Oskar Moore: Fasting is the one health intervention that costs in principle nothing. Yet people come to booking a Wilhelmi for 10 days or more and pay a premium price to do it under your roof. Why not just lock the fridge and stay at home?

Leo: So fasting, the way we do it here is a medically and therapeutically supervised fast. So it's different than a healthy person that would do this at home by locking the fridge. So in general, the fasting ecosystem has places for people to fast in good health, which would be the fast at home if you lock the fridge. Then you have people that come to a clinic where you have doctors, nurses, therapists, so on, sort of supervise you in your fast. You might have a medical condition, for example, diabetes, high blood pressure, and so on, where it makes sense to do this in a medicalized setting. So you can do this at home if you're healthy, if you know how to do it, if you're disciplined, that's also an important factor. But if you prefer to do it in a setting that is more supervised, medically supervised with a lot of experience in the guidance of fasting, then you should come to a clinic like ours.

Oskar Moore: Leo, welcome to the business of longevity. It's a pleasure to have you on the podcast. You're part of the fourth generation leading booker Wilhelmi, a family business that has spent more than 100 years building therapeutic fasting into medically supervised premium health experience across clinics in both Germany and Spain with research, hospitality and even at home products layered on top. For someone hearing about Buchinger Wilhelmi and excuse my pronunciation for the first time, what do you guys actually offer?

Leo: Yeah, it's a very good question. It's an elevator pitch that I have difficulty sometimes to answer. What is it that we do? Because it's true that if you ask 10 patients in our clinic right now, you will get 10 different answers. And I always regroup it by saying that Buchinger Wilhelmi is a mix between a clinic, a hotel and a monastery. So these three elements combined make for the experience that you can expect when you come to our clinic. The clinic is the part where everything we do here is medicalized. You have a doctor that you see for your whole stay many times. So you have an initial examination. Then the second meeting you have is discussing your lab results. Then you have a meeting sort of midway. And then you have a meeting with a doctor at the end. In the meantime, you can, if you choose to do it, have more diagnostics so you can do a meeting with a cardiologist, with a neurologist. We can go very deep if we want to for a person that likes to have that. but we can also be sort of accompanying a person that's depending on the needs and the medical situation of the patient. We also have nurses that follow you every day. So you see the doctor three, four times in your stay, but the nurse you see every day, checks your vitals in the morning and so on. So you have a real medical suivi when you're here with us. The second layer is the hotel or the hospitality part. We have an infrastructure here that is nice. It's somewhere between four to five stars with a service level. We have a big gym. We have a big sauna area. have sort of the facilities that you could expect for a person that not only wants to do something like a fast in a medicalized setting, but maybe is more focused on longevity. This is the topic of your podcast. So a person that might not be very sick yet, but that's also a question for definition. When is a person sick? But wants to invest in energy and being a good father, a good boss, a good friend, and to do this with... a yearly fasting ritual at our clinic in a place that is nice and has a good level of hospitality. And the third thing that we offer is this monastery aspect of fasting, or you could call it the monastic element of the fasting metabolism. The fasting metabolism puts you in a state where your body sort of shifts from glucose to the ketose state. The Americans call it the G2K switch that is activated and in this metabolism things become easier like meditation or yoga or going on a walk in nature. You have a different perception of your reality and I have the pleasure of talking to many of our patients that come every year. The champion of our clinic has come 104 times. the longest medically supervised fast and human. We've published that data also in a journal. There are people here that come 20, 30, 50, 70 times and they all tell me the same thing. the physical effects of fasting are something that they know. They're not surprised by what's happening on a physical side anymore when they come for the 50th time or the 60th time. But the true wonders is what happens with the mind and the power it gives you to focus, to think about a problem, to contemplate about your life and to maybe structure something that lies ahead. Many of our patients come, for example, in what we call an in-between phase, a moment charnier, sort of the door that opens and closes. So if you, for example, come out of a divorce or you've sold your business or you've had a very, very stressful life or you retire and you want to do something that sort of ends a period and opens the door to another one.

Oskar Moore: So that leads me to the next question, is, are people coming because they want to fast, or is it more for this kind of reset that they're coming to your clinics?

