Downgrading/ moving

[charan]

I never thought I would come to the point where I would have to think about selling or moving my store. Our store is in a mall where the rent is super high and the area is becoming pretty crappy. Mall management keeps raising the rents and in our mall we have 50% stores on sale.

I either want to sell and move on to another career but part of me want to stay in the optical industry. I'm not sure if anyone have tried this, I was thinking about renting an office setting where I would call my store an eyewear studio and try to keep very unique or high end stuff and only open maybe 2-3 days a week or by appointment only.

My idea is not to keep any contact lenses or sunglasses, just some really nice materials and brands I'd like to work with, I do have list of many loyal clients.

would this idea fly or I'm just being unrealistic. Let me know what you guys think, I wanna know the bitter truth.

[charan]

Admin can this thread be moved to general area, I don't want to create another one.

[Fezz]

Done!

[charan]

Thanks fezz

[Chris Ryser]

I never thought I would come to the point where I would have to think about selling or moving my store. Our store is in a mall where the rent is super high and the area is becoming pretty crappy. Mall management keeps raising the rents and in our mall we have 50% stores on sale.

I either want to sell and move on to another career but part of me want to stay in the optical industry. I'm not sure if anyone have tried this, I was thinking about renting an office setting where I would call my store an eyewear studio and try to keep very unique or high end stuff and only open maybe 2-3 days a week or by appointment only.

My idea is not to keep any contact lenses or sunglasses, just some really nice materials and brands I'd like to work with, I do have list of many loyal clients.

........................would this idea fly or I'm just being unrealistic. Let me know what you guys think, I wanna know the bitter truth.

Charan.............What a superb and timely thread you have started, and if you edit and change the title to something more catchy this could become one of the better threads on OptiBoard, because you are touching a very sensitive subject which is on the mind of thousands of retailers, not only the posting members but also the many lookers we will never know, that come on OB for ideas to their problems and suggestions.

In my local suburb (Dorval)where I live, the local once booming shopping center had become a looser over the last few years. 3 super stores, a Maxi Food market, a Bay department store and a Zeller's department store, one local chain optician (never seen busy),were the leading attraction for years, and lately traffic was fading away over the last few years, mainly due to the bad economy I assume.
Many stores got closed over time and the food area in thecenter has been a hungry place for customers.

Last spring it was announced that the 2 story Zeller's wasalso closing which was another death stab to that shopping center, however soon after that another news hit town, announced by WalMart that they would moveinto the Zeller's space by this fall.
They did a couple of months ago, and what a change we can see now. The parking lot is packed all day, every day. This Friday I went tobuy some "Smoked Meat Sandwiches" for the staff, at the Dorval Deliand nearly slipped on the newly high polished mirror tile floor in the hallway.The hallways and the food plaza was packed with people like it used to be in the old days. Most probably the empty stores will be rented soon........

Conclusion:
Retailers and actually any type of business have to be visible to the customer, the more the better.
You can not live on existing customers for long, without getting a continuous flow of new ones. Existing customers disappear slowly, by thousands of reasons and have to be replaced.
Can you do that in an office environment ? You are not visible to any new customers without heavy local advertising which is not cheap, specially if you want to go into high end products.

You are also going against the heavy advertising of supercheap on-line glasses.
Advertising through a website is the least expensive but you have to be able to get it to the target market fast, which takes a lot of invested time.

...............The bitter truth is that you really have to think it over and over again before making the right decision. Times have changed and are changing even more so over the next few years.

[GokhanSF]

Just get out of the mall and set up your store on the street somewhere. If you have the right product and service customers will find you

[Dennis]

I can say most the products are homogeneous itself, we only can differentiate by offering unique professional service. Office setting is not suitable for retail business such as eyeglasses biz. We need continuously attract new patients to keep the business going, which is probably even higher than the mall setting if you need to invest on the ads.

[Tallboy]

Chris, you know the old school and the new school... What if we have recently moved out of a somewhat unique medical center near the downtown to a relatively close ( a mile or two from where we were) more suburban environment in a rapidly growing neighborhood. It will probably be 2 years before it really gets moving out this way though. Can we survive 2 years on old patients before things get really get moving? Its been kinda slow... but I've heard thats the same for everyone around this way.

[idispense]

Learn from Chris's Walmart story, customers flocked to follow the price leader.

[obxeyeguy]

Learn from Chris's Walmart story, customers flocked to follow the price leader.

Lemmings.

[Wes]

Has anyone else noticed that when a mall gets its own police station, it's time to not go to that mall? We have a couple of those around here.

[Johns]

Has anyone else noticed that when a mall gets its own police station, it's time to not go to that mall? We have a couple of those around here.

Either that, or a baseball card shop.

How about this...there's a mall in the "city" that got so desperate for tenants that they gave space to the local library, just so they'd have cars in parking lot! It lasted about 2 years, and even they moved out! (people didn't feel safe there)

[AngeHamm]

Lemmings.

Lemmings' money spends just as well as independent thinkers'.

[Chris Ryser]

Chris, you know the old school and the new school...

It will probably be 2 years before it really gets moving out this way though. Can we survive 2 years on old patients before things get really get moving? Its been kinda slow... but I've heard thats the same for everyone around this way.

Tallboy..........................I know the old school very well, but the really new school is still in the very near future.

One idea is to get as many people aside from the old trusted customers to your new location. You have seen all the postings on OB where most refuse to work with people that have purchased their glasses elsewhere. If you are not, become a specialist in the adjustment of glasses, old one or new ones, as well as repairs.

