Glasses are expensive because there is no competition. One company - Luxottica - owns pretty much everything.
You go to LensCrafters and prices seem super expensive, so you go to Pearle Vision and that's expensive too, so you go to Target Optical and prices are still high and then you think maybe glasses are expensive, since you went to multiple stores and they all have similar prices. What you don't realize is that all those retail brands are owned by the same company - Luxottica [1]. They operate under several names, so there is an appearance of competition but there isn't.
But wait, it isn't just stores, they also own eyewear brands such as Ray-Ban, Chanel, Coach, Oakley, Prada, Tiffany, and so on. Yes, all of those brands are owned by Luxottica [2].
Wait, not done yet. They also own insurance. Luxottica owns the vision insurance company EyeMed. [3]
Still not done. Luxottica has merged with Essilor and now own multiple lens brands [4].
See 60 Minutes story on Luxottica if you're not outraged yet [5].
Where are the anti-trust enforcers in this country and other countries, and why are they not doing anything?
I worked on the retail IT side of things at Luxottica.
I don't even think that you've scratched the surface of just how prevalent Luxottica is: you've touched the retail side of things, but, you also haven't touched the manufacturing side of things (Lux has patents on the hinges used in glasses), the wholesaling side of things (Lux supplies generic and branded frames to your local optician on less-than-preferred terms), and then just the genetic beast that is their optimization efforts.
I discovered some ineffective linux and db management that was adding 15-30 minutes of closing time every night -- time where we'd have employees on the clock waiting to close the store -- and figured out why it was behaving the way that it was and fixed it so the 'point of sales' part of closing wouldn't be the hold up. Saved the company almost 13 million dollars a year in labor costs and 45 million in licensing costs when I came up with a way to replace the POS systems OS without needing a cross-ship of new hardware...and still got screwed around when it came to my hourly rate increased or getting my contract renewed...
When my girlfriend's son passed away from complications with cancer, I had flowers and cards sent from some former coworkers, but, not a single person even reached out to me until a few months later, where they asked me if I was 'ready to go back to work' after cutting my contract.
It was well known that if someone robbed a Sunglass hut, the most expensive item in the store to replace was the iPad...
I've had very good luck ordering from Zenni and Coastal. It is perhaps a bit harder to find a frame style you like, but once you have a frame of reference for say width measurements it's not so bad.
They're especially good for cheap prescription sun glasses. I bought a whole stack of them years ago I'm still working through. If I go to the river or where ever and something happens to them I'm out $25 instead of $250.
It also helped that the last time I went to a local shop it proved to be a ridiculous experience. I ordered a pair of clear acrylic frames, and for whatever reason when they came in the sales clerk got bored and thought it'd be interesting to use highlighter on the insides of the frame to see what it looked like. But then it wouldn't come off so she just kinda tried to play it off like nothing happened when I picked them up. It was completely absurd. I had to wait another month for them to reorder.
So yeah, eyeglasses are now one of those categories of local businesses where I've learned they're basically all scams.
Related: it's getting hard to find a cleaner that does alterations in house vs mailing them off to a service. Last couple times I've had to do that it turns into a 4 to 6 week long game of "where did your clothing disappear to and will the store find it this time or tell you to come back in a week yet again."
Why is it so many of these simple services increasingly feel like total scams in the US?
> Why is it so many of these simple services increasingly feel like total scams in the US?
Because 'quiet franchising' is a huge money maker for those selling the franchises.
For alterations you need to look for someone who does full custom clothing in-house; cleaning services almost all now ship even the cleaning to some central location.
I was able to find an actual cobbler nearby; they're still out there but it can be hard to find.
Yeah, the guy in my neighborhood is a full tailor, which is why I was surprised he sent my jeans out. Guy has a bit of an ego too cuz he used to do Johny Carson's suits back in the day or something. But anyhow, getting some jeans taken up shouldn't turn into a 6 week adventure.
Eyebuydirect is a Luxottica subsidiary. Coastal became Clearly became a Luxottica subsidiary. I think Zenni is independent for now (couldn't find any evidence to the contrary).
> I don't think that I'd ever pay more than $100 for a frame again.
$100 sounds like it's ~10x what the price should actually be for simple plastic shapes, and it's probably more than 100x the actual cost to manufacture them.
I assume that's $100 including the lenses—seems like a reasonable price for something that requires custom high-precision manufacturing, although it would be great for the price to come down even further over time.
I have a moderately strong prescription (with slight differences for each eye) and I got the best glasses I've ever had from Zenni for $72.90 + tax. Could have been $60 without a presumably overpriced anti-reflective coating. I don't remember how much my glasses cost from traditional sources, but I think it was on the order of $200–$300 after insurance.
Lenses are no longer custom high precision manufacturing... In fact a 50 cent laser pointer has far more far more precise lenses than a pair of glasses.
Lenses today tend to be polycarbonate plastic anyway - which means they can be produced rapidly like any other plastic moulding.
For a lot of people you can just take lenses from the production line and cut them to shape and be done but that is not always the case. Personally I always have to wait 2 to 3 weeks to get new glasses done as the lenses have to be made to spec and the lenses alone are around 350€ and no they are not any cheaper at any online retailer that operates here if they even offer to make lenses to my spec.
Methods for cheap fully custom made lenses are also coming to fruition.
Both SLA and FDM 3D printers are now able to make curved surfaces with 10's of micrometer precision across the lens surface, and local 10's of nanometer smoothness (usually via a surface-tension based smoothing process).
Usually you then use that as part of a two part mould to make the lens out of polycarbonate or some resin which has optical and hardness properties you want.
The whole lot, if done in ~10M quantities should come out to only 10 cents or so per piece (with each piece having a custom geometry).
There are really big opportunities available for doing this to contact lenses, since the lens can then fully compensate for any unevenness in the eye below, and could possibly lead to superhuman vision if done right. The same can't be done for glasses since the eyeball moves - instead the best you can do is a best-fit approximation for looking ahead.
Then you are an incredible outlier. The vast majority of folks that need glasses do not have this as the reason for the lenses being expensive. They're just being shafted.
Which country and what is special about your eyes or glasses?
I have noticed that in France glasses with decent but standard frames cost around 5 times as much as in the UK. My suspicion is that the difference is related to how supplementary health insurance works in France rather than any special manufacturing requirements.
Frames you can find for cheap if you look around a bit. The lenses cost a lot as I need massive amounts of prism (took me a bit of looking around to find an optometrist/eye doctor with equipment that could even measure it as it is outside of the range of normal measuring machines) on both to ensure that my eyes focus on the same point
The amount of prism is now to the point that adding more is not really possible and thus if it gets worse next step is surgery on the muscles controlling the eyes or intentionally letting one eye look away. Over time the brain starts to ignore the other eye for focused vision (it would still get used for peripheral vision)
But yeah without the prism the lenses are like 30€. Once you add prisms the lenses are around 350€.
I'm not the OP but I just got new glasses and they were ~$500. The frames were about $180 (one of the cheaper sets in the store and about $60 more than I paid 2 years ago; yay inflation). So the lens were around $300 and took 2 weeks to produce.
I have a severe case of Strabismus (Exotropia) and my left lens requires a prism in order to keep my eyes focused on the same target. The required prism has gotten strong over the years and as it has, the price of the prism has gone up as well. The prism alone added nearly $200 to my lens cost this time around.
All that said, I imagine the lack of competition (the thread topic) is at least partly to blame for this. I highly doubt my glasses cost anywhere near that much, even if they are special.
i work at Luxottica in a subsidiary that sells finished lenses to opticians or semifinished lenses to labs, cheap plastic lenses go for 0.15€/pcs, the expensive lenses range between 10-15€ each
You don't pay $100 on Zenni for simple glasses. I bought a pair of glasses there with metal frame, anti-glare and anti-fog coating for under $20 with shipping.
Indeed. I buy 5 pairs of glasses at a time (cheapest ones I can manage which look OK). 5 at a time is still cheaper than 1/3rd the price of low cost normal glasses.
And each of those 5 pairs is half as durable.