Leo: So because we've been... around for more than 100 years, so to be precise, 106 years, we have seen ourselves going through various markets. when we started, my great grandfather, Dr. Otto Buchinger started, it was called the Heilfasten. So it was heel fasting. So it was very descriptive because there was not a lot of data. There was not a lot of clinical experience, let alone scientific findings about fasting. there was always fast. Fasting is not new, it's not something that we invented or that anybody invented. It's an evolutionary mechanism. So evolution shows the people that were best adapted to periods of food scarcity to survive. And so we've got this system in our body. And what we've done is that we've sort of built a fasting protocol. that we have been developing since 106 years, that we think is most suited to be applicable to people with medical conditions and that has shown to have the best results. general people that come to our clinic have come at the beginning for high fasting then we moved into the preventive medicine market so fasting was considered to be a method of prevention we were very much sought after for people with obesity problems so a lot of people came as an ultimate measure to to lose weight and then sort of around the 2000s, suddenly we saw a lot of research from the US coming into the fasting market that came out of this longevity research. So people around the 2000s started to look for ways to prolong life. There was these Ray Walford studies and basically suddenly science caught up with the fact that calorie restriction and different forms of nutrition and chronic nutrition. So when do you eat? How much do you eat? What pauses do you get yourself in between meals had an effect on longevity? And then you have these places in Okinawa and Sicily where people live very long. So then this research came sort of into our lives and we realized that in this new era of longevity medicine, fasting will be one cornerstone. So you have physical exercise, have nutrition, have mental health, you have all these pillars of longevity and that fasting is one of these pillars. now, since I would say 25 years, the reason to come here is not because of weight loss, it's not because of, but it's really about investing in your health, investing in your longevity. And if I look around today at the patients that come here, weight plays a very little role. compared to the 90s, to the 80s, when I was a kid walking around the clinic here, would see a lot of people with severe problems of adipositas and overweight. And today, that's not the case. So the reason people come here is to treat metabolic syndromes, to simply stay in good health, to have a fasting routine that allows them to live a long and a healthy life.

Oskar Moore: So it's a very interesting story and I love that you look a little bit back at when you were a kid and reflect on what's changed. And you mentioned your, was it your grandfather or your great grandfather? Your

Leo: I was a great grandfather actually.

Oskar Moore: great grandfather, Dr. Otto Bukinger. And I'm really curious to say you've just taken us through the steps of evolution for Bukinger Wilhelmi. But what has actually stayed constant from 106 years ago when he founded the company?

Leo: So what's constant is that we put the fasting in the center of our methods. So we believe that fasting is the strongest non-pharmacological intervention in medicine that we have available. So it's very important to understand. So non-pharmacological intervention means that things that you can do for yourself without the help of medication or without the help of, but actually something that everybody can do no matter what gender, what race, what age, what everybody can fast. And it's like a superpower that everybody has and that has a lot of benefits. So Otto Buchinger already understood that and he put this in the center of the method and he then said around the fasting we should offer treatments that support the fast. at his time that was going into nature, cold water therapy, so thermoregulation. It was things like talking to a psychiatrist, this psycho hygiene, so very light, supportive elements of the fasting. And over the last 100 years, we have sort of kept fasting in the middle of everything that we do. Now we've added intermittent fasting, we've added some fasting has sort of evolved, but it's still the core of everything that we do. and also the supporting methods around it have evolved. So now we've got very powerful diagnostics, we can analyze sleep, we can analyze, we have five laboratories that we work with, we can go into microbiome analysis, genetic analysis, we have a strong network of doctors around the clinic that we work with, dermatologists and so on. So we have sort of evolved the inner layer of fasting and also the outer layer. But the main structure that we are a place where we believe in the power of fasting, specifically our protocol, the Buchinger fasting, has stayed the same.

Oskar Moore: And Leo, if we focus a little bit on yourself now, I fundamentally believe that companies are driven by the culture that's set by the leaders. And in your case, you are not the founder, so you haven't been able to enforce that culture from the beginning, but you've inherited a culture and you've inherited a position and had to make that yours, which is... is very interesting and inspiring and I want to kind of dig into that. So you mentioned yourself running around as a kid again and that you grew up inside this world and I'm kind of imagining it and I can imagine that it was a ambivalent feeling sometimes being constantly locked into the business. But was this always obvious that you'd end up leading the business?

