News Releases
Dental Lab Products - 10 Questions
May 2014 | Additions January 20251. What's Strategy Milling's background? How long has it been around? How does it work with APMR, and who is in leadership?
Strategy Milling was the idea of Don Mappin, who surmised that if labs were still making gold crowns, the apparent benefits of milling and digitizing would benefit that restoration type and the industry just as it has for many other materials and processes. The figurative groundwork was put in motion at the beginning of 2012. Fast forward to 2024, and Strategy Milling has been the leader in precious and non-precious CAD/CAM dental restorations in North America. Scott Mappin is the President at Strategy.
2. What led APMR to form Strategy Milling?
LLate in 2011, Scott Mappin, Don's youngest brother, a veteran of the dental laboratory industry with a broad scope of experience, resigned from a lab and found himself unemployed. Don offered a position. Scott was in his 33rd year as a technician and unwittingly became an asset to Atlantic, eventually transforming Don's idea into a reality. Scott had spent the previous 5 years focusing on different aspects of digital forms of dental technology. From being a trainer for 3M's LAVA COS and training over 100 dental offices to use and integrate that intraoral scanner to managing large milling and outsourcing laboratories such as Issaquah Dental Lab & Albensi Dental Lab. These three opportunities provided the foundation of knowledge regarding how to create Strategy Milling.
3. What were you hearing from the industry that led you to know it was the right time?
Nothing... realistically, there was no one banging down the door for this service. We looked at it through the lens of a precious metal refiner that built its business refining all sorts of dental scrap and our understanding of the state of the industry:
- Gold crowns are still being made, albeit at a lower rate than in previous years.
- Atlantic, a precious metals refiner for over 25 years, saw that gold was leaving dentistry through the eyes of the scrap lots it was collecting and asked the question, "Why?" We surmised that there was still a desire and need among clinicians and lab owners alike for this product. So, how do we help the customers who helped build Atlantic? By providing better quality, better fitting, and more cost-effective service to continue producing affordable gold alloy prosthetics that fit into the digital workflow.
- Outsourcing has become a more prominent, more accepted way of doing business in the lab industry.
4. How has the technology changed that enables Strategy Milling's gold milling?
- Milling machines and software have both lowered in price and risen in capability.
- Milling has benefits that surpass the lost wax and cast technique when comparing the two results side by side
5. What's been the response from around the lab industry?
While we anticipated quicker growth, the response has been highly positive. The only negative from my perspective is that there is confusion out there. One large company dominating gold sales in this space has created confusion by stating that they, too, were milling gold when, in fact, they were not. No other milling centers or companies in the USA were milling gold alloys at the beginning. Strategy was the sole provider in the North American market for three and a half years.
6. What have you heard from labs and dentists who have used Strategy Milling?
- We hear from labs using Strategy that they have been delighted... the quality surpasses expectations.
- While we don't sell to dentists directly, we do hear from them that they like to place gold restorations, love the track record gold has as well as its positive attributes such as malleability, track record, ease of placement and removal, and being non-antagonistic. Strategy has, in a sense, stabilized the cost of manufacturing, and labs that can scan and design are in a strong position to sell a flat fee gold restoration to their clients.
7. In your opinion, what does gold offer to labs that other alternatives don't?
Specifically, "milled" gold offers a laboratory a restoration containing the following positive attributes: Lower cost of manufacturing higher quality of internal "fit" when comparing the state of our milled product as the customer receives it VS the state of a divested gold crown that has been cast; less finish time from the fit and external surface texture... and if appropriately designed, a great way to save money as the lab is only paying for the restorations weight and not the typically accompanying sprue system. Other than that, it falls back to what are now becoming the classic discussions between the available alternatives. Do YOU believe that gold is good? We do. It is more reliable, consistent, and user-friendly for all involved... lab, Dr., patient, and a better fitting product than Zirconia, milled Lithium Dislocate, or cast PFM frameworks for posterior restorations.
8. What makes Strategy Milling different from other milling center options?
Strategy Milling began as the first company to provide a milled precious metal milling service to the dental industry in North America. The product range has expanded over the years to include milled cobalt chrome, titanium, two brands of Premill abutments, two zirconia brands, two PMMA materials, one for night guards, one for long-term temporary restorations, and also the ability to mill implant interfaces for multi-unit bridges in two gold alloys for crowns and bridges, two PFM alloys for ceramic application, and titanium, eliminating the need for abutments. At the time of this writing, tests are ongoing to validate single-unit pfm or gold restorations milled directly to the implant interface, eliminating the need for abutments or UCLA-style work.
9. How will Strategy Milling change the industry?
We believe Strategy will become the standard in the industry for producing gold prosthetics as labs learn about our products and services. We have brought gold restorations into the digital age. Fast-forward to 2025, and Strategy has added numerous products and services, maintaining its unique offerings at far better prices and challenging other vendors in this space.
10. Anything else you'd like to add?
Labs now have a resource to aid them in manufacturing gold products more efficiently and attaining what doctors would like to see: a flat-rate gold restoration. Labs that do this and market it to their dentist clients could see their gold business grow!