It is a similarly wild situation where eye exams at Walmart can be cheaper than at a regular eye doctor covered by my insurance.
Something I have noticed with eye "insurance"--mostly they pay $X for particular things but when you look at what's available it's something like $X *above* what we pay at Costco. In one case I was even able to confirm that the "insurance" isn't actually paying anything.
And the only time I've paid over $100 for frames is when I order the ones with a magnetic polarized clip-on that are hard to find. (And I wish I could find something like my old ones where the magnets were on top instead of on the bottom. It was more secure.)
I bought my lone pair of glasses in 2009 and I've replaced the lenses once since then. I wear them every day. Now I'm wondering what everyone else is doing.
Mine generally last a two years or so, before they are scratched and fogged to the point that my vision is affected. The big culprit is dust - often metal dust, but also hardwood dust - in the shop. Even if you religiously use a non-scratching, micro-fiber wipe (which is hard), just dragging the stuff across the lenses damages them. Another culprit is glue, particularly CA (super) glue but also other types. You may not think it would end up on your glasses, but if you're using much of it, eventually microdroplets end up on your lenses. This does immediate, permanent damage to polycarbonate lenses.
My desk glasses, optimized for computer screen distance and never actually leaving my office, on the other hand - easily last a decade with no discernable damage. Because - no significant dust, no organic vapors, no glue, and always wiped with a clean micro-fiber wipe.
For me it’s always been chlorine and other cleaning products. Salt water and sweat doesn’t help either.
Forget to take the glasses off before you jump into the pool or readjust your glasses while cleaning the house and before you know it the coating starts to dissolve. Even if you’re religiously rinsing them, the accumulated damage to the coatings fogs up the lenses and weakens the surface against scratches.
That removes way less than all of the abrasive dust, and to some extent just turns what remains in to an abrasive slurry. You still get abrasion of the coating over time. And water doesn't help at all with damage due to solvents, glue, and the like.
Some of us have eyes that don't permit that. From the point I started needed glasses I have only once gone a year on the pair I use for the computer--nothing wrong with the glass, it's just my eyes drift enough that they start giving me headaches. I usually get 2-3 years out of my progressives before they're too far off and need replacement. With an adaptable lens my brain simply automatically compensates as my eyes change, I only need replacement when the infinity goes wrong or as my astigmatism changes too much.
For me I've got regular driving glasses, safety glasses, computer glasses (you don't want to use your full prescription for close distance), and sun glasses.
Unless state law says otherwise the optician is an independent business. Check your local laws, some states don't allow that arrangement.
I'm not sure what the business deal is, but it looks to me like the rent the space from walmart and wal-mart does the scheduling. That is the person who does the exam isn't a WalMart employee, but they use WalMart for services. If you watch close you will notice they use a different POS system for paying for your exam from the one you use to buy your glasses.
Independent doesn't mean that there isn't a profit to Walmart in having it there. I go to one of those Walmart eye docs--she's independent of the store and has her own office staff, but her office has a second door that opens into Walmart's optical center.
Zenni is a good choice _if you know your PD_ (pupillary distance) - the distance from nose to center of pupil. 1 mm off will turn your glasses into headache machines.
And the phone apps that purport to measure this are universally bad. Get it professionally done at a place that will give you the value. Costco will do so.
If you don't want to purchase online Costco is decent price - $180ish for the progressives lenses I just purchased vs $400+ from LensCrafters.
Downside of Costco is a limited selection of frames, but worth a look.
Also heard good things about Warby Parker but have not purchased lenses from them.
Oh, Zenni's progressive lenses have a much narrower distance vision section in the lens than Costco's. So I get progressive glasses at Costco then single reading and computer glasses (for < $40 each) at Zenni.
How does buying glasses online even work? I have never tried, so I'd expect it to be like buying shoes without trying them on (which I won't do either, based on in-store experience I'd be returning 9 pairs out of 10 for bad fit).
I wear glasses for 95% of time, I want to not hate how they feel.
Yes. Like a charm. Biggest potential hitch is that your optometrist will give you your prescription (they are required by law), but won't include your ocular measurements, which you then have to make yourself at home in order to order the glasses. Get the inter-ocular distance wrong, in particular, and your glasses will not work correctly.
Hint, when buy glasses ask about swim goggles - they will write down the PD distance (since they don't have swim goggles), and then you can keep that number. You still need to buy one final set of glasses, but you can get their cheap frames and be done.
This life hack really isn't necessary, you can just ask for your PD distance and they'll bring out a little machine that measures it. No optometrist has ever been weird about it, a few have even told me a few sites to get cheaper glasses.
My optometrist was weird about it, presumably because he also sells frames and lenses. I went to an optometrist who doesn't sell frames or lenses and she was happy to spend less than a minute to measure my PD. I won't be going back to the former.
I go to Walmart Vision. They do all the measurements and write down everything without complaining at all for (I think) about $70. Then order a few pair from Zenni and restock every 5-7 years.
US scripts usually don't include the ocular measurements. I've had a pair where they got the vertical ever so slightly wrong on a progressive, truly horrible, I went back to the eye doc about it and it confounded him also--I could look through the script on his machine and it was fine. He finally figured out what had happened, dialed something into his machine and it was just as awful as the glasses. The optician recut the offending lens, no problem at all. I have no idea how you are even supposed to measure that at home, the opticians always seem to do it on the frame you're actually going to be using. It's not fixed like PD is. (If you're not doing progressive it doesn't have to be spot on, though.)
Measuring Pupillary Distance (PD, or distance between your pupils) is easy! Here's how:
1) Stand in front of a vertical mirror, making sure you are square to the mirror.
2) Place a horizontal ruler on the surface of the mirror.
3) Close one eye and move your head until the reflection of the centre of your pupil lines up with zero on the ruler.
4) Keeping your head still, open your eye and close the other eye.
5) The Pupillary Distance is the reading on the ruler that lines up with the centre of the reflection of your pupil.
6) If you want to double check it, just swap the opening of your eyes and check that the other eye still sees itself at zero.
I use this method whenever I order glasses online and have yet to have a pair of glasses that have any error in the manufacturing. I now only buy glasses online.
Not every opto is always willing to give you your PD. Some like to beat around the bush because they'd rather try to nudge you into buying in store instead.
a) The method works because placing the ruler on the surface of the mirror guarantees that it is parallel to the mirror. The source and destination of the light ray is your pupil, so the ray is guranteed to be perpendicular to the mirror and the ruler.
b) The plane of your pupils needs to be parallel to the mirror/ruler. This is easy to judge as your eyes will be relaxed and looking straight ahead at your own reflection in the mirror. If your eyes are looking left or right you need to turn your head so you are looking straight ahead. People are generally pretty good at judging "straight ahead", so chances are that you are doing this correctly.
Satisfying the above two constraints means the geometry gives an accurate measurement, probably more accurate than an optometrist can judge by holding a ruler up to your eyes and trying to guesstimate that they have no parallax error.
My friend has purchased several pairs from Zenni but the frames kept cracking around the lens even though she only wears them for a couple of hours each day. They'd send her a new frame and it would do the same after a month or two. She didnt really like the metal frames they offered so kept choosing plastic frames. Finally she got fed up with Zenni and purchased slightly more expensive glasses from Warby Parker and has had zero issues since. It definitely feels like a "you get what you paid for" type of story here. Zenni is much cheaper than buying frames from Luxottica but there's definitely some happy medium where you aren't overpaying for glasses but still buying something of comparable quality to the overpriced brands. She used to get Ray-Ban frames while on her parent's insurance but when she got her own, she could get a free years supply of contacts or Luxottica-priced pair of glasses. So now she gets her big supply of contacts from a retailer using insurance and buys a new pair of Warby Parker glasses using HSA money.
For Europe, Ace & Tate [1] are affordable and pretty good quality. Frame + lens go for €110, or €120 to include blue light filter coating.
Frankly, unless we're talking about real designer pieces, glasses have been a completely utilitarian/commodity item for the past half century. The real achievement of Luxottica (which also reflects in their brand name) is that they still manage to sell them as premium/craft products.
