CLINICAL

  OPTICAL

QUANTIFY YOUR FRAME OPTIONS

COMPARING OFFERINGS WITH SALES DATA LEADS TO MORE INFORMED PURCHASES

DAVE ZIEGLER, O.D.

CONSIDER TWO scenarios: First, a lab manager selects frame lines for your practice based on his or her perception of what the patients want. Second, a quantified analysis informs a designated employee what your most expensive frame, least expensive frame, average frame price and what price range sells the most in your practice, and he or she utilizes it to purchase frames for the practice.

Which is a better way to decide which frames to display? Which of these scenarios does your practice fall under? These questions can expose a real weakness in many optometric practices.

Here’s how to get some real data to make better buying decisions.

GATHER DATA

Determine what you display on your frame boards. Using $25 price increments, go through your physical inventory, and tally what you have. Using this data, you will start to see your price ranges and different price zones that are either over- or under-represented.

Next, print an annual report of frames sold, and put them in the same price grid as your physical inventory. Now, you can see what you sell vs. what you display. For comparison, I have included a grid that represents my study group of a dozen offices from around the country. While more national data like this would be valuable, it gives you a place to start. But what can you learn from this exercise?

PUT THE DATA TO WORK

Here are some action steps to take with the data you’ve collected:

1. Decide market positioning. Look at the quality and price range of your offerings to your patients. Do you want to be the low-cost leader or do you want to skew toward higher-quality frames? You have to understand your market, while not making the mistake of prejudging how much your patients are willing to pay for eyewear.

2. Rebalance. Look for areas in your price structure that need adjustment by either eliminating frames that are over-represented or by adding new frame lines to fill a missing spot in your inventory.

3. Add higher-end eyewear. Take a risk with a couple of frame brands that stretch your comfort zone. I think you will be surprised what consumers are willing to spend when you offer and merchandise better brands of eyewear.

ANALYZE STUDY GROUP DATA

When we looked at my study group data this way, we learned some of the members display very inexpensive frames. However, sales data show most patients chose frames that were more expensive than the average price. This mismatch represents a missed opportunity. Those practices need to increase their offerings of more expensive brands. As an added benefit, we found that introducing the more expensive frames make the frames that were previously the most expensive sell better. The revenue per patient continues to increase as it brings in those so-called “accessible luxury items” that cost more but are not out of reach for many consumers.

SHOW AND TELL

In my experience, many patients are willing to trade up to frames that are unique, have better quality and cost more. But you will never know that until you show them, and tell the story about each exclusive brand. OM

DR. ZIEGLER is a senior partner at Ziegler & Leffingwell Eyecare in Milwaukee, Wisc., and a fellow of the AAO. Email him at daveaziegler@gmail.com, or visit tinyurl.com/OMcomment to comment.