Leo: Yeah, so we are the fourth generation that is working in the clinics. So my brother and my cousin in our clinic in Spain, in Marbella, and me and my other cousin, who's the chief doctor here in New Berlin, and myself have taken over the responsibility here. The fact that you, I mean, growing up in a family business, you, as the name already says, your family and the business is one. So there's, we believe that the business wouldn't exist without the family and the family would look very different than it does now without the business. So both growing up in a family business you always have these two realities that you're confronted with. We live right next door so sitting at our dinner table you see the clinic and it's full width and I came here always after school, I did my homework here, I had my lunch here with the employees, with my parents and this was my playground to be honest. So the clinic was always present but then when you grow up and you start to go, you end your school and you think about what to do in life, you always try to find an access to that family business because in the end you have to have something of a... you have to add something to the family business if you want to succeed, if you want to be of value for the family business and that starts to become something that you think about between school and your studies. So what we did is we had a process that we did with an institute here with the whole family where we built a family chart So the family charter was the process, something that we developed as a family to establish rules for succession. So we described various paths into the family business. We are a clinic, so one path was medicine. If you study medicine, you have to have a certain degree, you have to have worked for a specific time and had at least one promotion. as a doctor. The same was true for business, which was my case. So I studied business. I need to have a master's degree and three years of working somewhere else and one promotion. And so the road into the family business was clear for the conditions what you bring into the family business. And then the second thing was the conviction that you are working in a place that is... doing something good. So in my case, as I said, I studied business. I was a bit lost at the beginning. I did my civil year in a hospital here in Germany. I thought I was going to be a doctor, but it was such a terrible experience that I thought, my God, I'm never going to be able to do this studies until I become a doctor. So I lost faith. And then I said, OK, business is something where you don't do harm. I'm not a cello player. didn't have a passion that was strong enough to study it. So I said, okay, I'm going to do business because that's something you always need. It's a good education for your brain and you might learn something valuable. And then... I, after the first semester, I came home to my father and I was, okay, dad, I know everything now. I'm going to tell you exactly what to do because I study one semester of business. And

Oskar Moore: Okay.

Leo: then he said, okay, Leo, do you know what? You fasted, of course. I mean, you're part of our family. So we did that with you growing up, but there's one thing that you're still missing before you are. able to talk to me in that way is that you have to check in as a regular patient and you have to do the experience from the inside and then we can sit down and have a talk. So I said okay next time I'm to come and you know what I'm going to bring a couple of friends if that's okay and so I came here with three friends and I prepared the whole program for them. I chose the doctors that I knew, I chose the therapies, I sort of led them through the process because they had many questions, how to prepare, how to... And that first experience was so great that when we came back to my university, of course they told everyone. And without knowing it, my perception from my friends and my peers changed. And suddenly I became the fasting guy at my university. And they were all like, man. so great and what happens if I have this and my cousin has diabetes and my uncle is fat and my aunt is struggling with this and so can you help her and so next time I brought other friends and so gradually I slipped into this role and I realized that this was something that was relevant for the people around me you know it wasn't something that was Relevant from my grandparents or you know, something that I knew was in the in the past But no this was doing actually good to my friends my my business friends that Were of my age and had my problems and were living in my world and So I realized well, this is actually a timeless thing. This is not and it's actually more relevant nowadays then it was in the past because as your podcast is about longevity, of our age, of our generation are struggling with things that fasting has an answer.

Oskar Moore: So what I kind of hear between the lines here is a form of pride you found out. You became very proud of what your family was building and you could bring in your friends and you could see the impact that was happening. And that's something that I can, I really can follow. It's something that I'm experiencing as well since my parents have built a Nordic group that does lots of functional medicine as well. And growing up, my experience of it was, it was very far from my understanding, it was very difficult for me to grasp the understanding of what they were actually building in terms of, in that case, it was, you mentioned genetics and, and, and GI tests, et cetera, that you guys do. It's, it's that portfolio that we sell very much of. And, and it's difficult when you're a kid to understand the complexities of it and the impact that it's actually having. And when you grow up and you start listening around to your friends and your peers saying that they've got gut issues or their grand grandmother can't get out of bed or as you say, someone's fat over here. And I'm just going, Hmm, okay. This is everything I've actually heard of when growing up about these issues that we're trying to solve. And then you get into this teenage stage and this, go to university and you start reflecting because you can start plugging in that university degree into the company that you've been living in your entire life. And things start to make sense. from that, in my case, at least, a real pride kicks in and it becomes like a mission to continue that and completely different. purpose arises, think, than if you were working somewhere else.

