While planning the theme for this blog post, I was reminded of the time my father told me to never throw out my double-breasted suit coat. He said that styles are like the wheel on a car, sometimes the style is on top and yet the wheel keeps rolling and it gets crushed on the bottom. AND THEN…it comes back again!
While it might sound odd, I have been a student of frame merchandising ever since I entered the business in 1975. In those days, there were three basic styles of display. Glass shelves inside a wooden cabinet, a reversible “flip” display wall cabinet with plastic trays from B&L and homemade wooden boxes with fish line to hang glasses. Merchandising in those days took a major backseat to the professional services. Very little space was allocated to the sale of eyewear and in those cases, the practitioner might simply have a cabinet with numerous drawers and frames inside. It is important to remember that this timeframe was “just before” the first designer eyewear was introduced. Styles, colors and trims were all very limited and frames were sold through distributors (labs) vs. direct like they are today.
I bring this all up because frame display began to change very dramatically in the early 1980’s. While “wooden box style” displays were most common until then, the introduction of acrylic rod displays cut the overall cost of display and removed many of the “dimensional” constraints associated with fixed size units. The use of glass shelves, drawers, and fixed sized units changed, but remember that the wheel is always rolling!
In recent years there has been a return to some of the original styles of display. Some of the changes are attributable to a change in the desired presentation or interaction with the client and some are related to a desire to reduce inventory and create a more boutique experience. The first change we might discuss was made possible by the introduction of LED strip lighting. Shelving can create a boutique look and at the same time can reduce your inventory since you cannot get as many frames vertically due to the spacing requirements of the shelf units and the clearances needed for illumination and frame retrieval. The second change is more related to presentation. I was always intrigued by the sales approach in Europe where the client was assessed and then the dispenser would bring trays of frames to them based on facial shape, pricing, colors or other identified patient desires. The rest of the space could be framed almost as “museum like” while the sales approach was very specific.
So many of the domestic retailers still feel they need a fairly large selection of frames. This has led to a combination approach to display. While illuminated shelving creates the “image”, the remainder of the display unit might require either visible or hidden frame trays to hold the extra inventory not shown on the shelving units. In addition, the desired frame count might also require some more vertically oriented frame display as well as possible security devices for both the vertical and horizontally merchandised items.
No matter which merchandising and sales approach you take, the companies that are focused specifically on optical merchandising can assist you to achieve your goals. Don’t throw out those old displays…they are coming back some day!
