All it will take for this venture to be successful is for the marketing
to convince patients that dentistry is a commodity.  If a Cerec
restoration is a Cerec restoration, is a Cerec restoration (or at least
in a consumer's eyes) it might work.

I don't think a Cerec machine will make a mediocre dentist into a
superior one.  However, Costco won't be marketing as providing
superior dental *service*, they will be marketing lower cost, single
visit, Cerec *restorations*.  They will focus on the Cerec machine as
being the key ingredient, not who is treating the consumer (not much
of a patient at this point).

If people can be 'sold' on the idea that a machine producing a
restoration is more important than the person who provides the
diagnosis, anesthesia, preparation, and cementation, it might work.

If they created a significant demand for Cerec restorations, it wouldn't
be much of a problem to get one myself.

JMHO,
Fawks

If you had two milling machines, you could attach a battery backup to the
acquisition unit so that you can un-plug it and move it from room to room
without interrupting the data stream to the milling machine.  You could
prep, scan, design, start mill in room #1, go to room #2 and do the same
thing, by the time you were ready to mill in room #3 the first one would be
done.  This would require that you allow a staff person to play Lab-Tech and
do the design work while you are prepping or bonding.

With one acquisition unit and one milling machine, you can easily keep two
rooms busy as George pointed out.  If the DA is a RDA, many states will
allow her to do the scan and the trial fitting of the porcelain restoration.
The doctor would only need to the anesthetize, prep, and bond.  If people
don't mind getting treated a bit like cattle, this thing can be turned into
quite the assembly line.