A few years back my wife bought a pair (single vision) in China for about $30--excellent at the time but they turned out not to be durable. (She had taken a tumble and smashed her pair.)
I paid $11 (shipped) for a pair of glasses from them for use in VR. I didn’t want to screw up my normal glasses. For eleven bucks they aren’t bad at all. Not my style. And I didn’t get any coating so the reflections are bad but man, I can’t see for shit without glasses and I’m happy that if I even fall on hard times I can at least pay for a new pair of glasses.
I definitely think it's cool that they have some pretty freaking cheap frames. That said, I didn't pay more than $100 for my frame.
They didn't have that many $100+ glasses at the store. I think the frames that I bought for like $60 (didn't even hit the max, so they were free). Honestly, think they're nicer than most of the frames there.
You can buy oakleys for like $40-70. Even the sale ones tend to look better than the ones on zenni. Some of the nicer zenni's are $40+ anyway.
Of course it is really cool to see decent frames for $20 or less. I'm going to keep it in mind in the future.
Zenni is a Chinese company that wouldn’t ship to Lithuania presumably because of Taiwan situation. I’ve got new sunnies from them just few days ago, but still super wary. There must be better.
My fiance did store tech support, and holy SHIT I cannot believe that place manages to function day to day. There was some weird system that support staff had to RDP into, but the server was set to Spanish. Instead of, I dunno, fixing the language, all the support staff were given a document with translations of everything they need to use.
There was another HR system that support staff again had to RDP into to change passwords or personnel details or something. But it was so horribly misconfigured that there was a delay of minutes between keypress on the staff's client and response from the server. This task routinely took half an hour to update a few text fields.
Also yeah, they totally fucked him on hours and pay. The real big problem was the constant verbal harassment from store employees who are angry about systemic IT issues that have gone unresolved for years. One store has their internet drop out every single weekend. There's a ticket that's been open for years with hundreds of notes because the manager calls every weekend to report it.
Huh. That's interesting. I've wondered for over fifteen years why the parts of glasses appear to be so incredibly similar between brands, never really having stumbled across any quality stuff that's markedly different.
Is it US-specific thing?
In my country most offered branded lenses are Hoya (Japanese optical glass manufacturer) and Zeiss (German one). And, of course, a lot of cheap no-name lenses. Does Luxottica owns Hoya and/or Zeiss brands? I don't think so.
Frames are other story, of course, if you want Ray Ban you pay for (Luxottica-owned) Ray Ban. But, again, a lot of dirt-cheap non-name frames but, also, local-produced high-quality ones are available (cheaper than Ray Ban, much more expensive than no-name).
I know, that Luxottica owns all brands which will be sold to you in Tax-free shop or in in-flight magazine, but still.
For me there is one problem: Luxottica bought Oakley. Best technical sun shades ever. Now owned by Luxottica :-(
About ordering on-line: good to you if you can wear random frame without pain in nose bridge and ears :-( I don't need prescription glasses, but I've spent a lot of time to buy shades for cycling - something, which seems Ok in shop is painful after 8 hours of wearing for me.
Luxottica is an Italian company, though. I’m not sure its presence is much stronger in US than in Europe. I think they focus more on the frames than on lenses.
Essilor which merged with Luxottica is pretty big in Europe as well. And it’s also a French company
Check out Shuron. USA-made and not owned by Luxottica. Superior quality zyl frames and five-barrel hinges, unlike almost everything Luxottica sells. And they are full service and have top-notch customer service—they'll fill your prescription and also send you five different frames to try on and return:
I wanted to like these, but these are some ugly frames compared to some of Lux's Italian-made frames. Same deal with a lot of discount frames (including some from Luxottica) - very old styling and cheap looking materials. But to each his own - I'm sure some people will like Shuron and maybe I'm not up on the latest trends.
It's true, Shurons are retro style frames. And some of them are...eccentric to say the least. But the zyl they use is pretty high quality compared to others. And the hinges...I haven't found a brand of frame with tougher hinges. My faves are either the Sidewinder or the Ronsir Zyl (the latter is the original "browline" style frame as worn by Malcolm X).
Yes, Shuron invented the classic "browline" frame and that's why Shuron Ronsirs are what Hollywood used for frames in "JFK" and "Malcolm X". Pretty sure they also invented the "cat's eye" style frames for women, too.
I’ve gotten my last 8+ pairs at one of those two (may have been a third but can’t remember) the most I paid was for some sunglasses where I wanted a few upgrades $80… the rest averaged $12
eyebuydirect.com is owned by Essilor, which is part of Luxottica. Despite that I still buy my glasses from them since its way cheaper than a retail store.
https://www.eyebuydirect.com/terms-of-use "Thank you for visiting EyeBuyDirect.com! — an Essilor Group US Inc. website (the "Site")."
I just ordered a pair from zenni using their "fastframe" service. Not so much because I needed a pair fast. Just because they at least they cut the lenses to fit the frame and assemble them in the USA.
And yet, most people don't know google own Waze, Youtube, Gmail, Android, Chrome, Chromecast and so on.
They also don't realize most sites use Google Analytics, meaning your activity on a site completely unrelated to google is still recorded.
They don't realize that Meta own not just Facebook, but also Instagram, WhatsApp or Oculus.
They also don't realize all sites that use "share with facebook" send date to facebook, meaning your activity on a site completely unrelated to FB is still recorded.
We know that on HN, but ask somebody in the street, they barely know what a URL is, how would they understand a monopoly?
Anecdotal, but the non-techies on my personal circle are, on average, more critical of Google and Facebook than techies are. And they understand that those are monopolies on a very visceral level - because it's so hard to escape from them as a casual user.
Not to mention the pupillary distance is not commonly included on optical prescriptions which creates a significant hurdle, even though it can be measured yourself or usually given when asked.
I've asked for my pupillary distance in the past and got a talking to about how evil online ordering is and how it'll ruin my eyes before they would give it to me.
All BS, and when I asked if they'd fill a prescription for lenses for my VR unit instead of ordering them online, they stared at me like I had grown a third arm.
Mine gave me the number without question. Mind you, by this time, I had spent about 2 hours at the store trying on different frames and asking for frames that were on their website only to be told something like "we have those at the other branch, not this one".
In the US anyway, they're legally required to give you your prescription (SPH, CYL, prism, etc). However, PD and other ocular measurements aren't classified as part of a prescription.
Zenni will send you a cool little cardboard ruler that sits on the bridge of your nose to measure PD. It suffices (I am wearing my Zenni frames as I write this).
Not the poster but I see no reason to doubt the claim. A while back when dealing with glasses that didn't come out right my eye doc wanted to check the PD in an attempt to figure out why my glasses were bothering me (I'm incredibly sensitive on my computer pair, I can't tolerate anything that isn't absolutely spot on)--and she walked over to the optical center to borrow their PD measurer. She didn't have one because it's not something she normally needs.
I've been seeing the same ophthalmologist for years, but last time, they told me I needed to get the COVID booster for next visit. So there was no next visit. I have other doctors and a dentist, and none of them push that.
He's also absolutely dogmatic and dismissive about how LASIK is safe (although he didn't push it for me).
I don't know anyone requiring a booster or even a vaccine for patients, but it's their practice and their health. Ophthalmologists are second only to ENT and Anesthesia in risk of contracting infectious diseases from patients due to our physical proximity to your face during the exam. Maybe that's what motivates their behavior.
Physicians do have to ask about vaccines and document the answer in order meet meaningful use requirements. Maybe this is what you experienced?
LASIK is safe, but when there are complications they're a big deal.
Unless there's need for specialized medical or surgical treatment, getting eye exams and eyeglass prescriptions from an ophthalmologist as opposed to a optometrist is like getting your teeth cleaned by an oral surgeon rather than a dentist. Astigmatism and/or myopia, refractive errors, corneal disease, amblyopia? Optometrist. Ptosis, proptosis, endophthalmitis, macular degeneration, excess tearing, detached retina or trauma? Ophthalmologist.
To be fair, I had a dentist who was technically an oral surgeon but would sometimes even bump the hygienist and do the cleanings himself; because they were easy and he was bored. Same cost to me so I didn't mind.
