Latest Headlines – Page 126
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Latin America is the new eldorado for vision care
Essilor sees the market for ophthalmic lenses more than doubling in value over the next 10 years in Brazil and the rest of Latin America. In terms of volume alone, the consumption of lenses is expected to grow from 100 million in 2010 to 140-180 million units, but their added ...
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Alain Mikli stores will become more specialized opticians
Alain Mikli International is going through an interesting phase of transformation under the management of Antonio Bortuzzo, the Italian executive who led a major strategic reorientation at Marcolin and then at Allison. He was appointed chief executive of the French company last autumn.The challenge is to turn Alain Mikli into ...
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Hoya introduces new high-tech tools
During the last Mido fair in Milan, Hoya chose not to exhibit and to organize instead a big party for some 1,200 opticians from all over Italy to present three new high-tech tools on portable devices that it is introducing all over Europe.The Hoya Vision Consultant Viewer is a system ...
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Pince-nez glasses are back
Pince-nez spectacles were the 19th-century glasses that distinguished professionals and aristocrats. Spectacles with no temples that clip onto the nose actually made their first appearance at the end of the 13th century. They were rediscovered two years ago by two Austrian eyewear specialists, Gerald and Martin Lasnik, who now produce ...
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Italia Independent opens shop-in-shops
Italia Independent has a new commercial strategy – the shop-in-shop – as a corner in eyewear stores, discotheques and restaurants. The corners sell eyewear, apparel and motorbike helmets produced by Italia Independent. The store gets the merchandise on a consignment basis, with a contract stipulating that the supplier takes care ...
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Immagine Eyewear down 20% on the domestic market
Immagine Eyewear has suffered badly from the recession on the Italian market, with sales down by 20 percent. Domestic sales represent 40 percent of the Italian company's total turnover, which reached €3.5 million thanks to better performance from exports. The company has had to take measures such as cutting down ...
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Eyeglass wearers want the best, but don’t know what that is
PPG Industries has sponsored a survey that found that consumers aren't entirely familiar with their options when it comes to choosing lenses for their eyewear. They know they want a combination of certain attributes, but aren't receiving sufficient information from their eye care professionals. The problem is apparently increasing. In ...
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Survey finds Americans skimping on eye protection
Eighty-five percent of Americans say they think that eye protection is important to their good health, yet fewer than two-thirds of them regularly wear protective eyewear when they're outdoors. The number falls to just a third of people aged 18-24. The survey, which was conducted by N3L Optics, a retailer ...
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Lower profits for Hal’s optical retail sector
Hal Holding reported a 14 percent increase in its net income to €493 million for 2011. Hal's total operating profits rose to €620.9 million from €546.6 million, but its extensive optical retail operation had an operating profit of €248 million after amortization of intangible assets, down from €258 million in ...
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Major French buying groups stride forward
The two biggest French buying and franchising groups for independent opticians, Krys and Optic 2000, performed better than thier national market, which grew by only 1.5 percent in 2011, according to GfK.The Optic 2000 group reported a drop of 0.8 percent on a same-store basis for its various chains. Adding ...
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Sales, margins and investments all rise at Salmoiraghi
Salmoiraghi & Viganò, Italy's largest optical chain with around 500 sales outlets, has finally announced its results for the financial year ended last Sept. 30, 2011, showing that its revenues grew to €183 million in the period, after a drop in 2009-10 and in spite of the recession. This represents ...
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Essilor’s growth picks up speed
Hubert Sagnières, chairman and chief executive of Essilor, is forecasting a currency-neutral sales increase of between 12 and 15 percent this year for his group, with organic growth of “at least” 5 percent. Last March 1, the group announced a 7.7 percent sales increase to €4,189.5 million for the group ...
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Safilo’s confirms improved profitability
Safilo is looking to acquire other brands, in addition to its recent takeover of Polaroid Eyewear, to help compensate for the loss of Armani, which the Italian eyewear producer terms an “outright raid” by Luxottica.Safilo's chief executive, Roberto Vedovotto,, told us at the Mido show in Milan that the group ...
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Luxottica’s bond issue was a roaring success
It was considerably oversubscribed. Luxottica received total requests of nearly €9 billion for the €500 million seven-year bond it placed on the market on March 12. As the demand was 18 times the size of the proposed lot, the bond was placed in about half an hour, enabling the company ...
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Allison restructures production, new licenses in the pipeline
Allison succeeded in closing 2011 with turnover of around €50 million, on a par with 2010, and with Ebitda up thanks to the restructuring process set in motion a few years ago, including the slashing of its portfolio from 26 to 16 collections. Mido went relatively well for the Italian ...
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Marcolin books record results
In 2011, Marcolin booked a 9.0 percent rise in sales to €224.1 million, driven by growth in fashion and luxury brands as well as Asian markets. On a currency-neutral basis, sales were up by 10.4 percent.In Europe, revenues rose by 4.6 percent to €119.9 million, driven by France, Germany, the ...
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Marchon grows double-digits
The development strategy introduced by Marchon a couple of years ago is paying off – the group closed 2011 with double-digit growth on turnover. Claudio Gottardi, chairman and CEO, made the announcement at Mido, but true to the group's tradition, he gave little detail. He went as far as to ...
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Italian eyewear firms sell 8.2% more
Sales by Italyian producers of optical goods rose by 8.2 percent in 2011 to €2.650 billion thanks to a 10.9 percent increase in exports to €2.451 billion. Exports represent about 90 percent of the country's production of prescription frames, sunglasses and lenses and have topped the pre-crisis peak reached in ...
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The 2011 optical market rose by 1.9% in main eurozone countries
Retail sales of optical products rose by 1.9 percent to €15.2 billion last year in the eurozone's four main economies, Germany, France, Italy and Spain, according to estimates released by the research group GFK. The region's growth was driven by a 4.5 percent increase to €4.8 billion in Germany. The ...
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Opticians are urged to sell more sunglasses
Retail sales of sunglasses declined in Italy and Spain last year, but they generally performed better than prescription frames and other types of optical products, according to research conducted by Strategy With Vision (SWV) for the European Sunglass Association. The situation was much better in France and Germany, and slightly ...
