Last month The Ratava Group team attended LabDay Chicago, which for the last thirty years has been held at the Sheraton Hotel on the river. LabDay Chicago is always a great show characterized by its basement setting and whirlwind nature. Over the years, the show in the Sheraton’s basement has become one of North America’s largest annual tradeshows drawing attendees from all over the globe!

Dental lab owners and technicians attend lab day to find solutions for their laboratory needs and to see the latest, most technologically advanced products on the market. This year at LabDay Chicago the hype was all about the multilayered PMMA and multilayered zirconia discs! There were several presentations at the show each day, which focused on different aspects of the dental laboratory business. The Ratava Group delivered an educational presentation on the uses, profitability, and residual business that can be achieved with high translucent PMMA on behalf of Merz Dental.

RG was really hoping to announce the acquisition of Health Canada Approval and Certification for their line of Chrome Cobalt and Grade 5 Titanium CAD/CAM discs, but the approval was not available in time for the show. RG is really hoping the tedious process of obtaining Health Canada Certification will be over soon, so that Canadian Dental Labs and milling centers can have more options when it comes to milling non-precious metals. RG may not have been able to announce Health Canada Approval at the show, but they were able to expand their offerings for long-lasting milling machine tools!

In the evenings after the show exhibitors and attendees gathered, as always, at the Sheraton Chicago Chi Bar to catch up with colleagues and for more CAD/CAM talk. RG attended the CAP (Custom Automated Prosthetics) happy hour in the Colorado room and had the opportunity to meet a few really great technicians and dental laboratory owners and discuss the latest products and trends in digital dentistry. RG also had a chance to meet with Glenn with Roland DGA who is an expert on the milling machines. It is always great to catch up with the Roland team!

After attending the happy hour on Friday evening, RG had dinner at Howell’s and Hood on N. Michigan Avenue with the Delcam team, as well as the representatives from RG’s German manufacturers, Merz Dental and Doceram Medical Ceramics. The freshly-tapped Chicago-brewed beer paired well with gigantic cheeseburgers!

A trip to the Windy City is never complete without deep-dish pizza! RG concluded LabDay Chicago on Saturday evening by attending a meet and greet at Lou Malnati’s Pizzeria hosted by Datron. Datrons are advanced, high-tech milling machines, so it was great to have the chance to talk with the Datron team. RG also had the opportunity to meet the owner of iMilling, who has several milling machines, including a Datron, and to get his perspective on the various machines and millable materials.

As always, LabDay Chicago was fun, fast-paced, and really productive. RG is looking forward to exhibiting at LabDay Chicago again in 2015!