A simple ruler is enough. I am wearing glasses for 30 years and I had the few pairs with wrong PD, the next optometrist used a simple ruler and I am working with him for the past 20 years.
I've had great experience with Zenni for single-vision prescriptions, but when I graduated to progressive (i.e. bifocal) lenses, the Zenni lenses were terrible and I couldn't use them. Not sure if it was the frame fit, or poor PD measuring on my part, but I tried twice and both times I couldn't use them.
The glasses I got from my optometrist are much better, at 3X - 4X the price of Zenni.
my family won't even ask for the pd... so I can't buy them cheaper lenses... and I'm not going to have a giant fight with my spouse even tho for what I'm paying in vision coverage we could get 4-10x the glasses they get now.
I have been using zennioptical for years, and I’ve saved friends and family lots of money with my recommendations. They don’t do fancy, brand name frames. But otherwise the quality is fine.
It would be nice if any of these sites had an AR solution that was completely clientside. I can't bring myself to agree to let them store my face + face info for 3 years.
Your employer may offer pre-tax vision insurance, this vision insurance is run by Luxottica, and works exclusively at their retail locations and brands.
Sometimes employers will even pay part of the vision insurance premium, thus making it, so your choices are to leave that money on the table OR pay completely out of pocket post-tax dollars.
There are alternative ways to use pretax dollars on eyeware, but many people aren't familiar with them and they require some management.
You know, the kind of health care self-employed people are more likely to have (high deductible) is more likely to qualify for HSA -- and an HSA is great because it's like a pre-tax extra IRA allowance if you don't use it for healthcare.
Retail stores can be started by anyone, and there are tons of optometrists that sell glasses from their own store.
The “insurance” company presents a higher barrier, since it is basically the government handing a discount to people for buying via employer subsidized vision “insurance”. The discount is that this benefit can be paid with pre tax dollars, so it obfuscates the real prices when people with vision insurance shop for eyewear.
I put “insurance” in quotes because the annual benefit maximums, like dental “insurance”, are so low that the premiums are simply prepaying for routine exams/eyeglasses. In effect, employer subsidized dental/vision insurance is just an advantage for large employers who can afford to administer those benefits and the employees who are lucky enough to work at those kinds of employers get to pay for routine dental/vision with pre tax dollars.
I'm guessing that part of is that they have a very tight relationship with insurance. Insurance covers Luxottica much more than the budget brands, so for me personally, it's actually a similar price if I choose a frame that's on sale. I tried a pair of Zennis, but they honestly felt super low-quality compared to my other glasses, even though I got all the upgrades.
There are two markets: The cheap, and the "brand". You either buy a "cheap" one for $10 and get a lens for it; or you go for a "brand" name like RayBan (which is Luxottica).
I started buying cheap 4 years ago, and surprisingly the frame is still doing well (brand frames usually last 2-3 years)
Since Luxottica bought out RayBan, the quality has plummeted. I have a pair of original Wayfarer II's that I got years before the buyout. The plastic is noticeably higher quality, the lenses are polarized and Bausch & Lomb. And they have five barrel hinges! Built like a tank and have survived many drops. Mine are still going strong and are 'buy it for life' quality. Still going strong after 38 years...I got them when I was 16 years old and in HS for a trip to the Bahamas.
Compare that to current RayBans. Cheap plastic. Plastic lenses. Spring hinges that break quickly and don't last. And worst of all, branding everywhere. On the temple. And again on the lens. Terrible.
That’s how they make their money, brand names affords them to charge a lot of money, they lower the quality and the manufacturing the cost and then pocket the rest.
It's probably higher than appears at first blush, at least to do at scale. But not a huge barrier.
But there isn't an open market for manufactured lenses, you have to get them into consumers hands, and you have to get prescriptions, and people want fitting and ability to try frames.
Superficially it seems that glasses are highly vertical in practice, which is why budget outfits like zenni and warby parker seem mostly to be focused on the margins of direct-to-consumer.
Not for manufacturing, but you need good designs first, something people will want to buy. And most people will want to buy something with a BIG BRAND NAME on it.
I tried buying glasses online and discovered another problem: the industry hasn't standardized on measurements. It's very difficult to buy frames online. The numbers/measurements will be, for example, for lens width and nose bridge width only — go figure how large the entire frame is. I tried, and failed, accepting that I pretty much need to visit a store.
The frame size is normally written (in Europe, at least) on the inside of one of the arms of the glasses. Find an existing pair that fits you and note the measurements. That measure, together with your prescription and PD should be sufficient to order online.
True. But. Even before Luxottica started buying up the industry, glasses were expensive. I worked in the industry in the early 90s (paid for college). We could buy CR-39 bifocal blanks for about $3.50. A frame in the Frames catalog (name brand) was about $10. Tint and UV were about $4 a bottle and would last a week, and that would tint/UV hundreds of lenses. I was making $7.50 and hour and it would take me half an hour to make them in the lab. We'd sell that pair for about $250.
Wow you just described Canada in every industry sectors! It’s the same. That’s why Canada is overpriced everywhere (telecom, banks, groceries, etc): no competition.
Is there some way to make this comment a billboard?
The lenses are manufactured per individual according to their need. Granted it's within a spectrum of choices such as it's -1.5 or -2, not -1.66421 (right?). Then one can add features to the lenses like anti-glare, anti-scratch, spectrum, blue light filter. Insurance covers 100%, and it's not a lot. But the frames?? They're very, very small amounts of metal and mass produced. What a sham. But yeah I do buy them at Lens Crafters after my optometrist appointment for the convenience.
> Granted it's within a spectrum of choices such as it's -1.5 or -2, not -1.66421 (right?)
Usually right, typically in 0.25 steps. Then there's Zeiss i.Scription [0], with lenses produced not only to weird numbers, but also to correct higher order deviations than just spherical and cylindrical.
I haven't tried those yet, seeing slightly changing test results on the needed standard correction, so I assume that higher order correction would be a short term improvement only.
The steps are .25 on the diopters. I suspect I would have slightly better vision for a while if they went to .125 as there have been plenty of times I felt that her 1 and 2 were bracketing ideal. I don't know the resolution of the axis and cylinder numbers.
> Glasses are expensive because there is no competition. One company - Luxottica - owns pretty much everything.
When I first heard about their dominance I checked my frames, and the maybe 3 old ones I still had around. To my surprise none of them were Luxottica. My latest were Safilo. I don't remember what the other 3 were but I did look them up and they were not brands from Luxottica.
I'm pretty sure some of the places I bought some of those from did carry Luxottica too, so I'm not sure how I ended up with something else. I am pretty picky about frames (not the appearance...as long as I don't look like I'm having a go at Elton John cosplay the appearance probably won't bother me--it's the feel and size as seen from my side that matters) and usually end up going through around 90% of the frames at a glasses store before finding some I like.
I wonder now if it is just coincidence that I keep ending up with non-Luxottica frames or if there actually is some difference between their designs and the others that makes me just not like Luxottica even in a blind comparison?
Leica (makers of lenses for cameras and phones) is moving in the market. They have the knowledge and the tools to make it, but they are still very small compared to Luxottica.
Yes, the prices aren't really competitive. You do get really good quality, though, especially with their "individual" lenses. Also, in the EU at least, Luxottica is less dominant. There are many smaller designers (like ic berlin for example). I don't see much price competition, though — it's all ridiculously expensive.
EssilorLuxottica has a similar company has a comparable share in US and Europe (about 40%). I can only find figures for EMEA but I’d assume that it would have a higher share in richer European countries than in poorer ones.
Which makes sense considering both companies are European.
It's actually quite reasonably priced (for the market, which is still absurdly marked up). Mine ran me 95€ a piece, where the Luxottica equivalent would be over 200.
Capitalism stops working when monopolies take over markets.
It is urgently needed to break up all the monopolies and go back to healthy competition.
Many problems that we see in society today come from power accumulation in a few hands. The economy is becoming an authoritarian power.
Kill monopolies and growth will come back in full force. People is not out of ideas, it is just that companies do not care anymore because they have their market share assured.
