Perspectives
Safe Spex and Other Malaprops

Sometimes being cute just isn't, well, cute. And labeling can definitely backfire. Like when people try too hard to come up with a catchy name. A woman I met at last month's International Vision Expo East told me she was going to call her kids' eyewear shop Temples for Tots. She was finally dissuaded when friends told her everyone would come in looking for playhouses, but that no one looking for eyewear--other than another optician--would get it.

That reminded me of what a dispenser from suburban Chicago told me a couple of years ago. He'd just added a sports and safety eyewear section, and, trying to be catchy, called it Safe Spex. Though he thought it was great, not everyone else did, and it actually cost him business with some of his more conservative clients.

The same problem of labeling gone wrong also goes for the way some eyecare professionals position their product selections. An optician recently told me that her nephew plays on a sports team where he's the only one who wears eyeglasses and is also one of the few who doesn't wear "cool looking" protective eyewear onto the field. Why? Because a well-meaning optometrist told him, "We sell sight here, not toys. That's why sports glasses are sold in sporting goods stores. They're for people who don't need glasses." This was the same doctor who'd told him he didn't need polycarbonate.

That doctor is just lucky the boy hasn't been hurt playing sports. And, as misleading as that eye doctor's statements were, there's no question that prescription sports eyewear--especially when it's designed for kids--is one of the least understood categories in eyewear. Even consumers who understand polycarbonate and the new Trivex lenses, for example, often don't understand that safe lenses won't protect the eyes unless the frame is structurally sound as well.

As this special sports eyewear issue of EB suggests, the good news is that fashion and function have merged to create a terrific crop of sports eyewear. But all the new designs won't help if you don't get the message out in clear and concise terms. To kids. And to their parents.

Sincerely,

Stephanie K. De Long
Editor-in-Chief