The "Hand-Off"

[spex911]

Wow.... I am witnessing so many excuses for not making money on here

[Paul Smith LDO]

Wow.... I am witnessing so many excuses for not making money on here

The success of a profitable optical is usually predicated by the optician, the more skilled and seasoned the optician the busier he/she is. Walk-ins can make up a large percentage of the optical business, they do so without appointments, and they can vary from one day to the next. No matter how well oiled the office handles the MD/OD, patient to LDO transition, there are always those opportunities presented to us. When someone comes in off the street and asks for X, by name they don't want to see B, so they may have to wait. A successful optical will provide a cup of coffee, tea, or water while they wait for, X. Staffing isn't always enough, sometimes there just aren't enough hours in the day. So you stay and work later because that is what the optician does. No offense to the Doc's, they stay late as well. Especially DRK, as he is always on Optiboard. :)

[spex911]

The success of a profitable optical is usually predicated by the optician, the more skilled and seasoned the optician the busier he/she is. Walk-ins can make up a large percentage of the optical business, they do so without appointments, and they can vary from one day to the next. No matter how well oiled the office handles the MD/OD, patient to LDO transition, there are always those opportunities presented to us. When someone comes in off the street and asks for X, by name they don't want to see B, so they may have to wait. A successful optical will provide a cup of coffee, tea, or water while they wait for, X. Staffing isn't always enough, sometimes there just aren't enough hours in the day. So you stay and work later because that is what the optician does. No offense to the Doc's, they stay late as well. Especially DRK, as he is always on Optiboard. :)

I see where you are coming from, and that does seem to be a successful formula for maintaining a professional and solid running optical, yes. But everything you have just mentioned was and is not in the formula for the multi-million dollar opticals we are surrounded by today. The big successful opticals that we wish we can all become (Lux, Visionworks -- basically the top ten you always see on Vision Monday's top grossing opticals) ALL STARTED AS SMALL BUSINESSES. Those big boys do NOT provide cups of coffee, they DEFINITELY do not require skilled opticians (as many of us already know).

Don't you guys know that the million-dollar guys pay LOTS and LOTS of money to people in their corporate office who have the sole position of just predicting and preparing for "rushes" and "dead time" ? In fact, all successful businesses do this.

[Paul Smith LDO]

You mean like Nostradamus.

[spex911]

You mean like Nostradamus.

If by Nostradamus you mean someone with an MBA in Marketing, then sure lol

[AngeHamm]

I'm done.

[mervinek]

I am the lone optician in a practice with 2 MDs and 1 OD... hand off is usually a tech putting the rx on my desk (while I am already working with a patient) and telling the patient "men's are on this side...She'll be with you shortly." Not my ideal hand off... The good thing is that I am very good at multitasking. Get one patient started and then work with the other. Maybe do an adjustment while someone else is narrowing down their frame selections. It is not uncommon to have 3+ patients at one time. The OD is very good at educating the patient about certain lenses in the exam room. That does help a lot.