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Vision industry revenue down $46 million
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The total vision care industry generated $40.21 billion in revenue over the last year ending in the third quarter of 2017, which represents a decrease of 0.1%, or $46.1 million, compared to 2016 totals, according to a VisionWatch quarterly market research report.
The report indicates that eyeglasses accounted for the largest share of the vision correction market, at 55.4%, representing $22.29 billion in revenue from September 2016 to September 2017.
An additional 1.3 million U.S. adults started wearing contact lenses in the past year, according to Steve Kodey, senior director of industry research at The Vision Council, in the press release.
This increase in wearers led to a 2% increase in contact lens purchases and a 4.7% increase in contact lens sales revenue.
The independent sector of the optical industry is the largest component of the U.S. vision care industry, generating $18.44 billion in revenue over the past year, according to the report.
The independent side is up 0.7% compared to dollar revenues from a year ago.
Additionally, the group reported that:
- A total of 114.7 million adult eye exams were performed, generating $6.01 million in revenue.
- Americans with managed vision care coverage were more than twice as likely to have had an exam as Americans without coverage.
- Frames sold totaled 74.13 million pairs — a unit decrease of less than 0.4% from the previous year, but with no change in revenue due to a slight (0.4%) increase in average selling prices, generating close to $9.71 billion in sales revenue.