Leo: You know, because we are in the fourth generation, we can look back on three generations. You've got the founder, Otto Buchinger, his struggle was basically... bringing this to life, the concept and making it sort of applicable to his time and basically just start everything. The requirements were different in energy, you have to convince people, you have to convince the first employees, it's the first generation founders have a specific role to play. in the business or the family business. Second generations were my grandparents. These were the post-war people, know, in Germany, the country was in ruins. And this was this energy that these people had to rebuild and to create and to... And of course, the post-war era of their generation had a different need. They were talking about different things. were... The whole time was different. My parents, the third generations, were the ones that then said, okay, we have to start hiring more experts in the field. So we can't just focus on fasting, but we have to open it up to science. We have to open the field also to experts from different, more therapists, more sports therapists, nutritionists, and so on and so on. and our generation will have a specific task. We'll have a different, your podcast about longevity is exactly describing that. We are moving now into this conversion of medicine, hospitality, and other sectors that are sort of grouping themselves around longevity. And people are asking about the definition, about... where this is going, but they can connect. can sort of, if you talk to a person about longevity, they will have an opinion about it nowadays. And so this is basically our task of our generation. finding

Oskar Moore: Absolutely.

Leo: your place in that, yeah, I think we both know what it means.

Oskar Moore: So if we get into the science a little bit of this, why should people fast? So that if we're trying to explain this to someone who has a little sense of longevity, but don't actually know what the benefits are, what would you, how would you explain it to them?

