medical was found guilty of by the Medical Board. Kremer’s other website Bosley Medical Violations is a very detailed account of “10 things you should know about Bosley Medical”, as well as a number of unflattering Bosley transplant surgery experiences. The 10 things that Mr. Kremer wants you to know about Bosley are not good, but we will get into that later.
Throughout the course of Bosley Medical Institute, Inc., et al. v. Michael Steven Kremer 403 F.3d 672 (9th Cir., April 4, 2005), Bosley’s attorneys argued that they were not suing Kremer over talking a ration of crap about Bosley Medical on his websites. After all, that would be an infringement on his freedom of speech. However, they were suing because Kremer’s websites linked to his lawyer’s website that was selling a service, and that Kremer also linked to a discussion group that contained adverting. As such, the Bosley attorneys argued, Kremer’s websites were commercial in nature, and that constituted trademark infringement.
The End Result
After closing arguments, the Court held:
“Kremer’s website contains no commercial links, but rather contains links to a discussion group, which in turn contains advertising. This roundabout path to the advertising of others is too attenuated to render Kremer’s site commercial. At no time did Kremer’s BosleyMedical.com site offer for sale any product or service or contain paid advertisements from any other commercial entity.”
After the brilliant yet failed attempt by Bosley’s lawyers to silence Mr. Kramer, you have to ask yourself how the Bosley transplant surgery has become one of the best-known names in the industry. Well, the answer is simple, brilliant marketing. That and a whole lot of cold hard cash.
When looking at the Linkedin profile for the former, as of January 2022, Marketing Director of Bosley Medical, one Jeremy Shubitz, you see him describing pretty much every marketing venture known to man that he oversaw while working for Bosley. What struck us as interesting is he states that the overall Bosley budget for marketing alone was $25 MILLION DOLLARS A YEAR. If you have the money to spend 25 million dollars a year on just advertising alone you can just about be the leading, number one provider of anything you damn well please.
So does a good marketing team and a massive advertising budget mean that the Bosley transplant surgery is the best in the business? Most of Bosley’s ads say that they have “America’s #1 Hair Doctors.” Surely if they have the money to spend 25 million dollars a year on advertising then they have the money to hire doctors that can perform the very best Bosely transplant surgery possible, right?
Things You Need to Know About Bosley Transplant Surgery
Trouble in Paradise
In 1994 the State of California filed suit against Bosley Medical for false and misleading advertising. The State of California claimed that Bosley engaged in an advertising campaign that used false and misleading advertising material. Prosecutors for California alleged that Bosley used retouched and false “after” photos in their advertising and the advertised hairlines were “airbrushed.” The lawsuit also alleged that Bosley never actually took any real photos of people who had hair transplant surgery at all.
Also contained in the State’s complaint were allegations of misrepresentations in Bosley’s advertising about pain during and after the procedure, scarring, and non-doctors performing the operations. As a result, Bosley was fined almost $650,000. The icing on the cake was that Dr. Bosley & Bosley Medical had already been sued by California and found guilty in 1979 of false advertising. For more information regarding this, there is a letter from the LA DA office to Bosley’s attorneys regarding this suit published by Michael Steven Kremer himself.
Medical Negligence?
On February 5th, 2010, a 70-year-old diabetic man with hypertension underwent a Bosley transplant surgery. The aging fellow carefully disclosed all these medical conditions to the Bosley staff prior to the surgery. However, the Bosley staff did not perform a pre-surgery exam or pre-surgery physical, nor did the Bosley staff attach any sort of vital monitoring devices to the clearly unwell and aging man during the surgery. Consequently, this poor fellow suffered a major stroke during his Bosley transplant surgery. He even began convulsing during the procedure, and for some reason, Bosley’s “#1 Doctors” either didn’t recognize the stroke or didn’t really care because they just continued with the man’s hair restoration procedure without skipping a beat.
Even after the procedure was completed, and even though this poor man was showing clear signs of systolic hypertension, there was no post-surgery exam. After the procedure, the man could not get out of his chair, walk or even talk. Bosleys “#1 Doctors” then sent the man home. Classy!
Needless to say, Bosley Medical was once again sued. In the end, 2.7 million dollars went to that patient in Ghorban Ali Salmanzadeh v Bosley Medical Group et al. However, if you take into account the fact that Bosley has a 25 million dollar a year advertising budget, I guess the poor man almost dying just means fewer late-night commercials in Q3 2010. It’s a common way that big companies do business. Shuffle as many people in as possible, rake in cash, and deal with the fallout whenever it arises. And it usually does. However, it’s usually cheaper for them to employ this type of tactic than to operate in an ethical, caring manner.
Medical Professionals or Salespeople?
Bosley Medical also employs what they call “Hair Transplant Counselors.” While these counselors are told to interact with customers like they have some kind of professional medical background, they are actually just salespeople that work on a commission.
One of the leading causes of all of Bosley Medicals’ legal issues is that they in fact do NOT hire the “#1 doctors” in the field of Hair Restoration. In fact, Bosley is well known to hire doctors with little to no hair restoration training. Frequently, they give them a brief crash course, and throw them into practice. If Bosley Medical did in fact hire the “#1 doctors,” it would be highly unlikely that they would be able to afford their 25 million dollars a year advertising budget.
