FUTURE FOCUS: LENSES FOR A DIGITAL AGE

Looking FORWARD

Lens manufacturers opine on future trends and technology, and how it will affect the way ECPs serve patients

BY SUSAN TARRANT

Ending one year and prepping for another tends to get us in forward-looking mood, so EB asked several leaders in the U.S. lens market to be as prescient as they could be and join us in providing a peek into what may come in the lens category. What follows are expert predictions about what will be driving the lens business in the near future, whether it be in lens design, customer engagement, or delivery channels.

Beyond Free-Form

Michael Rybacki, Seiko: Sales of private label free-form lenses will continue to increase as consumers learn to recognize that the added value of these sophisticated designs and the superior optics they provide are worth the higher price point. The growing availability of private label designs, manufactured either in-house by independent labs or from overseas distributors, make them an emerging value-added solution for everyone from ECPs to optical wholesalers. Sales of branded and private label free-form PALs will continue to increase as the advances in technology and design continue to outperform conventional front-surface PAL designs.

Don Oakley, VSP Optics Group: The past 10 years or so have really centered on free-form design and digital processing. The industry developed phenomenal lens designs in this period, but the reality is that there are only two sides to a lens, two square inches of surface, and a finite number of unique design combinations. To be truly innovative moving forward, we need to look beyond lens design. The new landscape is all about building functionality into and onto lenses.

Personal Designs

Edward DeRosa, Signet Armorlite: Over the next five to 10 years, there will be a greater focus on customizing the individual patient’s viewing experience, as well as a refining of current lens designs. Multiple lens designs will continue to be refined for specific uses and individual lifestyles. Patients are looking for lens designs that help with specific lifestyle viewing needs. With an even greater use of mobile devices, computers, and televisions, patients need additional lens technologies that address their specific viewing needs. Many industries have embraced the option for a highly customized customer experience and this is something that needs to be done within the optical industry.

Understanding the patient’s individual viewing concerns and including the patient in the lens’ development will increase patient satisfaction.

Barney Dougher, HOYA Vision Care: Personalization is now an expectation! In order for eyecare providers to keep their brands competitive, they will need to offer free-form designs. If a provider is putting a patient in an old conventional lens design that millions of other people are wearing, the patient experience is not going to meet their expectations. Patients will go to the Internet for the same thing you sold them. But if you offer a personalized experience and a personalized vision correction, then they will choose your brand.

OUR CONTRIBUTORS

MARK BECKER, vice president, marketing & strategic partnerships, Shamir Insight, Inc.

EDWARD P. DEROSA, executive vice president, North America sales & operations, Signet Armorlite, Inc.

BARNEY DOUGHER, president, HOYA Vision Care North America

PADDY MCDERMOTT, president, Transitions Optical, Inc.

DON OAKLEY, president, VSP Optics Group

HOWARD PURCELL, O.D., FAAO, senior vice president of customer development, Essilor of America, Inc.

MICHAEL RYBACKI, senior vice president, sales & marketing, Seiko Optical Products of America

New Technology

DeRosa: Eye health and maintaining excellent vision over the long term are major challenges. Because of these concerns, there will be an increased focus on lens designs, materials, and coatings related to eye health. We have already seen some major developments regarding combatting harmful blue light with various materials and lens coatings.

Mark Becker, Shamir Insight: Premium lens development will embrace lifestyle shifts ultimately using technology to improve, protect, and recreate perfect vision. The exploration into e-wear will continue, which will encourage even greater emphasis on lifestyle eyewear.

Howard Purcell, Essilor: For patients, there is an increased need for not only products that correct refractive errors, but also the need for even greater protection against factors including UV from the sun and from harmful blue light emitted by our hand-held devices, computers, and overhead lighting. The good news: advanced products exist today and are becoming even more available to eyecare professionals to offer their patients. As an industry, we have the responsibility to continue to anticipate these needs and develop products that will allow tomorrow’s consumers to experience healthy vision for a lifetime.

Customer Engagement

Paddy McDermott, Transitions Optical: The notion of consumers becoming more engaged in the purchasing process is gaining traction, in my view. I think this is a significant trend that will have quite a profound effect on our industry going forward. Our industry has always been facilitated by the eyecare professional with limited input from the consumer—apart from their frame choice. Some of the newer technologies that are in development involve a greater control exercised by the consumer in the testing process, as they can now choose their optimized correction using a mouse or through another interface. I think this new, engaged purchasing transaction will become even more mainstream because consumers’ buying habits are continuing to be greatly influenced by social and digital media. Online retail shows us that the engaged consumer has a propensity to purchase in greater quantities and more frequently, but only when their perception of value and benefits is met.

Dougher: Through free-form technology we have been able to personalize vision correction for nearly a decade. Now patients are looking for a personalized experience in the buying process. Independent practices have to sell technology with technology. This approach requires a personal touch and a level of education that is tough to replicate on a website or during the big box “jiffy exam” experience.

New Delivery Channels

Becker: Digital designs and processing will control share as most lens manufacturers move away from casting. Smaller and more affordable generating systems will continue to enable digital processing on private Rx orders in every market. The effort to embrace localized, full-service processing in same-day time will grow even when many corporate and insurance laboratories continue to off-shore and centralize efforts. All channels will have a lab/production-to-consumer delivery option for the ECP when needed.

To assist in ease-to-market, along with the driving pressure on service time, frame printing and possibly lens printing will be innovated. Initially the products will be private label until a brand qualifies the quality and enables the licensing.

Purcell: We know that up to 40% of patients use the Internet to conduct research about eye care and available products, but far fewer actually purchase eyewear online (3% to 4%). We are all aware that not every pair of spectacles around the world can or will be sold across a dispensing table. While technology has allowed for a changing retail landscape across all industries, an omni-channel approach to selling—that incorporates both the traditional bricks and mortar stores and e-commerce—has emerged even in the optical industry. In our industry, the relationship between the eyecare professional and the patient is still paramount, and it is one that cannot and will not be replaced. Today, the omni-channel business is becoming the preferred approach for the consumer, and I believe ECPs are definitely in the best position to deliver this combination of benefits to their patients.