New Idea makes Wholesale Lab $Millions$ in just weeks!

[icare]

How's that for an attention grabber?

In actuality, here's my idea. Slam it if you will.

I want to give my wholesale dollars to a lab that will guarantee turn around with top quality or PAY ME BACK when they foul up the job and inconvenience my customer. I want more than just the free redo which really is just a loss to everyone, especially the customer. Turn around isn't everything, but it counts, and I want the supreme quality labs to put their money where their mouths are.

So, for example, the job is finished and I receive it and it's botched. One redo = free redo and 1/4 of the original cost back. Two redos = another free redo and another 1/4 of the original cost back, Three redos = another free shot at getting it right and a complete refund of the original job.

OK, let the flames fly! - dis me if you will.

Or let the Champions step up to the plate and attempt to meet this challenge.

[JandJOPT]

It looks like you have no idea about
the cost, or more important the time
that goes into making a pair of glasses.
sounds like you need to get a better
lab to do your jobs, or go after the
doctor thats doing such shoddy
eye exams. Because contrary to
popular belief doctors are not
perfect either.:idea:

[Jeff Trail]

icare said:
How's that for an attention grabber?

In actuality, here's my idea. Slam it if you will.

I want to give my wholesale dollars to a lab that will guarantee turn around with top quality or PAY ME BACK when they foul up the job and inconvenience my customer. I want more than just the free redo which really is just a loss to everyone, especially the customer. Turn around isn't everything, but it counts, and I want the supreme quality labs to put their money where their mouths are.

So, for example, the job is finished and I receive it and it's botched. One redo = free redo and 1/4 of the original cost back. Two redos = another free redo and another 1/4 of the original cost back, Three redos = another free shot at getting it right and a complete refund of the original job.

Or let the Champions step up to the plate and attempt to meet this challenge.

First, this site is not to big on "flaming", and the vast majority of time we are fairly "civil" :-)
As a wholesaler let me ask you a few questions :-) Do you stock every frame size and color scheme in every frame you carry? Economically not wise. Or when someone comes in and asks you "I like this frame but I need it a little larger and in silver" and you do NOT, do you just say, sorry and give that person 1/4 of the cost of the frame, even if they bought nothing and left(with your check :-) ? I doubt it, so why would you expect that every lab should have every design, material and base curve right there on hand when you order it and if not we should do the job for free and give you a 1/4 :-) When you make a mistake, and I'm sure you have as I think everyone I know in optics has one time or another, when you reorder do you tell the lab to charge you 125%? I doubt it, but that is what you are asking us to do, right? What you are calling a "free" redo is sure not FREE on my end, in fact any time you have that "free" job from me, I just lost my profit on the next two or three jobs as well to make up the loss :-) SO you think we like it when a mistake is made?
If I had a buck for every trick that was tried on me by a retailer I could have retired long ago, nice things like, "this job is "wrong" since you have to redo it change the add" (interchangeable with seg hght., axis, PD etc., etc. :-) OR the really tricky ones that deal in uncut love to write on there in BIG letters LAB ERROR, but when I put it into the system and call up the previous job # something is changed (power,PD,frame size, added prism, deleted prism, material, etc., etc.)
After all these years I have heard it all how we "labs" are ripping off the retailers.. I have been on both sides of the track, I owned two retail stores as well as a wholesale lab and I can tell you my profit margin was WAY higher in retail than wholesale and with a lot less work.. now before you FLAME me :-) The reason I got out of retail was I sold both stores to Doctors at a great profit to myself :-) .. and have not gotten back into it because of signing a noncompete clause, with the lab being exempt ...
The easy answer to your problem is that you can set up your own in house lab and stock around $120,000 worth of inventory like I have and drop around $230,000 in equipment ...that is if you want to make sure you do EVERYTHING (glass,poly etc., etc.) :-)

There, no "flame"...

Jeff "you want my job you can have it" Trail

[John R]

icare said:
How's that for an attention grabber?

I know its the season of good will but you are pushing just a bit to far there.
I have no dobt that if a lab cocks up a job they will re-do for free, if its their fault. I know thats how we work....
But why the hell should they pay for your foul ups....

Saddly speed and quality do not make for good bed fellows. If you find a lab with a fast turn round then they are quiet and there has to be a reason for that, be it price, quality or some other problem. Good quality labs will always be busy and that means slower turn round. You cant have it both ways...
Unless you start surfacing yourself....
Now there's a good idea then you find out just how hard it is to make lenses RIGHT.......first time every time....

[APV Optical]

I am a new Wholesale start up, my niche in the local area has been turn around on drill mounts. Which has cost many all nighters at the lab drilling lenses, a small sacrafice my Lovely wife and children are accepting for now. I will do what it takes to get your work out perfect and timely. I will be glad to accept your challenge. E-mail me directly apvoptical@hotmail.com and I will follow up.

