Vision Council: Eye wear, contact lens purchases reach highest rate in 2 years
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New data from The Vision Council’s Consumer InSights and Market inSights reports show that the optical industry continues to grow, with rising in-person purchases for eye wear and contact lenses in the first quarter of 2024.
“Consumers are returning to their usual seasonal habits, like buying prescription products at the start of the year, likely due to available managed vision care benefits or FSA/HSA funds,” Alysse Henkel, the council’s vice president of data and inSights, said in a Vision Council press release. “This increased spending and the higher number of exams conducted this past quarter have led to an improvement in the annual total market value forecast, shifting from an anticipated 0.33% decline to a 0.68% increase.”
In a survey of 12,063 U.S. adults, respondents were asked about vision correction, managed vision care, eye exams, prescription eye wear, reading glasses and plano glasses.
According to the report, in-person purchases for eye wear and contact lenses reached their highest rate in the past 2 years, with the online purchase rate for glasses dropping from 16% throughout 2023 to 14%.
In addition, the contact lens market continues its growth with a valuation of $3.14 billion, with 78% of contact lens users making a purchase within the past year. Nearly 30 million patients received a comprehensive eye exam, and approximately 79% of those patients use some form of vision correction.
The report also noted that more than 20 million pairs of lenses and more than 17 million pairs of frames were sold, as well as 51 million pairs of readers, with 52% of consumers purchasing multiple pairs of readers. The market value of plano sunglasses exceeded $3.6 billion — more than half of respondents (58%) wear them.
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