Consumers’ Need to Feel Good and Look Good Boosting Sunglass Market : Trend: Oakley Inc. of Irvine and other manufacturers are benefiting from a convergence of fashion and concern about damage from ultraviolet rays.
Some people are trying to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger. Others just want to protect their eyes.
Whether they’re fashion-conscious, health-conscious or both, consumers are spending more money on sunglasses every year.
“People are beginning to view sunglasses as something other than a medical need. Now there’s a lot of specialization and fashion going on. It’s become more of a lifestyle thing,” said David Buchsbaum, a retail analyst for Southeast Research Partners Inc. in Boca Raton, Fla.
About 263 million pairs of sunglasses were sold last year in the United States, pulling in $2.5 billion, according to the Sunglass Assn. of America, an industry trade group. Those sales--up 9% in dollar terms compared to 1993--were the highest since the group began tracking data 15 years ago, said Richard Enholm, its statistical chairman.
Based on sales through April, Enholm said sales for this year are projected to rise an additional 8%, which would equal $2.7 billion.
Growth has been particularly strong the past three or four years as more people become aware of the dangers of the sun’s ultraviolet rays, Enholm said.
Overexposure to ultraviolet light can dry the eye’s cornea, or transparent coating, and perhaps even lead to cataracts. “If you spend a whole day at the beach with no sunglasses and the next day your eyes feel like you have sand in them--that’s ultraviolet damage,” said Carol Norbeck, an optician in Seattle.
Style is also a major concern to customers at Studio Optix, an eyeglass retailer in Manhattan, said owner Mitchell Cassel.
“People see Arnold Schwarzenegger wearing [sunglasses] in a certain movie and say, ‘I’d like to have that certain type of frame,’ ” said Cassel, whose store carries sunglasses ranging in price from $45 to $400.
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Enholm said Americans last year spent an average of $9.50 for each pair of sunglasses--not a healthy price, according to optician John Alessandro.
“A sunglass that is purchased in the streets for 5 or 10 bucks can’t possibly give you [good] protection,” said Alessandro, who sells sunglasses ranging from $25 to $200 at his Manhattan office.
“You don’t have spend $200 on a pair of sunglasses,” he said. “You can spend--if it’s not a prescription--$50, $75, $100 for a good pair of sunglasses.”
To appeal to the growing market, manufacturers are pumping out a wide array of frames.
Smaller round and oval-shaped frames are particularly in vogue now, although they lack the protection of larger sunglasses. There’s also a thriving market for sports sunglasses, especially the big wraparound “shield” types often used by baseball players and cyclists, Enholm said.
Among the largest makers of both sunglass lenses and frames are privately held Oakley Inc. of Irvine and Bausch & Lomb of Rochester, N.Y., whose Ray-Ban brand was popularized by Tom Cruise in the movie “Risky Business.” Other popular shades include Corning Inc.’s Serengeti label, Benson Eyecare Corp.’s Foster Grant brand, and Riviera sunglasses, Enholm said.
Traditionally a warm-weather product, sunglasses’ major sales period is April through August. But as ski goggles and other shades for winter sports gain popularity, most retailers are keeping sunglass displays year-round.
Sunglass Hut International Inc., the nation’s largest specialty retailer of non-prescription sunglasses, has been able to cultivate a prosperous year-round business by focusing on warm spots such as California and the South, and by varying its product mix geographically, said analyst Buchsbaum.
“They can sell sunglasses in Buffalo,” he said.
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The Coral Gables, Fla.-based company, which started as a kiosk business in Miami in 1971, has evolved into an international chain of stores with $244 million in sales last year.
And while most U.S. retailers have suffered through a sluggish first half of 1995, Sunglass Hut’s overall sales rose 38% to $174.9 million in the period. Sales at stores open at least a year, considered the most accurate measure of a retailer’s strength, climbed a healthy 7%.
The company has 1,379 stores including 325 Sunsations Sunglass Co. stores acquired in late June.
Buchsbaum said the company isn’t likely to face any significant direct competition as it expands because it has most major mall locations tied up.
He said Sunglass Hut has an advantage because its specialty format makes it more knowledgeable about shades than department stores or other general retailers. For health-conscious consumers, that’s the most important factor, said Norbeck, the Seattle optician.
“The shopper has to be sure they are buying [sunglasses] from a knowledgeable source,” Norbeck said. “Buying sunglasses off the street in New York is the same as buying as a watch on the street in New York. Gucci isn’t necessarily Gucci.”
