ECP BUSINESS METRICS

The U.S. optical business continues trending upward as its fifth week of positive metrics show a consistent rate of growth.

All Sales Categories Continue Upward
On a national level, all product/service categories grew substantially. This week, frame units were the standout, growing at a rate of 21 index points, compared with gross revenue, exams/refractions, and lens pairs, all growing at index levels in the teens. This brought all categories to around 60 index points, a major improvement over the index levels of teens and single digits when these optical business metrics bottomed out in early April. (All except contact lenses, which only dipped as low as 36 index points in mid-April.)

REGIONAL BREAKOUT

Regionally, every product category in every region showed improvement. Most growth was consistent across the board at index rates in the mid-teens for all products in all regions. Contact lenses again followed their own path as they have since monitoring these metrics began, also increasing in sales but at a slightly lower rate hovering around 10 index points and as low as 8 index points in the Northeast.

* The index baseline was developed by Jobson Research from total sales from an average seven days in the first quarter of 2019. This index baseline is equivalent to a score of 100. All other time periods going forward are calculated as a percent increase or decrease from the 100 baseline index of that period. This index is intended to show directional and magnitudinal change that the market is experiencing. Actual index scores are arbitrary meaning the baseline of 100 is simply used as a benchmark. Jobson Research shall not be held liable for any use or misuse of the data described and/or contained herein.

Source: GPN and ABB Analyze contributed anonymous sales data used to determine gross revenue, exams/refractions, frame units, lens pairs, and contact lens boxes. Data was collected from approximately 3,500 independent eye care practices.

Consumer Sentiments

* Percentage of Rx eyewear users that are planning to postpone or cancel their Rx eyewear purchase until conditions are better. "If you need new eyeglasses or contact lenses while COVID-19 is still a threat, which of the following actions are you likely to take?"
** Selected answer option 8, 9 or 10 for the question "On a scale of 1-10 (were 1 = No concern at all and 10 = Extremely concerned) how concerned are you over the recent global COVID-19 threat and outbreak?"

Source: The Vision Council VisionWatch COVID-19 Consumer Sentiment Study: February and March editions

For additional information, you may reach out to GPN, ABB Analyze, and The Vision Council directly.

For more information from Jobson Research contact jwaller@jobson.com.