[sticklert]

Jeff I am with you all the way!

ICARE

First, if the job is botched (by the lab), YES your lab should redo it at NC. But get real they should NOT have to pay you 25% for it.

I have been at both ends as well, and the profit margins on retail smoke wholesale. Wholesale is lucky to get double digit profit. That plate you want someone to step up to only exist in a fantasy world.

I mean come on we are NOT making rivets. We are making custom made eyewear to your patients desired request. Something is going to go wrong every once and awhile. Wholesalers always are dealing with MFG back-orders and defective products not to mention we mess up sometimes. It is your job to inform the patient on any delays before they get mad and if your doing business with a good laboratory they should be contacting you in a timely manner to inform you and making suggestions on other products available that are similar. It is amazing what you can accomplish with good communication.

In addition to the above we are dealing with rapidly changing trends in frames and mountings that take time and patients. The drill work in our lab alone has more than tripled. Which = more breakage and spoilage = more time = more cost.

I have always said you can get good SERVICE, excellent QUALITY, CHEAP, or FAST. You will only be able to pick maybe three. You can't have it all! It is a thing called economics and you will always get what you pay for.

I am going to get off my soap box now. I would suggest shopping around. Their are great labs out there, you need to decide if you want to pay more for less stress and headache or deal with what you got.

[RT]

What are you offering in return? Would you be willing to give up your free progressive refits and non-adapts? After all, progressives have been around for 30 years, you ought to know how to fit them by now. Why does the lab have to make good on your mistake?

Would you be willing to give up your 50% off on Dr/Optician changes? At our lab, the rate of Dr/Optician changes far exceeds the rate of lab redos (by at least 6:1). If you're willing to pay on YOUR mistakes, your lab would actually come out ahead.

As Jeff said, no lab wants to turn out work that gets returned, but keep things in perspective. If your lab has a return rate above 1%, you've got the wrong lab. Good turn time and accuracy CAN and do go hand in hand--turn time is worst when breakage/rework is highest. When everything is working right, then accuracy is a function of the lab process integrity, and the speed falls into place.

[icare]

Thanks for your prompt replies. I had to wonder if anyone was confident that they could get the job done right the first time often enough to provide this type of insurance.

Whether our office has chosen to do the same for our patients is subject to conjecture. In a sense, we do personally offer this type of compensation.
Here'e the scenario:
Patient plunks down $500 on a drilled, etc...
Then we caution the patient that the job could take a bit longer due to the attention it deserves (as we always do.) But what happens when the job and it comes back with a major coating bubble right in the middle, or a crooked seg, or is way too thick (compared to specification), or the eyewire is closed irreverently, etc...? Well, certainly the patient loses something. In return we are stuck offering the patient monetary compensation for the wholesale lab's sloppiness, in hopes that we don't lose the patient forever. What else can we do?

We certainly have lost a patient or two forever because of just this scenario. That's thousands of dollars in lost lifetime revenue. Assuredly, my knowledge of wholesale lab costs is not thorough. But our Rx redo numbers and personal finishing fabrication errors are definately lower than the number of redos for sloppy workmanship that I see from the top rated wholesale labs we've used. Labs don't have any problem clarifying who's fault an error is. We also don't have any problem accepting errors when they are clearly our fault. Can I say that the average wholesale lab's understanding of the costs to our practice are less than should be expected? I'd love to find a lab that really supports the end consumer.

I know I'm not the only one left in this situation. And I don't know what a solution would be. I had to wonder, though, if there was a lab out there that would be willing to gamble that they'll finish properly the majority of the time?

I do not ask a lab to pay for a redo that is our error. I just wonder how many times a lab should have a FREE chance to do it again when the patient is the one who ends up with the loss. The lab loses nothing when they get to do the job again with no further ramifications. And please don't say that they lose the cost of the spoilage. I think that the spoilage that labs swallow is simply the cost of learning to do the job properly. We've swallowed the same costs teaching ourselves the craft of finishing.

I would personally be willing to pay full cost for every remake due to our doctor's Rx errors if we could insure better all around quality on the majority of work we job out. And if progressive manufacturers stopped offering incentives to try their styles, we'd still dispense them. We just wouldn't be so willing to take a risk with every new product they push out.

Thanks again for the blunt feedback. I really wanted to hear it for all it was worth.

[sticklert]

I just wonder how many times a lab should have a FREE chance to do it again when the patient is the one who ends up with the loss. The lab loses nothing when they get to do the job again with no further ramifications.

The lab does loose, if they loose you as a customer....