Well, no. Monopolising a market with the economy, which is a tiny fraction of all decision-making power, is not authoritarian.
The main thing to ask is: are there high barriers to entry for new players? If not, then competition will arise when it needs to. If there are, then we have a problem. If there are, and they're government/state regulations, then we have a common problem :)
If it chooses to be. This is a voluntary arrangement. If the monopoly becomes destructive (e.g. it raises prices) then there will arise a competitor that sees they can make more money than the buyer can afford to pay by charging less and gaining a large chunk of the market.
> Capitalism stops working when monopolies take over markets.
It is an inherit property of capitalism that it works towards this goal. There are forms of capitalism that exert more regulatory influence to help prevent this, but the way capitalism works is that it constantly tries to erode regulation and trend towards monopolies. We see this constantly and nonstop in real life.
Take a trip to an EU country and buy some glasses. Do your research beforehand though, not all stores are cheap either. Most of the cost is on the frame usually, so if you go with a cheap frame, there's a high chance the glasses will be cheap, unless your lenses have some crazy requirements that is.
I got sunglasses and "normal" glasses for 100€ both, not each, both. And they do not use premade lenses.
I still use the sunglasses to this day but I broke the normal glasses due to my own stupidity after 3 years or so. Then I decided to try a different store and payed 300€ just for normal glasses. I will never go there again, they are not any better then the ones I broke before but are waaay more expensive.
Same reason medical care is so expensive in the US: Insurance and the art of the upsell. The provider gets to charge high prices because the bulk of the cost is covered by insurance and thus "hidden" from consumers. The insurance company gets a non-trivial cut of the pie, which pads the bill further. And in my experience, when you go in with something wrong with you, most doctors will recommend (or perform without asking) tests that aren't covered by insurance and you don't find that out until the bill arrives in the mail.
I have a pretty standard vision insurance plan and need glasses roughly every two years. (Two pairs: one for indoors, and sunglasses for outdoors and driving.) I go into an optometrist office and get my vision checked. $10 copay or whatever for the exam. Then the pain starts. The frame selection is terrible and it turns out that the only decent-looking frames and lenses cost 3-4x what insurance will cover. And insurance doesn't cover more-or-less "required" add-ons to lenses like anti-glare coatings. And the person selling you the glasses is _very_ good at convincing you that you need all the extras.
I did the math one time and I paid $200 per year for vision insurance to save $190 (including the cost of the exam) on one pair of glasses.
The last time I bought glasses, I took my (recent) prescription to an online eyelasses e-tailer website and purchased a pair that included all the fancy extras for $60 out the door. I don't _love_ them, but I can certainly live with them for the price.
It's healthcare monopolies, from supply to distribution, it's all wrapped up pretty tightly. There's also one large payer that covers most of the market already.
Zero people have effective choices in this system. So.. prices go up.
I would suggest checking out other optometrists, most have a much better insurance wall than they had a couple of decades ago. Or go online (to order, not suggesting an eye exam over webcam :D ).
That said, I'm currently getting cataracts removed and IOL implants and insurance is like "correcting your astigmatism isn't needed so we won't cover the IOL that does that, just your distance vision". If correcting my vision isn't necessary then why cover any IOL at all??? :-/
This gets into the weeds a little but the reason boils down to money and tradition, and “what is needed” is a shifting goalpost for society.
Just thirty years ago you may have never even gotten an IOL due to tradition or cost. After adoption in the developed world there was a huge push to prevent lower income countries from accessing the technology because they “didn’t need” that technology and could benefit from lower cost interventions such as glasses.
So as companies started to innovate and lower cost, single vision non toric IOLs became cheap enough for insurance to cover. Then to make some money on premium lenses companies (and ophthalmologists, sadly) really started to push torics and multifocal lenses.
The fact of the matter is that few patients benefit all that much from toric lenses that fix astigmatism. Most people have less than 1 diopter of astigmatic error, which they don’t even manufacture a toric lens for at any usable tolerance (the FDA allows a +/-0.50D tolerance to all lenses including torics), and surgical modifications can nullify that to some extent. Veterans get it free at most VA hospitals though, so they probably get more implanted than the average population.
In the next fifteen years though I bet Medicare will begin to cover toric lenses, and the rest of the insurance industry will follow. The surgery doesn’t change much between toric and non toric. The Multifocal IOLs will remain “premium” for a while to come I expect.
> The fact of the matter is that few patients benefit all that much from toric lenses that fix astigmatism. Most people have less than 1 diopter of astigmatic error, which they don’t even manufacture a toric lens for at any usable tolerance (the FDA allows a +/-0.50D tolerance to all lenses including torics), and surgical modifications can nullify that to some extent.
I do think the cheapness of astigmatism correction in lenses for glasses means that more people get full correction than in the past, but if you're like me and apparently descended from mole people then correcting distance vision alone does squat. My distance vision is far from the worst at 7-8 diopters, so can be mostly corrected with normal lenses, but my astigmatism is bad enough that I wouldn't be able to legally drive without correction. Despite that, instead of getting insurance covered IOLs, I'm paying 3k each for the IOL for each eye.
Only real problem with the one I have so far is that the existing "accommodating" IOLs simply aren't particularly good, and the varying types of multi-focal IOL do cause halos, so if you're like me and already get halos they're off the table. So on the one hand my right eye now has 20/20 vision, on the other: instant presbyopia.
My unpopular opinion is that Multifocal and extended depth of field IOLs are all attempting to cheat physics unsuccessfully and are a cash grab by ophthalmologists and manufacturers.
The other option you have is some form of refractive surgery. Also the wholesale cost of a toric IOL is somewhere around $700 so unless the surgeon fee is thru the roof it shouldn’t be costing you $3k each eye.
multifocal ones work for some people, but also fairly often creates halos etc because as you say they're trying to cheat physics and rely on the brain learning what to filter out.
I cannot find any place that is offering $300 toric IOLs, patient cost of tonic IOLs is generally 1100-1500 (with insurance covering the remainder, however it does make me realize that I should get the receipt so I can submit that particular bit to my insurance company directly which I realize they may not have done)
> [...] they don’t even manufacture a toric lens for at any usable tolerance (the FDA allows a +/-0.50D tolerance to all lenses including torics)
I tried a quick google search but couldn't immediately verify. That seems horrible. Really production/specification tolerance, or just eye-correction tolerance to determine the need for a change?
I feel tempted to replace the lenses when eyes have changed by 0.25 (though delaying until 0.5 off). I have returned glasses which were mis-manufactured with the cylindrical axis for one eye off by 10 degrees.
"Warby Parker recognized this as a business opportunity. I’m surprised others haven’t jumped in as well with reasonably priced eyewear."
This author is uninformed. Others have jumped in. And Warby Parker wasn't even the first.
15 years ago I would buy my single-vision prescription glasses from optical4less.com. The cost was $58 for 2 pairs, including worldwide shipping.
Today I buy my glasses from Zenni. Last month, I paid $176.75 total for two pairs of glasses, each with single-vision photochromic lenses (and one pair with additional blue light blocking).
You know, my family member bought a pair of cheap glasses for 2 $ in India. Granted it was probably not very powerful or may last long. But I am shocked at the definition of what is cheap. I am now skeptical if the glasses he bought actually work well enough for him.
You can buy "reading glasses" from a supermarket in Britain for $4.
They might be OK, but custom lenses will almost certainly be better.
(Also, glasses ordered online in Britain start at less than $10 a pair. Once something purchased that infrequently costs less than a McDonald's meal, there's not much pressure to further reduce the price. It's one hour work at the legal minimum wage.)
Here in the US I could buy reading glasses in a pharmacy for less than $10 (several variations). They come in a range like -2.0 to +2.0 in increments of 0.25.
I don't wear glasses, but I suppose I did I could get something that roughly works for me for a price of a coffee and a couple of doughnuts. These glasses don't look cool, but don't look ugly either, they are just extremely basic. Likely fine for reading at home.
They are also on Amazon. There are folding reading glasses that go from 1.0x to 4.0x that are $15 for 2 pair. I keep one on me for really tiny print. It even survived ending up in the washing machine.