Leo: So. Basically, I always explain to people that tell me, for example, we have patients here say, I told all my friends, I'm gonna spend 10 days in the south of Germany and I'm gonna fast. And then they all look at me like, what the hell are you doing? You could be anywhere in the world and you chose to be here. And the truth is that for people who still believe fasting is something that goes against your nature, against your health, against your... I always say that it's basically your body was made to experience periods of food scarcity. So your body is actually built to have periods of fasting and it's not built to have three to five meals a day until you die. That's not the way your body was made. Your body is supposed to fast. for certain periods throughout the year. The same way it's supposed to sleep. You're supposed to be awake and you're supposed to be asleep. like 20, 30 years ago, sleep was supposed was considered to be a waste of time. You know, we've got Gordon, Gordon Gecko saying, I can sleep when I money never sleeps in a sleeping is for for for losers and so on. And nowadays, we've discovered that sleeping has these incredible repair mechanisms and so on. And the same is true about fasting. have you have two basic basic cycles in nature, you have day and night and you have seasons you have summer spring winter and fall and And if you go back 100 or 200 or 300 years, the way we were living without electricity, without supermarkets, without... We basically lived according to these cycles. We were eating in the day and we were sleeping in the night. We had a lot of food in summer. We ate maybe a little bit too much, but that was okay because in winter we fasted and lost that weight. basically, fasting is not something that is new or it's a capability we've lost and because we have now an availability of food all the time everywhere and we've sort of we are out of sync of these of these cycles. the second thing that you have to understand is that there are different fasting protocols and there are different indications to fast. there is, if you have fasting protocols, you can go from zero calories up to about a thousand calories and all of these different protocols will call themselves fasting protocols. So this is based on calories. Then you have fasting protocols based on time. You've got day fast and then you've got a prolonged fast. Then you've got fasting protocols that have two days of fasting in a week and five days of eating. So when we talk about fasting, we have to be also precise about the protocols that we talk about. Then another thing that is highly relevant when we talk about fasting and the positive effects of fasting is when we talk about specific indications. Let's say for example, we have a person with a diabetes type 2. You have specific protocols that have a very high scientific significance. to heal that diabetes type 2. But you can't just do that without supervision or a doctor that sort of follows you on that. when we here in the clinic decided to engage in science, it was exactly to prove that our Buchinger fasting protocol has specific benefits to health. And the way we did that, we started with the first scientific study by looking at the safety and the efficacy of our fasting protocol. So is it safe to fast with different diseases and what are the effects? We have in the clinic here and in Marbella 7,000 patients per year. So we can, we take blood at the beginning and at the end. So we can really. with high certainty say the way the fasting protocol affects our patients. So we started with the first study, which was the biggest fasting study in the world, 1,400 patients, and we proved the safety and the efficacy of fasting. And then from there on, we go down into specific indications like diabetes, the effect on the microbiome, the effect on high blood pressure, weight, visceral fat, muscle composition, and so on. So we go down, we even did a study with a dentist to check the oral microbiome and the effect it has on paradontitis, for example. So we basically start at the, like we do the basics, we did the basics first and now we go deeper and deeper and deeper into different fields that affect our patients. One topic that we're looking at right now is the period after fasting. So there's a lot of science now that had been done about fasting. It's been very studied. We know if you go on research gate, you take fasting, you get hits from China to the US, to Germany, to Spain, and everywhere in the Nordics, everywhere in the world. What the science is now shifting towards is for example, the period after fasting. So what happens when a person has ended the fast and is going back into the refeeding cycles? day one, day two, day three, day four. What types of food can we give to our patients and what types of food can we give based on a specific diagnosis? So a person that has high levels of inflammation is probably going to need a different refeeding after the fasting. A second thing that we're looking at is women's health. So we know that, for example, menopause is affecting many of our patients and there are effects of fasting, for example, on the cycle of women. There is a topic on fertility that affects our patients here. So we want to better understand how we can treat the women that come here with these specific indications. We're looking at the moment also with the University of Almeria in Spain at a sports protocol. You probably heard of that. Where because we did a study on muscle with another group in France where we've shown that the muscle function and size stays intact. So there's a big myth around muscle and fasting, but we debunked that with that study and now that we know that we're thinking about what types of physical activity can we apply during fasting and for example since 106 years we have done a daily hike with all of our patients that want to participate in the hike and there is group A which is very fast there's group B which is medium and there's group C which is slow and then there's group D which is a silent walk. but the patients automatically sort of regroup themselves, meaning that they're all fasting, the same, they're all fasting, but there's different levels in physical activity and we want to make a perfect program for people in physical activity and fasting. We're doing a study now with hip surgeons that are prescribing the fasting box to their patients pre-operation to see if they have a better result after the operation and they feel better going into the operation. Then we're looking at things like scarring and readaptation after the surgery based on the fasting protocol that they got going in. We have a study now that is going to look at adding fibers to our fasting protocol because we want to understand how the microbiome can maybe be functioning better after fasting when we give fibers. So there's a lot of things that we have in the pipeline and... We are really, really starting to understand fasting on a very, very sophisticated level. We can now also treat our patients with a very high level of certainty when it comes to the effects of fasting. There are certain things that are still not very much understood. For example, things like cancer, fasting and cancer. There's many studies that are going to come out, but a cancer is a very complex, there's not one cancer, like there's not one fasting or one sport. So cancers are different in their forms and they affect patients differently. So this is a very, very complex, a very difficult thing to understand. So this is one big topic that is being studied, but for the rest... people that are afraid of fasting or that think that they are going to do something that's going to harm their health. I think we can now really say with over a hundred years of experience that this is not the case and that we can treat patients here. And also from a scientific point of view, we can say now that fasting is a very, very powerful tool for health and longevity.

Oskar Moore: So you explaining some really fascinating studies that you guys are doing. And what I know working in kind of medicine and longevity is that when you do these clinical studies is often an expense associated with it. And that's the income and a cost model that that is in a business. So that means that you guys have to be generating a significant amount of income to be able to go off and and make these studies. So how do you prioritize that income that comes in and when do you decide to go off and do a clinical study? Like there must be some kind of decision making to make sure that there's a positive cash flow.

