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A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

businessoffashion.com

121–130 of 138 posts

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Luxottica offered to buy Oakley, and Oakley refused.. said it was never going to happen. So Luxottica stopped distributing Oakley's products in Sunglass Hut, etc.. which deprived Oakley of the majority of it's revenue, causing their stock to crash. Oakley then accepted a buyout offer from Luxottica. So to answer your question, why are there not better Luxottica competitors.. because when someone produces a good produ…

Did Oakley have their retail outlets at that time? Or did that come after the Luxottica purchase? When I bought my Oakleys last year, most of my research was by browsing in the two Oakley retail stores in my city. Some was from browsing at surfwear stores (as far as I know, Luxottica don't own Rip Curl or City Beach). A small portion of my shopping research was on my (Luxottica-owned) optometrist's website, but I end…

This article from 2007 (after the merger) says they had 250 stores out of 11,000 retail outlets that carried their products

https://seekingalpha.com/article/40333-oakley-luxottica-grou...

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have free shipping. Hi-index single vision lenses are included in frame prices, https://www.jins.com . JINS PC (blue-light blocking) glasses were an industry marketing breakthrough, selling almost 1 million units in the first year, https://corp.jins.com/jp/en/company/history . Their success prompted eyeglass lens makers to launch blue-blocking coatings, now widely available.

Can anyone shed some light on whether blue-blocking coatings are actually useful/good for you?

Long article on this topic, arguing “no”, https://amp.businessinsider.com/blue-blocking-glasses-scienc...

For computers, Flux (http://justgetflux.com) offers more control of blue light, and it does make a difference. Also, increase your blinking, periodically focus on distant objects (use a timer if needed) and don’t look at a bright screen in a dark room without ambient light.

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#123

As I write this, I am attending SILMO 2017 optical trade show in Paris. I've been attending for a few years and what you see when talking to industry participants is that there is real aversion to business models that can disrupt the industry to lower costs. Frame suppliers that sell to brick-and-mortar shops will very often refuse to sell to e-commerce players, for fear of alienating their brick and mortar accounts…

> Opticians will often refuse to disclose pupillary distance, as a way to prevent their customer from purchasing elsewhere As I understand their logic is that the PD is part of the fitting process for the glasses and not the optical prescription.

Except that’s not true. PD varies by focal distance (far, near) and is unchanged by any frame.

Perhaps they obtain frame measurements at the same time as they measure PD. But the machine is capable of measuring PD alone.

Try another store/human.

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#124
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The opticians are safe and sound for now but if I were in the business I'd be weary. 1. augmented reality could get real and good very fast. Lots of people will be comfortable testing glasses at home instead of checking the optician. Visiting the optician is the most awkward shop I go to. 2. How long before we have advanced cameras and the eye test could be done online? Well, I think a bit longer than I'd think but t…

I feel that we need to see an uptick in automation/computer vision in the machines at the opticians before we're likely to see any sort of capability of the same at home. I would feel safer if the machines made diagnoses and there was an onsite optometrist/ophthalmologist for verification. Also some conditions such as glaucoma can be difficult to test ( http://www.glaucoma.org/glaucoma/diagnostic-tests.php ). I remem…

State of the art in eye imaging sensors is the equipment used in Lasik surgery. Already being used to supplement smaller opticians with remote optometrists, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15374489

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#125

If you're ever in Japan or Taiwan, have some glasses made there. JINS in Japan is ~$120 including lenses, lenses ready in 3 hours. Pick up same day. I heard there's a company in Taiwan with a similar business model as well. They're set up to handle tourists, and will handle duty free as well.

[deleted]

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Opticians will often refuse to disclose pupillary distance, as a way to prevent their customer from purchasing elsewhere As I understand their logic is that the PD is part of the fitting process for the glasses and not the optical prescription.

Except that’s not true. PD varies by focal distance (far, near) and is unchanged by any frame. Perhaps they obtain frame measurements at the same time as they measure PD. But the machine is capable of measuring PD alone. Try another store/human.

Over the years I've been to several opticians and they all measure the PD with a special looking ruler as part of the frame fitting measurements.

I don't doubt that it could be measured as part of the optical prescription process but it isn't as far as I've seen. I'm in the UK.

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that’s not true. PD varies by focal distance (far, near) and is unchanged by any frame. Perhaps they obtain frame measurements at the same time as they measure PD. But the machine is capable of measuring PD alone. Try another store/human.

Over the years I've been to several opticians and they all measure the PD with a special looking ruler as part of the frame fitting measurements. I don't doubt that it could be measured as part of the optical prescription process but it isn't as far as I've seen. I'm in the UK.

This is what Lenscrafters (US) uses: http://www.uiwoptometryblog.org/2013/09/accufit/

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#129
post #69
post #8

The reason glasses cost so much is because one company owns: (1) nearly all brand name frames including Ray-Ban, Oakley, Prada eyewear, Armani eyewear and so on, (2) nearly all retail stores such as LensCrafters, Pearle Vision, Sears Optical and Target Optical and (3) EyeMed, one of the largest vision insurance companies. Luxottica retail brands: http://www.luxottica.com/en/retail-brands Luxottica eyewear brands: htt…

Another monopoly that needs to be broken up... Can you imagine Comcast owning most of the media production companies, all of college/professional sports broadcast rights, internet access for home/business, AND forcing you to rent all personal computers you can use at home? This is exactly what's happening with the eyewear industry.

Why isn't anyone launching a competitor in this space. There should be lot of room for innovation with current tech to create a entire organization competing in everything Luxottica does and may be more.

Clearly because of this monopoly there is no innovation from within industry except for designs. There is no substantial feature development around glasses, lenses or frames, again Silicon Valley has to step in and do innovation by combining two different industries.

Seems like this problem will never get solved.

Governments seem to be just surrendering to Corporate all over the world. Clearly Corporate have more buying power and they take care of themselves and not the general public. So there is no entity to take care of general public's interest.

:(

Re: A Closer Look at the $13B Premium Eyewear Market

#130
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i mean... maybe they got so good at marketing that they have succeeded in incepting the concept of "decently built frames for non hipsters" in your mind to be the stuff they produce? thats kinda sorta the whole point of marketing a branded commodity product...

Even if so, the point of blinding is that it's not the brand per se, but the actual design. And unless they have intellectual property defending the design, there should be nothing keeping a competitor from copying it.

The problem may be the copying. If what the cheap brands do is copying the expensive brands while trying to subtly change it to avoid getting sued (trade dress/copyright/design patent), the changes are likely to make the design worse in some way.
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