Sure, it's enough to pay for the materials (frames cost pennies, and cheap lenses maybe $1?).
But someone still has to cut the the lenses to size, and fit them to the frame. This requires both equipment and skill.
I don't think I've ever paid less than $15-$20 for prescription single-vision glasses. I've paid more even in the 'wholesale' optical market in Beijing.
$2 is easily achievable for reading glasses, which are mass produced with lenses installed at the factory.
Skilled labor is dirt cheap in India. Most car mechanics will do an oil and filter change for INR 200 (USD 2.46) if you bring your own materials. Practically a rounding error.
(not indian but this is my impression from what I've read)
india has a very weird medical economy at times, geared to the costs necessary to deliver ultra-basic care to many people who are dirt-poor, utilizing generics (occasionally of questionable quality), the ultra-cheap cost of labor, etc.
for example centchroman is an interesting case-study... the government basically paid to develop and take it through trials and it was generic from day-1, and then the generics manufacturers go to work and you have birth control that can be delivered to market for under a dollar a month (4 pills) in retail quantities, and the government distributes them free because it's cheaper than pregnancy/social services.
Not that at the high level, the care isn't great, but, a lot of india is super poor and underdeveloped and delivering core medicines cheaply is relatively effective to provide a super basic level of care, they have a focus on delivering super cheap generics that cover the basic use-cases. I'm sure the glasses are cheap shitty molded plastic or something, or at most a super basic molded glass lens, perhaps with some subsidies. I'm mentally imagining the "BCG" glasses from basic training, designed to be indestructible and unscratchable (aka the birth control glasses).
But that is the 80% solution, make em cheap and polish em up with super cheap labor and with basic materials you probably can get that down to 2 bucks or within subsidy distance of that.
India has very low labor costs, so you get a lot if all you need is something you can get by paying someone to do something with materials on hand, without substantial energy or rare materials.
I have used an Indian online site [1] to order a really good pair of glasses. It cost me $150, but I found the quality to be much better than what I could get in the US.
you ordered from a brand which is considered premium in India. You can get similar kind of glasses at even lower price at lenskart.com and from local stores.
Glass lenses cost me Rs 1000 (about $12.5) a few months back (myopia, -5) - I'd say these were on the cheaper side, and no special coating (they cost as much as the lenses themselves!!). Frames on the cheaper end also cost around this much.
I also prefer glass lenses. The tradeoffs seem to be weight (glass weighs more) and durability (glass can be cleaned with cloth or a towel without scratching, plastic lenses need to be babied with a microcloth or else you get little swirly scratches that will eventually ruin the lenses).
I'd rather have my glasses weigh a bit more if the lenses are more durable.
The scratches are caused by particles of dust pressed by you against the lens, and then rubbed all around. A quick rinse removes almost all the dust, and then you can dry them with any clean towel, tissue or even the shirt. I also use a drop of soap to degrease them.
I have plastic lenses with zero scratches after five years of use.
Oh, I know about this. I did rinse them thoroughly. Then I used a few drops of Dawn dish detergent to wash them. But what I found was that even if you clean plastic lenses thoroughly, what counts is how you dry them. If you use paper or even a towel it can scratch them incrementally over time.
It's so much more convenient (or maybe I'm just lazy!) to be able to dry glass lenses with a towel, paper towel, a t-shirt, or anything absorbent.
Interesting. Are you referring to Windex or one of the optical-grade solutions? I used to use dish soap but I found that I can just run mine under warm water for thirty seconds or so and that gets them pretty clean.
Yeah, scratching was the biggest reason I went back to glasses. Got a plastic one last year and within months it got plenty of scratches. Before that I had glass lenses that lasted more than 5 years (though one of lenses did break, which is why I wanted to try plastic).
$2 is cheap, but the best glasses I've ever bought start at $6, up to $30 for all the filters, so I'm not surprised you can buy something useful for $2.
Yup, Zenni is like 20 years old. My partner worked there for 7 years on the eyewear supply chain and catalog. There are tons and tons of low-cost eyewear startups like payneglasses.com
Agreed! I love Payne. I have over 100 pair because it's so inexpensive to buy online. Why not have multiple pair? You can get sunglasses or computer glasses, so you're not just stuck with one pair.
When you buy glasses from a bricks and mortar optician, you're getting whatever bog-standard lenses they sell, unless they specifically mention they're high index, or have some specific feature/coating, or are from some specific manufacturer.
Just like when you buy glasses online.
There are definitely differences in lens quality, but the available range is just as wide in retail stores as it is online.
The high end luxury brands such as Silhouette offer very advanced lens coatings and materials that aren't found in any of the discount stores online or brick-and-mortar, so there's definitely a difference there. It's only their full priced partner shops that carry them. They also claim to use custom technology that allows their 10+ layers of coatings to stick together much better and not flake off.
The mid range to entry luxury brands, many owned by Luxottica, use broadly available lenses and coatings, or so the discount online stores claim.
I've never been to a discount brick-and-mortar store selling the full range of Luxottica products, usually only a few styles here and there. So I can't comment there.
What I'm asking is if the claims of discount stores, like that they have access to the same lenses as full priced Luxottica stores, are actually true.
And whether they are honest with their shipped product.
e.g. How would anyone know if they in fact got a X layer coated lens (where X could be from 3 to 8) from a discount shop?
It seems trivial to ship a X-1 layer coated lens instead, with a very low possibility of getting caught.
Presuming that they have multiple different lenses in stock you can compare them side by side visually?
You can wet them, shine a flashlight, put them under the sun for transition lenses, etc...
Not foolproof, but it would make it harder to substitute the lower end lenses, 3 coatings vs 2 coating would likely be noticeable.
8 coatings vs 7 coatings might not be.
So for the mid range and above it probably doesn't make sense to discount shop at all. Your entirely trusting the brand reputation or shop reputation on whether they will deliver.
So we can't trust the store to give us the glasses we ordered, we need to test them. To get a control to test against, we're then going to...trust the store and have them provide the control?
How do you know those glasses on the counter touting 8 layers actually has those 8 layers?
It kind of sounds like all you can really do is see if the glasses have the features you requested. Do they transition? Does it seem like they transition as much as you were wanting? Do they seem like they don't have bad glare? Does it attenuate the glare as much as you were wanting? If not, then return them. This is entirely possible with online glasses retailers, they usually have decently generous return policies.
People don't buy glasses because they have 8 layers instead of 7. They buy them because those layers give additional features and it's the features they want. If they can do the features you want in 7 layers instead of 8, does it really matter if it's only 7 layers?
Well that’s why I mentioned in-store testing would likely only be useful for low end lenses.
For mid range to high end lenses it would probably be impossible to confirm the actual layer count without destructive testing.
Of course it would be reputation and gut-feel-perception based for most buyers in any case.
However, for the higher end stuff, gut-feel-perception probably wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. Human eyes can’t perceive the strength of lamination between layers, for example.
So it would be entirely reputation based at the higher end.
Which probably explains why high end glasses are vastly more expensive then Warby Parker and other discount places…
What a weird argument. Obviously a company can go n-layers deep when it comes to misdirection, but I'd say going to a store to physically inspect what you're getting is a much better option than blindly trusting everything they tell you.
In a store you can compare things side by side. If you order something, you get what you get and have no frame of reference.
Removes the need to customise the product to the individual, and the need to see an optometrist - it reduces the cost of the product and makes 'prescription' glasses a viable option even in nations without adequate medical services.
Interestingly, a pair of glasses here in Vietnam -- including eye exam, fancy lenses (high refractive index, anti-glare etc.), and frame -- usually runs in the 20-40$ range. As with most things here, you can find cheaper if you need (e.g. secondhand).
I'm not certain, but it sure feels like the inflated cost in North America makes it seem like eyeglasses are less affordable here than they actually are, at least in the cities.
The kicker is when I fly to North America and I see the same frames being sold there!
Edit: Eyeglasses are one of the things I recommend colleagues buy here while visiting. It's conceivable some (from nearby countries) save more than the cost of their trip!
