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Comment by andperseand | Hacker News Reader

Being married to an optometrist and privy to some of the numbers of the business, I'm always a bit annoyed reading these articles. Yes, the margins on frames are high. Are the overall profits of the business high? Not particularly. The staffing costs are essentially subsidised by the products they sell. If you put 'reasonable' markups on the frames, then you have to make the costs of the eye tests a lot higher to pay for the time of your expensive staff and then fewer people are willing to get tested and their problems go unnoticed. Sometimes they are serious enough to be life-threatening or to cause total loss of vision. Your GP is not going to notice a bulging optic disc for example.

So while I appreciate the consumer sentiment of 'This looks like I'm being ripped off', I think the current pricing model is actually in the best interest of public health. Even SpecSavers model of 30min appointments is a bit suspect really.

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Yeah, if you consider the actual cost of visits, the end product has to subsidize the entire business. It took 3 visits for me to get contacts. The contacts were about $200 for a year's supply, and each visit was about $60.00. Each of the people involved has to make a part of that as their pay, and on top of that they have to rent an office, maintain stock, lease equipment, etc.. All to sell me some squishy bits of hydrogel for less than what a cell phone costs. I'm really surprised if they broke even on me.

But why did it take you three visits to get contacts?

It's also interesting that hard (RGP) contacts, which last essentially forever, are now virtually impossible to buy from high-street opticians.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rigid_gas_permeable_lens

Contact lenses aren't always easy to fit. Especially if you are correcting for astigmatism. There's sizing, weighting, permeability and the unmeasured but distinct differences between brands. There's also the choice of changing the actual powers involved for different reasons. So people have to take them away, try them for comfort and such... Three visits is pretty normal. If you are a keratoconic then 3 visits would be a very easy case...

RGPs aren't nearly as gas-permeable as hydrogel lenses. They also break and they fall out, and they're not as hygienic because you're reusing them so much. A year's supply of monthly lenses is about $200, which is about what I would spend on glasses.

As another poster said, you have to try different brands and make sure the prescription works and that they're comfortable. For example I couldn't stand having any of the Acuvue lenses in my eyes for more than a couple of hours, but the Biofinity lenses I use now are comfortable all day.

When you go to LensCrafters (owned by Luxottica), the doctor is not always employed by LensCrafters, they can be an independent. The price of eye exams is also influenced by the insurance industry.

And yet Ace and Tate can sell specs for €99.

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