Life-long Learner Driven to Share His Passion

Bill Zanin describes it as a "rav-enous appetite." From the first day he was introduced to the dental laboratory industry, he wanted to learn all he could about it.

He was 17 and a delivery boy for a laboratory in California. Having an artistic streak and a penchant for examining everything under a microscope as a kid, Zanin was immediately taken with the intricacies of dental technology. "I pestered and pestered the owner yet he refused to teach me anything," says Zanin. "But I was relentless; I'd constantly watch over his shoulder, pick up his handpiece when he put it down, and even practiced at home with a candle and a wax pot."

Eventually the owner gave in and six years later, Zanin was running a satellite lab for him. He left to open his own lab in 1982 and that ravenous appetite kicked up a notch. "I was working so many hours because I was constantly filling my desire to learn as much as possible. I was probably a little obsessive-compulsive...