Uh, they aren't. You go to Zenni Optical and it's a solved problem. You basically choose what you want to pay. Their $7 glasses work great. My every days were $25, until I decided to try out their UV blocking lenses, which bumped them to $50. My prescription sunglasses and prescription safety goggles were each $80.
If you've got a stronger prescription or need more than single vision lenses you'll pay a bit more. But nothing compared to the many hundreds by the time you walk out of an optician. Reasonable pricing completely changes the dynamic from bundling every what-if into a single pair, to one of why-not try something new - the way markets are supposed to work. Maybe next time I'll even try auto-darkening lenses, despite having had a lackluster experience with them decades ago.
Ctrl-F Zenni in the article show no results though. I know there are even some competitors by now, but the ones I've seen are still trying to gouge a bit.
Japanese brands are slowly starting to make inroads overseas too. Owndays (cheap) and 999.9 (expensive but great service and very high quality) are now available in Australia and many Asian countries, Zoff has made its way to Singapore and Hong Kong.
Glasses actually aren't expensive. I pay like $20-40 per prescription glasses from China. Firmoo, Zenni, ... No quality issues so far and a far more realistic price.
No 'classic' glasses dealer makes their glasses in-house anyway. They all produce in cheap countries.
I thought it was fairly well established that optometrists make most of their income from the sale of the frames as they have little to no control over how much they get for the examination, and the lens price determined by the lens manufacturer. The frames are the only thing that the optometrists get any significant margin on.
The moment you aren't buying the frame from the optometrist office the price craters, and has been that way for at least a couple of decades at this point.
I literally stated that they don’t have significant control over the lens prices. Every optometrist is getting their lens from a relatively minor set of manufacturers, and the manufacturers price to maximize their revenue, not the optometrist.
Now I’m sure that they make a bit more money in an absolute sense from coatings, but nothing like the full $8 or whatever it costs these days.
The biggest markup items they have are the frames, as there are many different manufacturers the frame manufacturers do have to offer margins to the places that sell them.
Having moved to specific focal point, variable focus on high refractive index plastic (because I have some untenably bad differential between eyes and glass was causing my specs to slide off diagonally) I now find that I don't seem to get "told" the magic formulae for making my specs, to my needs.
The basics are fine. I could use a $20 test and get fixed focus lenses cheap. Getting them to re-produce what I wear appears hard. I can't find anyone to explain the small piece of paper the machine spits out with a grid of numbers. (the very experienced ocular professor who assessed some structural eye issues for me used a 20second test machine and laughed at the professionals who still use the eye chart and a face sheet of lenses. He's confident they will ultimately stop using that stuff routinely, the box does it very well)
Probably there is a canonical formula to reproduce it, I broke a pair in flight once and took the bust lenses to an optician in Paris who made me a pair from the lenses in 2 days.
Some things demand fit. where the eye sweet spot is for variable focus depends how the lenses sit on your face.
Maybe breaking the monopoly on price starts with fixed focus or bi or tri focals first, not continuous variable focus.
I think the eye chart still has use. The machine spits out a field of numbers but my eye doc uses that as a starting point to refine from. Since I have some astigmatism there is no perfect answer, it's a matter of finding what deviation from perfect is the best and I get the strong impression that that's a matter of the individual, not something the machine can measure.
Lots of recommendations for Zenni here, which is excellent. I'll go ahead and recommend AliExpress if you want the absolute cheapest. You can get everything from very basic (usually ~$5 for same strength on both eyes, ~$15 for different strengths) to any custom combination of glasses & frames ($30+) there.
I've bought around a dozen and have only had good experiences. In case of bad experiences (one arrived a bit bent) you can get a refund.
I'd recommend going for a metal frame though, since they're more durable.
Just like anything you can shop around and get a good deal.
In the UK I use glasses direct, you can pick up a pair with a prescription for £50. They regularly have discount codes so most of the time that would be £35/40. Sure they aren't designer but they look ok for the price if you don't want to spend a lot, if you use them just got driving you can probably get an even cheaper pair that don't look as good.
I've worn glasses since I was a kid, when you're entitled to a free frame from the cheaper range at Boots (a local retailer) (also, thanks, NHS). I remember struggling to find a design that I liked decent around that price range. As soon as you went out into the price ranges that weren't covered, you got a lot more nicer looking ones. At the time I was buying new frames and lenses every few years so I went with the cheap ones.
My current pair were about £30 from Aliexpress, a gorgeous rimless set with anti-glare lenses included. Needless to say I won't be buying from local retailers anymore.
I'm sure here in the UK we're also affected by the Luxottica monopoly in the US, especially when it comes to designer brands.
don't buy your glasses from your optometrist, buy it from online sources. Most states require them to provide you with your prescription after an eye examination. I get mine for roughly 1/4-1/3 (I could probably get them cheaper if I wasn't sticking with a vendor that has been great for me) the price online and they're fine.
I've been paying $350-400 for my high strength prescription glasses for most of my life. Last time around I heard you could order from England and get them for a fraction. Found selectspecs.com and got my -10's for ~100 shipped to my door. Not affiliated at all, just glad I don't have to pay the gouge in the US anymore.
Are they? I ordered for wife glasses including frames from Zenni and it cost me 7 USD for cheap ones, 20 USD for more "expensive" ones (frame was cheap but chose some fancy lenses addons) plus 9 USD for shipping, so paid total 36 USD for two frames. But she had to have measured eyes which cost us like 20USD, it would be probably free in hospital, but too much hassle in hospital with appointments.
Because large corporations work together to ensure their mutual longevity by monopolizing the market and ensuring cheaper alternatives never make it to the market.
Nothing new under the sun.
If there was a tire that never wore our, would it be manufactured?
If there was a simple, cheap cancer treatment, would all associated businesses that profit from the treatment of cancer shut down?
If internet could be offered at 10x for the speed, for 1/10th the cost, would it be? Only if the incentives line up for the dominant player(s).
I’ll add another pro-Zenni comment. Not just because the glasses themselves are inexpensive (they are though, when I broke my favorite frames it cost $36 to get two replacements), but because it’s a godsend to get glasses you need if your prescription has “expired”. I’m sure there’s good reason for regulating routine vision checkups, but refusing to sell glasses to anyone who can’t get to the appointment isn’t serving anyone.
Yeah, I have never understood whole "prescription" thing in US, here in many (all?) European countries, you just go to eyeglasses shop, they measure your eyes and you get what you want, no prescriptions, nothing. Measuring is usually free if you buy frames from them, if not it cost like 20USD, though you could still go to ophthalmologist to have them measured professionally and it would be free, but you would need to get appointment and there is quite long waiting time and still not sure if they would provide you results for free.
By US logic it's better if people don't have any glasses than bad glasses, strange logic to me.
Usually, people buy glasses for a long time.
Carrera with chameleon glasses served me for almost 15 years. They were expensive, yes. But they lasted 15 years. And this means that during these 15 years I did not buy new glasses. And so do a lot of people. And that means that if you start a company that makes cheap good glasses, you will be in trouble in a couple of years. Because good glasses last a long time, people love them and don't want to change them. So you raise your prices.
I have vintage Ray Ban from the 1970s, still with real glass, not plastic, I love and wear them, and I'm not going to buy new "aviators" because I already have them.
It's just such a specific product, it's not impersonal plastic boxes of electronics, this is a thing that is always with you and becomes a part of you.
And there are many unknown manufacturers of cheap glasses, in any supermarket in the EU you will find racks with these glasses.
For many people, there is an option that side-steps the racket entirely, massively improves their QoL, and can even save money in the long term - laser eye surgery.
(disclaimer: prices are likely to be different in other countries)
Prices and quality of LES seems to have dropped significantly even as glasses have become more expensive. I had some annoying myopy / astigmastism combo so I used to pay up to 200-300€ for glasses, and prescription sunglasses were also expensive.
Femto-LASIK surgery cost me a whopping 1500€ a couple of years ago, whereas an older acquaintance told me that he had paid 10x as much in the mid-aughts. A couple of decades of glasses would not have cost me much less, and the difference it makes in quality of life cannot be overstated. Easily in the running for the best money I ever spent.
Of course, not everybody can get lasered - children and teenagers, first and foremost - but a lot more people do than realize it.