Leo: So the study is actually a very good example of something that a normal business would probably not do because we... We have around six people on the payroll for these studies. And it's something that we publish openly so we don't keep these studies to ourselves. They are publicly available for everyone. They are cited by others. They're used by others. And this is because we want to, we have a mission that is that we want to make fasting a known and accepted medical and therapeutically all over the world. This is our way to contribute to this discussion of science and this is why we invest in it and we are very proud of the team that has now done more than 25 scientific publications in medical journals. We've got more than a thousand seven hundred citations which is a good indicator. And we've got collaboration with top universities basically all over the world But then of course because you're asking from a business point of view it's also a way for us to show That we are a serious that we are a serious clinic. This is something that is also very good if you are hiring doctors, if you are hiring professionals, that you are a place of science where you don't only do what you've been doing for 106 years but you actually You have a scientific department that means that you're thinking, you're constantly rethinking things, you're questioning the way things are doing and you're not just relying on what the great grandfather has started 106 years ago. There's also this element of, of course, science, scientific findings also allows you to take part in a discussion, in a scientific discussion in congresses, in journals, and you can talk about it in the media. So it's a win-win situation. It's also a bit delicate because of course, science is... is independent. In our case we don't pressure our scientists to do anything, they're very free to work. But it's kind of a... It's kind of a unit that also works internally. For example, I give you an example of this study that we're doing on the refeeding of our patients has led us to start working with things like CGMs and ketone measurement devices. It's also allowed us to, we're going to launch soon a program that is the first post stay program of our patients. So when they leave the clinic, they can interact with our nutritionists. We track them for a certain period. So it's not only a scientific department, but it's also an innovation department. There is a product that's called the fasting box that we... that we have now, it's a five day program. It's a little bit different than the fasting program we do here. So it's higher in calories. It's got a little bit of a different setting. We send it in a box to people at home. and they can do that for a five day metabolic reset. And this is actually something that we came up with during COVID. Doors were shut, nobody came. So we thought we need to bring something to the patients that couldn't come to the clinic. And we worked on that with the scientific department. So at that time, they were basically like a startup incubator. So. We work with science in a way that we fund it. It's a high budget, but we get tremendous benefits from it.

Oskar Moore: My sales and marketing brain is, is doing hootah hoops in, my head right now, because for me, it sounds like this is a organic marketing play. It's not made for marketing. It's made for science and backing up what you guys are doing, but it has that positive effect that it creates the buzz around marketing and the trust and people can find it. online or sorts of different places. Now that kind of leads me into the marketing question because how do you find your customers? Are you guys so good at what you're doing that word of mouth is strong enough to bring in new ones or are you doing a digital marketing? Are you in magazines? What kind of marketing plays do you do aggressively to bring in new customers?

Leo: So the biggest marketing play that we have is the word of mouth. We have such a strong... customer base, that we basically the best marketing for us is the people that leave this place in good health and they come home and everybody's like, wow, this is amazing. I want to do that one day. So if we look back over periods of the last three years, over 70 % of our patients have been there more than once. So they come back.

Oskar Moore: Wow.

Leo: at least once over a period. So we have a very, very high rate of returning patients. In our case, we always say, if the experience you do here is good, you're very likely to come back at the. best time for you according to your timetable in the year. People strategically place that as one element of the year. Like they do a ski vacation or they check out a city or they do a mental retreat, meditation. They come here for fasting once a year. Then the second thing of course is classic communication. we... We work with journalists. We have a journalist base that we know that always contact us. For example, in the fasting period, the Christian Lent or the Ramadan or the period, for example, New Year's resolution is a classic topic for journalists where they think about us because we can contribute. Then, of course, we do a little bit of social media, to be honest, where we're not very very strong in that one because it's a very personal experience that social media can be very personal but it's sort of we have mixed feelings about it but we're there and sometimes we're... Yeah.

Oskar Moore: I have ideas, Leo. You just give me a call whenever. Already now it's ticking.

Leo: Yeah, of course. mean, so that's the mix, the marketing mix. We've got a few books that we publish. My mother has written a few books. So we're quite established in the market that is fasting and now longevity is different. So longevity means you have to be in podcasts, you have to talk to other... key players in the market. They have to be in certain congresses and certain fairs. But in general, because we've been around for so long, we have a very strong customer base that is now slightly changing because it's getting younger. The perspectives are changing. People are coming to our clinics very informed. They have their own ecosystem of wearables and doctors treating them at home. They've got constant blood measurements. So, for example, we have a a blood measuring every time a patient comes and now it's becoming people are bringing so much own results that we offer a supplementary one at the middle or whenever they choose to and we take the ones that they bring if they're good enough.

Oskar Moore: to more critical customers actually.

Leo: more critical, more informed. They know exactly what they want, what they come for. So we have to adapt to the fact that people are bringing in their own ecosystems now here. We have to be able to do like a plug and play or to become the treating. Where also many of our patients, for example, from countries with not that strong health systems, they choose us to be their treating doctors where they come every year for a general checkup. So they do colonoscopies here, they check their, they go to a cardiologist, dentist, ophthalmologist. So they do everything here once a year and also do a fasting cycle with us to regenerate.

Oskar Moore: So we have to go into the closing part of this episode now. And so I have four quick questions we have to run through. you, I'm curious to hear, what do you want Bookinger Wilhelmi to be in 2040 when you've had 20 years leading this company?

