For many people, glasses are a essential for clear vision, to reduce eye strain, and generally improve the quality of life.

Aside from these important functions, today's eyewear is a required fashion item that can enhance one's appearance. From feminine to sporty to sophisticated to custom-design - optical stores offer what's hot and trendy - for men, women, and teens.

And if one is bored of the way he/she has looked for the past 10 years or so, just changing the colour of your contacts to blue, green, grey or even brown-to-red, can change the way you feel, not to mention how you look - both to others and at others.

Spectacles now offer the chance to get that perfect look.

Market: The UAE market for opticals is a successful and growing segment. It is estimated that around Dh90 to Dh100 million worth of annual business volume is conducted in this sector.

And the average profit margin stands at approximately 30-40 per cent, said Gula Ghaffari, accountant, Dubai Opticals.

The items in opticals stores are almost totally imported from all over the world. Main sources are Italy, France, Germany, the U.S., UK, and Austria.

About 70 per cent of the imported items are consumed locally, and approximately 30 per cent are re-exported, according to the official Dubai statistics. It is estimated that the local market is about Dh100 million and another Dh30 million accounts for re-exports.

Imported items such as contact lenses are consumed locally with hardly anything get re-exported. Whereas almost half of the spectacles lenses made of glass gets re-exported. Frames also have a high level of local consumption, with about 10 per cent of the amount gets re-exported.

Players: Today, there are many choices as to where to get your spectacles from. In the UAE, there are around 300 optical stores spread all over the Emirates. Among them, the major retailers, who have been in this business for a long time, include Grand Optics, Yateem Optician, Dubai Opticals and Al Jaber Opticals. Plus, the branded boutiques sells their own collections of eyewear by themselves such as Bvlgari, Cartier, Giorgio Armani, Channel, Gucci, Christian Dior, and others.

An average store welcomes about 30 consumers daily from all age groups. It offers a large collection of eyewear items including frames, prescription lenses, contact lenses, sunglasses and a variety of eyewear accessories, from up to 50 different international brands, including Carrera, Police, Poucheron, Fendi, Ray ban, Laura Biagiotti, Rarlph Lauren, Safilo, Diesel, Valentino, Burberry, MaxMara, Trussardi, Pierre Cardin, Tommy Hilfiger and lots more.

"We import around 35 million spectacles a year from designer fashions to classic, sporty, and budget frames. Our store assures to offer the perfect look for everybody," said Mathews Jacob, operation manager, Yateem Optician.

"About 60 per cent of the UAE population - around 1.8 million people of the approximately 3 million living here - uses glasses in some form or the other, for either necessity or fashion." added Jacob.

Prices: Prices of opticals varies from one item to the other. They start from around Dh100-Dh300, right up till Dh1,000-Dh2,000. "Prices range depends on the brand, model and the material that it was made of. We have a pair of pure gold glasses which cost around Dh10,000. There is no limit for prices in our business," said Jacob.

The cost of these items goes up and down with every new season. "Prices sometimes fluctuate depending on the fashion. The fashion changes, and models are not constant. Every six months, there are new colours and designs with new prices," added Jacob.

However, Gula Ghaffari says that it is generally a stable market. "Our prices are fixed because they come from our suppliers, so they don't change much. Its almost the same year-to-year," said Ghaffari.

Seasons: Like any other business in the UAE, optical market has busy and low periods.

"During shopping festival is the peak for our business and the beginning of schools also," said Ghaffari. "Summer is a low period (July and August), which is the vacation seasons, so our business drops dramatically during these times," said Jacob.

"We generally keep around 10 per cent from our out turn-over for the advertising and promotions budgets."

Budoor Al Budoor

Articles from the author

Market Watch: Through the looking galss