Real Employees Speak Out
When we take a look at the Bosley “Counselor” job on the popular Indeed.com job posting website, one can’t help but notice the following reviews posted by past employees of Bosley:
“Needs work. Very high turnover rate in Atlanta office. Only concerned with numbers. Sales staff are dishonest and management allows this. Environment can be chaotic and atmosphere of distrust.”
“Never worked anywhere with such a low morale and this is largely due to management. Staff is able to get away with a lot if they have been there long – new people are treated terrible! A lot of turnover!”
“This had to be one of the worst places I ever worked at. Bosley may sound like an interesting company to work for, but everyone there is shady and the boss is very sarcastic and rude when she speaks to you. She does not make you feel welcome there at all. The staff isn’t friendly at all even though when you apply the clinical supervisor makes it seem like they are. Medical assistants definitely don’t get paid enough for the amount of work that they do. This place is just terrible.”
Bosley Transplant Surgery Customer Experiences
In addition to fostering a negative work environment, Bosley Medical racked up over 20 complaints to the BBB in just the last three years. While there are a few complaints about billing, most are regarding the terrible experience that patients are having at Bosley Medical. There are numerous horror stories regarding botched hair transplants and promises by Bosley’s untrained staff regarding unrealistic results so that they can earn their commission and bonuses for sales. There are also a number of complaints on the BBB website of untrained staff performing the hair transplants and the terrible results that would follow.
It appears Bosley Medical does respond to each and every BBB complaint. Each response appears to be written by a robot, or perhaps copied & pasted from a pre-written script that starts with “We sincerely regret…”
Failure to Deliver
Our friend Mr. Kremer was kind enough to publish a number of different Bosley customer experiences on his website bosleymedicalviolations.com. One such testimonial involves a woman who went to Bosley Medical for a procedure to fill out her slightly thinning hair. She got her consultation from one of Bosley’s “professionals” who told her that she has excellent donor hair and that the procedure would greatly enhance her look. However, after what was described as a “painful and exhausting procedure” the lady left Bosley Medical feeling terrible.
After a few days, she called the office concerned over the fact that she then has much less hair than she had before the procedure. Bosley Medical assured the panicked lady that it was only the excessive amounts of blood and matting that is a direct and common result of their Bosley transplant surgery. Three months later and after having none of the hair that was lost during the procedure grow back, the then desperate woman was told that it was “shock” from the procedure and that everything was fine.
This lady now wears a wig full time.
Bosley’s Shortcomings
One actual hair transplant technician that works for another hair restoration company wrote on bosleymedicalviolations.com:
“I’m happy you have a site that sheds light on Bosely’s mishaps. I’ve worked in the hair transplant field as a technician and have assisted over 1000 surgeries to date. A large majority of them, have been repair surgeries of ex-Bosley patients. It would be great to have some info on your site that informs folks about their repair options, such as scar revisions or using FUE to fill in old scars or harvest side areas to get better density on top (without affecting elasticity or adding scarring). Patients should know that they don’t have to live with their poor results, especially the ones in constant pain.”
Bosley Transplant Surgery is NOT Your Only Option
Sad to say the Bosley transplant surgery stories we have listed here are just the tip of the iceberg. If you are still leaning towards a Bosley transplant surgery even after reading this article, we encourage you to do your own research into Bosley Medical. We assure you that there is more than enough information online about the practices of Bosley and the Bosley transplant surgery results. However, there are other options. Better options. With better people, better service, and better results.
Our hair transplant specialists here at Best Hair Transplant assure you that Bosley Medical is not the end-all-be-all of the hair transplant surgery industry. No, we don’t have 25 million dollars to spend on advertising each year because we do everything possible to keep our overhead low so that we can offer the highest quality, most affordable hair transplant available on the market today.
Here at Best Hair Transplant, we make sure that our surgeons are well paid and actually have the skills to deliver the results you deserve. However, we make sure those expenses don’t fall on you, the hair transplant patient. The experiences people have had with Bosley Transplant surgery will never happen here at Best Hair, because we genuinely care about each and every one of our patients. Furthermore, we provide you with great service, offer honest discussions, and talk about realistic results & expectations.
Interested in learning more about FUE and FUT hair transplants? Contact us today for a complimentary consultation.
SUFFERING FROM HAIR LOSS?
Best Hair Transplant is the best place to schedule your hair transplant in Los Angeles. We’ve helped both men and women regrow their lost hair. But don’t take our word for it. We suggest learning as much as possible about hair restoration. Do so prior to making a decision on how to address your hair loss. Not every procedure is right for everyone.
At Best Hair Transplant, we’re proud of our results and happy to provide hair restoration services. Additionally, we’re proud to make hair transplants affordable and help you save money on a variety of hair transplants. To ensure your ease of mind, you can view our customer recommendations HERE. Furthermore, you can also see our Google reviews and Yelp reviews. We can’t wait to help you start restoring your lost hair.
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Redondo Beach, CA 90277
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