Leo: I want us to stay focused on fasting. So this is what we do the best. This is what we wanna keep doing and evolve the sort of supporting system around it. but to be true to our core and to our sort of USP, if you like, and not sort of fade into too many other things, but to stay focused on fasting, but to be able to evolve the layer around it. I want us to stay a family business. A family business means we can have a specific culture here that patients that trust us with their health. are very sensitive about when it comes to your health and who you trust for your health and longevity and where you go every year. You feel like if it's a place and it's just about money with investors behind it, they try to optimize the business model or if it's a family that wants to have wants you to have a specific experience. And that means that we will probably not be the most successful. successful ones in business terms, but we have sort of the results where we see the patients coming back every year, every year. So being independent in health is of high value. We are developing a third place in the south of France. So we're establishing ourselves from Germany in the 1920s, then Spain 1970s, now 2029 in the south of France. So we're becoming a European family business of health and longevity. So that means that we need to be a European family business with European values. And it's not very sexy at the moment because Everybody's talking bad about Europe, but we believe in Europe. We believe in also the values that represent Europe. And we see it now with the war in Iran that even though we're maybe a bit slower than the rest, but we are safe. We have a very high quality in health and our medical system is very good. And we have a very long tradition of fasting. that other countries don't have. That's a very European thing and I think that this European know-how of fasting, of integrative medicine can be a very, very valuable contribution to the longevity discussion.

Oskar Moore: And just to add, it looks absolutely beautiful. And I think I might just be your first guest in 2029 when it plans to open. Leo, what's your one recommendation for someone that wants to start in this longevity space?

Leo: Yeah, so longevity is like prevention medicine was at the beginning or if you want also when the wellness started. So it's basically something that regroups a lot of different elements. It's basically where hospitality and medicine and other markets meet and make a claim about something that you can do for your health or your well-being and yourself. I would look at something that could benefit your... definition of longevity. So make a definition for yourself about longevity. Does it mean to be healthy until you're 100? Does it mean to be healthy right now? Does it mean to be... And then also look at your surroundings. So who do you want to be there for? There's this classic theory that I love at the moment where you look at your... that you look at your situation from four different angles, the four burner theory. Have you heard about it? You've got the four burners.

Oskar Moore: full Bernouthe theory.

Leo: So if you want to define longevity for yourself, look at your life as having four burners. There's one that is family, there's one that is health, there's one that is your friends, and there's one that is work. And these four burners can only... you only have enough gas for all of them to be at 50%. So if you want to excel at two of them, you need to de-prioritize two of your other burners. So if you want to excel in health, that means that you have to put your energy into a different burner. And for me, Somebody that starts with longevity, you can get lost in supplements, you can get lost in listening to five different podcasts that have five different meanings. So I would always recommend to look at your personal situation. What is it that you can do and what applies to you as a person? It doesn't make sense to start with 20 supplements and then stop with them after one month. doesn't... It doesn't work if you go against your personal nature and skip dinner because if you're a social person you cannot skip dinner. If you are not able to be disciplined in your sports and run a marathon then you should choose a different sport. I always recommend if you want to start with longevity start with something that works for yourself.

Oskar Moore: what's the one health habit that you never miss?

Leo: Yeah. Excuse me?

Oskar Moore: What's the one health habit that you never miss? Is that the fasting or is it what's that one

Leo: I am...

Oskar Moore: thing?

Leo: The fasting is something that I regularly do. My sports is something that I regularly do. I am not very disciplined with my eating. I just love to eat. So this is my burden of longevity that I need to perfect. over the course of my next year. But one thing that I don't miss is my regular fasting. I kept the rhythm alive from my university days, so every time after my semester. So it's basically the first three weeks of January and the first three weeks of June are reserved for my fasting.

Oskar Moore: Awesome. Finally, where can people find yourself and booking a helmy online if they want to research a little bit more?

Leo: So you can find ourselves on YouTube. We've got a channel where we describe every study that we've done in five minutes. There's also lots of talks, lots of information. You can find us on social media, of course, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and so on. You can find us on our website as well, and also on various podcasts, which we've all linked in our social media.

Oskar Moore: Fantastic. Leo, thank you so much for joining me on the business of longevity. It's been a pleasure.

Leo: Thank you for hosting me, Oskar. See you soon.