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As with much of the economy, it's winner-take-all. I would put Zenni Optical alongside Luxottica as the duopoly at the moment. Warby is popular, but it's driven
by ngokevin 7y ago
As with much of the economy, it's winner-take-all. I would put Zenni Optical alongside Luxottica as the duopoly at the moment. Warby is popular, but it's driven a lot by marketing and VC.
- ceejayoz 7y agoIt was really jarring to order a $25 pair of glasses from Zenni and have them be basically indistinguishable from my old $400 pair.
- nyolfen 7y agothe WP glasses i tried a few years ago via mailed preview package all seemed like the very lowest quality i had ever handled -- flimsy plastic, cheap-feeling hinges. totally pleased with my 40$ pair from zenni though.
- ejstronge 7y agoIt's often true (even for brick-and-morter optometrists) that the floor models are not as solid as the frames they would actually sell you.
- gburdell3 7y agoPlus Zenni has more "normal" styles of glasses that you don't need a beard and 6-inch-tall haircut to pull off.
- wyclif 7y agoI have no idea what this means.
- hyperbovine 7y agoOh I think you do.
- wyclif 7y agoI totally don't. I have long-ish hair and no beard at the moment. What does this even mean? I'm trying to visualise glasses that require those things to "pull off" but I'm drawing a blank.
- bobsil1 7y agoSimilar experience with Jins (brick and mortar Tokyo chain expanding into US, nice designs, lens grinding bots, 30 min turn). $80, better than my old $600 pair.
- Finnucane 7y agoI have two pairs of Warby Parker glasses, and I have to give them this: their in-store customer service is very good.
- ssully 7y agoOnline support is good as well. First pair I ordered from them had a defective coating after the first 6 months (it was 'splotchy', it looked like water dried on the lenses but it wouldn't come off'). They sent me a replacement pair for free. The only downside I have with online glasses is you making adjustments to the fitting of the glasses. Your eye doctor will usually do this for you when you buy glasses for them, but online glasses require you to do it yourself or go into a store (if they have one). With that said, still not a big enough negative for me to go back to buying from my eye doctor.
- a-wu 7y agoWarby will reimburse $50 to go to an eye doctor for fitting. See "Fit" here: https://www.warbyparker.com/help https://www.warbyparker.com/help. I admittedly haven't needed to do this so I'm not sure what the experience is like.
- dublinben 7y agoOnline sales are a very small (~25%) part of the eyewear market. No DTC brand (Warby Parker, Zenni, etc.) is anywhere close to the market dominance of EssilorLuxottica.
- ngokevin 7y agoRelatively small, but their margins are way better. Of course they haven't overtaken Luxottica, but they are growing quick and are still businesses in the billions. I think online eyewear sales and awareness have been spiking over the last 5 years, and they have serious product market fit. You tell anyone about the existence of online eyewear and the price and they are sold. Luxottica is winning based on market ignorance at the moment IMO, it's only a matter of time.
- smeyer 7y agoIt's definitely not a duopoly and if it were it definitely wouldn't include Zenni. Here's one ranking of the top eyeglass retailers in 2015[0]. Another source says Zenni Optical had gross revenue of $214MM in 2018[1], so maybe they should be on that list but they'd be behind Warby Parker let alone some of the others. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/256664/sales-of-the-leading-15-us-optical-retailers/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/256664/sales-of-the-lead... [1] https://www.marketwatch.com/press-release/zenni-optical-celebrates-25-million-glasses-sold-and-over-15-years-of-disrupting-industry-controlled-pricing-2019-03-28 https://www.marketwatch.com/press-release/zenni-optical-cele...