Welcome to our New 'Off Topic' Page!

 We hope you enjoy our new 'Off Topic' page. We created this page to add some variety to our website, and share with you some of the interesting places and people we have had the pleasure of visiting and meeting over the years. We have found just as in the dental field, in most industries there are craftspeople... artisans who have developed their skills and elevated them to higher level. This always takes time and a great deal of effort, along with natural ability. With the advent of new technologies in most industries, it is abundantly evident that there will always be a demand for high quality, handmade products. As industry commercialization continues to expand, the chasm between high end, handmade products and mass-produced, generic products grows ever greater.

 In the dental laboratory industry we feel that there is a need for balance. Technology in the hands of an artisan can make us more efficient, more productive while maintaining a high level of quality. But to abandon the basics and completely rely on technology to solve complex cases, or to train individuals who do not yet possess a thorough knowledge of dental materials and the stomatognathic system, will always lead to results that are less than desirable. For most patients, this is unacceptable, especially when it comes to the individual nature of a person's smile.

 We dedicate our new 'Off Topic' page both to the artisans who create, and to the clientele who appreciate them!

In our second edition of 'Off Topic' we wanted to share with you what has become a shared love of artisanal mezcal which we first encountered after meeting with S.A.C.R.E.D. founder Lou Bank in Chicago in 2018.

Saving Agave for Culture, Recreation, Education and Development

The (relative) boom in interest in agave spirits (mezcal, raicilla, bacanora, tequila, and destilado de agave) has created an economic engine that is sparking enormous changes in the rural Mexican towns where they produce these traditional and artisanal spirits. The young adult male population had been depleted in these small towns, as they went north to make money to send home. But those same adult males are now needed in the towns to make these spirits, and to farm to feed the larger populations. And the increased income is allowing them to build libraries and stock those libraries with books — a scarce resource in rural Mexico.

SACRED is a USA-based, 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporationthat helps raise money to send to these towns, to aid in the building of these libraries; to help replant the agave, to ensure the economic engine doesn't die; and to underwrite the cost to maintain and replicate the water-preservation systems these towns have established to buffer against drought. The fund-raising generally takes the form of tasting events, where participants who make a donation to one of the projects in Mexico are treated to samples of five or more of the rare agave spirits from these towns.