We are an Ophthalmology practice in a fairly depressed rural area located outside of town--no foot traffic/window shopping availability. Considering the above, our eyeglass sales are quite good. We do have packages available, but mostly sell premium eyewear: premium progressives, pretty high rate of AR and Trans etc. However, after paying $400-$700 for a pair of eyeglasses, getting suns as a 2nd pair is like pulling teeth!! We currently have a "sprinkling" of sunglasses on the boards. We have routinely offered 15% off 2nd pairs and have also gotten in quality sell outs and offered them at 50% as well as having current models available. We've also tried flat $ amounts off. Nothing seems to sway people in that direction. Don't really know what more I can do. Anyway, since we don't have such great luck with Suns I don't wrap up alot of inventory $'s in carrying a huge amount of sunglasses. We usually have 25-30 models on hand.
Here's the problem... One of the doc's husband wanted a new pair of sunglasses and we didn't have anything he liked which sparked the whole why don't we carry more suns yada yada. My feeling is this: If they really want to get into the sunglass market then they need to commit more $'s into frames--at least 50-60 minimum and understand they may not get a great return on them--based on history and realize that styles d/c from year to year and they may not always be able to be exchanged for newer models every year etc. OR continue as we always have.
My question to you great folks is how might you handle this differently?
How many frames do you feel is a decent showing?
What do you think of offering the sun frame basically at cost?
Thanks for imput and sorry for the long post.
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