Reasons for the decline that had its origin ......................................
Originally Posted by wmcdonald
The commercial side of it .
Reasons for the decline that had its origin in the late 1970s, with optical frame wholesalers, offering opticians the optical frames in consignment, instead of actual purchasing, due to heavily increased manufacturing, supplies, and competition at the then conventional markup pricing.
Frames would be accepted for returns or exchange for newer models, without any questions asked by the wholesalers and importers.
So the financial burden carried by the wholesaler, and the following reaction was to increase the pricing to a higher level.
then following that move, to beat the competition, the general factory warranties against material defects was not good enough anymore, and the retail market started to offfer full 100% warranties on their products and asked the wholesalers for free replacements, which was accepted in many cases.
The next reaction was another price increase for the optical retail trade, on the newer models.
The optical retail who always enjoyed a higher selling markup than other commercial domains again increased their selling pricing.
Now enter the competition of the optical chain businesses, and their purchasing power. By owning multiple stores chains can purchase in much larger quantities and demand, and get, heavier discounts by the suppliers or even factory pricing, if they purchase directly in larger quantities at lower prices.
They can now compete well on pricing with the conventional optical stores, however the quality of service might be reduced, by lower salaried employees.
The last reason is the fastest growing optical retail market on the internet, which is now said to be at 17% of the total eyeglass sales, and to the largest single part, operated by high quality optical manufacturers. Their selling prices are around the retail price of the optical stores 30 years ago, but without any service.
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