I'm a customer of Zenni Optical. They have glasses from $10 - $100+.
I usually get the same set, for $100-- frameless. And that price includes blue-blocks (to reduce blue light from screens). They last long and are easily replaceable.
I buy glasses (in the US) from this place called Jins. They are cheaper out-of-pocket than glasses being sold by my optometrist, even after insurance (I pay for Jins out of pocket). Not sure why and my optometrist can't explain how his glasses are betters either. I assume its some kind of price gouging.
Buy from Zenni Optical. They are inexpensive and customer service is pretty great. My daughter broke an arm of one of her frames while playing at school. I emailed Zenni asking for tips on how to repair it. They sent me replacement frames for free.
I have purchased < $20 glasses from zennioptical without a perscription online many times that were every bit as good as $500 ones I bought at lenscrafters, with near identical styles.
I started buying in bulk and worrying less about losing or babying them.
Great suggestions for cheaper alternatives in this thread!
Does anyone knows if it's possible to get cycling sunglasses of similar quality as Oakley/100%? By cycling sunglasses I mean:
-shape (those need to be big and go over forehead so you see clearly from hunched position)
-lenses (tint, increased color contrast, preferably not polarized), anti fog
-safe in case of a crash
I tried shopping around but couldn't find anything that fits as well as 165$ pair of Speedcrafts (the lenses are amazing as well). The glasses are just 4 pieces of plastic (frame, lenses, nose bridge, nose pad) but somehow it's not easy to find a decent cheaper alternative.
I own exactly one pair of "expensive" glasses that I got from a retail chain and use as my primary pair.
I will admit, they are of much higher quality than the glasses that I order online as a back-up.
But outside of that pair, I get a print out of my prescription and go to places like www.eyebuydirect.com to get any other pairs.
The quality isn't there but we are talking about hundreds of dollars cheaper. And if anything was to happen to my main pair, I can quickly grab the $80 and I doubt anyone would even notice.
Plus, it makes wearing different styles from time to time a much more attractive offer.
Frame construction is generally much poorer quality. I've had them break from just taking them off my face too fast.
Face fit is tricky, they allow you to select things like your "size" but this is broken down into "small/medium/large" when in reality it needs to take into account things like temple (arm) length, bridge width, etc.
My main pair is perfect because I spent the big bucks on them and had a professional constantly tweaking them, putting them back on my face, tweaking them some more. And that comes with the ability to return to the store and have them do it again for free if I feel like I need to.
Online you won't get any of that, so the fit isn't perfect.
Optical clarity, no complaints. The lenses are good.
Glasses are expensive because they are not just a medical device, but also a fashion accessory, and this market is a fashion market.
I have to try about 20-30 frames or so, until I find something that looks OK on me.
But! It is still possible to buy cheap enough frames that look fine. Why the _lenses_ are so expensive, that’s a different question. I routinely pay $700 or so for the lenses. Many professional multi-component _camera_ lenses cost much less than that. And it has nothing to do with Luxottica.
In my last summer vacation I travelled abroad and forgot to bring my sunglasses.
Looking for a new one in the stores I found that prices for regular Ray-Ban (owned by Luxotica) were too expensive for my taste (~120 USD). So I decided to get a Polaroid sunglasses instead, for a third of the price (~40 USD).
My only concern was wether the lenses polarization would be up to standards. So I Googled it and found out that Polaroid was in fact the company that invented polarized lenses :)
This must be a US thing. In UK you pay £25 for an eye test (which employer is required to cover if you have to wear glasses at work) and then you can order online with prescription you get from test for £40 and usually there are 2 for 1 or 50% offers even on that. It is baffling that you would have no competition if this was costing $800 ... is there IP or regulations stopping this or something?
I now have to use reading glasses. First few prescriptions were eye-wateringly expensive.
Now I just order a 4-pack off Amazon for about a tenner - never been happier. I have a pair at home, at work, in the car, in my bag and if they break I just toss 'em away without a second thought.
I'm sure it must be a lot more tricky for those with unique prescriptions but for stock readers this is definitely the way to go.
Search engines don't seem to work anymore to find controversial information so I could not dig up the info again. It was from several years back it might be starting to change now.
The golf balls are more interesting. Walmart/sams club actually had to give up on their own brand of golf balls due to the nonstop litigation from top flight, making it unprofitable to produce them.
> Search engines don't seem to work anymore to find controversial information so I could not dig up the info again. It was from several years back it might be starting to change now.
Hmmm.... not really a satisfying answer for me. I wouldn't make such claims unless I was confident about it.
I used to pay $800-1,000 a pair, then I heard that the exact same glasses from the exact same factory just without that fancy logo costs you about $100 a pair. Bought a few of them, never looked back.
People need to accept that you get ripped off all the time, it just a normal part of everyday life. when you think a $5 walmart tshirt is cheap, well, the factory gets probably 50c.
There's plenty of margin in the industry - as an anecdote, I've paid around £40 for a pair in the UK through an online retailer (Glasses Direct), around ~₹1500-2000 in India through an online retailer (Lenskart) and ~₹800 by visiting a local store in a Tier 2 city in India
In Poland you can still get very decent glasses (that could be even with a premium brand frames) with top service included for about $300. I believe it's just a market that makes it expensive or cheap. Oh, and you don't need a prescription.
I had the same pair of glasses for 20 years just getting new lenses as needed. A year ago I had a slight change in prescription but also had to make the plunge into bifocals. Cost to me even after insurance? $800. And they're terrible.
Sunglass frames are in every petrol station. Would it be possible to 3d-print a resin with known index of refraction, then go to town on the buffing wheel for an hour?
Would love to hear more about DIY corrective lenses.
You can get glasses from Zenni for under $10 (their website says they start at $6.95), you'd have a hard time beating their price with DIY, gas station sun glasses cost more than that around here. Of course, at that price you're not getting the lightest lenses, or coatings, but you're probably not getting that with DIY either.
My go-to is Payneglasses.com. They're easy to work with and have incredible deals. Most of the frames I buy are $5.95 and then I add on the blue blocking protection and antiglare.
I started looking at getting new glasses recently and due to my extremely poor vision, need all these extra addons for lenses (high-index, progressive etc.) and they get EXPENSIVE very quickly.
I wonder why the Euro bureaucrats are not doing anything about one of the biggest monopolies in the Europe. Guess they are just too busy figuring out another way to milk Google.
Get your eyes tested and buy glasses at Costco.
Also if your prescription is a simple one, Costco sells off the shelf reading glasses for around $20 for three pairs.
When I used them regularly (as a kid) in the 2000s, they were just as expensive and gave me untold problems involving insurance and repairs. Specifically, they would turn over frame styling so often that if you broke your frame in just a few months, they would be unable to repair or replace them. I'm not convinced this isn't an issue that most places have.
Guessing it’s still a scalable issue for it to take off. King Children is still the only company I know that’s in this space, but they haven’t taken off like I’ve hoped for them to expand
You go to LensCrafters and prices seem super expensive, so you go to Pearle Vision and that's expensive too, so you go to Target Optical and prices are still high and then you think maybe glasses are expensive, since you went to multiple stores and they all have similar prices. What you don't realize is that all those retail brands are owned by the same company - Luxottica [1]. They operate under several names, so there is an appearance of competition but there isn't.
But wait, it isn't just stores, they also own eyewear brands such as Ray-Ban, Chanel, Coach, Oakley, Prada, Tiffany, and so on. Yes, all of those brands are owned by Luxottica [2].
Wait, not done yet. They also own insurance. Luxottica owns the vision insurance company EyeMed. [3]
Still not done. Luxottica has merged with Essilor and now own multiple lens brands [4].
See 60 Minutes story on Luxottica if you're not outraged yet [5].
Where are the anti-trust enforcers in this country and other countries, and why are they not doing anything?
[1] https://www.luxottica.com/en/retail-brands
[2] https://www.luxottica.com/en/eyewear-brands
[3] https://eyemed.com/en-us/about-us
[4] https://www.essilorluxottica.com/brands
[5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDdq2rIqAlM