Let it be known that you are the best to adjust not properly fitting glasses around in the north-south-east or west end of downtown one mile away with easy parking.

Advertise (just for example only) that you charge a service fee of $ 20.00, but have special for the next few months at half price. That should bring them in if properly done. There are plenty of optical retailers that can not properly adjust glasses. This is going to be part of the new school in the very new future. You could also offer to service their old previous glasses if there is a need.

Do not be a hard seller, just promote a service, and do what is needed and invite them to come back when needed and you will create a good future percentage of a new customers.

If you have a website let it all be known. Insert the meta tags of your competitors names, so that your site comes up when the search is beeing asked to look up a certain other optical name. There is many ways to get the message out.

[uncut]

Tallboy..........................I know the old school very well, but the really new school is still in the very near future.

One idea is to get as many people aside from the old trusted customers to your new location. You have seen all the postings on OB where most refuse to work with people that have purchased their glasses elsewhere. If you are not, become a specialist in the adjustment of glasses, old one or new ones, as well as repairs.

Let it be known that you are the best to adjust not properly fitting glasses around in the north-south-east or west end of downtown one mile away with easy parking.

Advertise (just for example only) that you charge a service fee of $ 20.00, but have special for the next few months at half price. That should bring them in if properly done. There are plenty of optical retailers that can not properly adjust glasses. This is going to be part of the new school in the very new future. You could also offer to service their old previous glasses if there is a need.

Do not be a hard seller, just promote a service, and do what is needed and invite them to come back when needed and you will create a good future percentage of a new customers.

If you have a website let it all be known. Insert the meta tags of your competitors names, so that your site comes up when the search is beeing asked to look up a certain other optical name. There is many ways to get the message out.

Unfortunately, Chris is suggesting that you settle for crumbs. He's saying that same mantra the unliners have propogated...................you must assist, do not resist!

Horsey-type-stuff! Do not give any credibility, as that......... sanctions the behavior!

The public is never well-served by a mediocre attempt of partial services, in the fitting of a medical device.

[gibby2020]

Great thread...
The consumer has too much power in the retail equation. They have too much choice in where to purchase eye wear! With time there will be a correction in the retail landscape: there will be less of us B&M stores as online sales capture more of the marketplace! We all try and hope that our businesses wont be the ones to go under, but many of us will. Sorry for the gloomy outlook but it is inevitable (I think).
I'm in a rural area with the majority of my clients/patients/customers being 45+. Even so I have calculated that at least 20% of my potential sales are lost to online. Even seniors are doing it. Sometimes it is successful other times not.
When it doesn't work out....Some thoughts from an OD standpoint when it comes to charging for service: Being saddled with the Dr title comes with different expectations from the consumer/patient. We are expected to help. A Dr has a fiduciary duty to the patient (many OD's would recoil at me calling them customer or client) whereas if a person walks into an optical looking for service they expect to have to pay although they may hope to get away with free service. In this retail environment they should not!!! Like Uncut said this sanctions online sales and hastens our demise.
We provide some service at not charge: "Your our patient, we're here to help.....we can check the glasses and see how they are fitting at no charge" --So the staff will do lenso and check fit w/o adjusting. This allows staff to let clients know what they didn't get and why there will be a charge. Of course it does not always go over well with clients but you cant win 'em all!

Regards
Gibby

[Johns]

Great thread...
The consumer has too much power in the retail equation. They have too much choice in where to purchase eye wear!

Strange statement.

When the retailer has the power, everybody loses.

Too much choice? You'd prefer the only choice to be...hmmm, let me guess.

Yes, many B&Ms will go by the wayside, just like they did in 1993, 2003, and they will in 2013. We are always adapting to SOMETHING...ODs w/dispensaries, MDs with dispensaries, Lenscrafters, WalMart, Laisks, Online...

WHATEVER...

Those that can't compete will go under. Nothing new here.

[Chris Ryser]

Unfortunately, Chris is suggesting that you settle for crumbs. He's saying that same mantra the unliners have propogated...................you must assist, do not resist!

Horsey-type-stuff! Do not give any credibility, as that......... sanctions the behavior!

The public is never well-served by a mediocre attempt of partial services, in the fitting of a medical device.

I just can not put the finger on the date when a pair of glasses became a medical device. It never was when I did my 3 years of apprentiship and passed the exams, and received Swiss National certification, then followed by 3 years of professional full time school and ended up as an opthalmic optician.

Today glasses can be sold, fitted and adjusted from east to west and south to north in North America by newest profession of the "frame stylists", who could have been a garbage collector in the previous job and just have some in the office instruction.

There were times when real opticians could only get uncut lenses from the labs and had to do the finishing themselves in house. This has all changed with the exception of the markup multiplier factor.

I would bet that the Barry Santini in Long Island and Craig in Fort Myers with a special niche, and Johns in his own ways will easily survive any rough times.

The only type of medial devices that have to be fitted are the "lens implants" done by an opthalmic surgeon or an "aortic valve implant" done by a cadiology surgeon, of which, the former I have two of them and the latter just one.

Glasses are a mechanical item, from frame to lenses and are mass production items with the exception of the surfaced lenses, of which the production becomes more and more automated. Lenses can be measured on automatic foci meters and even some refraction can be done the electronic way.

The only way a down to earth optician can be differentiated from all the above by his/her basic and advanced knowdledge of the profession as well as the hands on expirience. If your professional scale was one of several years of learning or expirience should you not be able to sell your time and expirience ? So much for the Horsey-Type-Stuff..................................