Offering low prices and an original business model for more than 15 years, the business of optician Philippe Rochette, alias the Man with Glasses, is growing.
A few days before Christmas, customers flocked to the headquarters of Bonhomme à spectacles, in a former industrial building in Montreal’s Mile-End.
“It’s a crazy week, people want to look good for parties with family and friends. It’s also a good period after Christmas, because people are talking about their new glasses and we work a lot by word-of-mouth,” said the entrepreneur with shoulder-length, slightly messy hair.
The dozens of drawers in his room are filled with glasses of various materials and colors. After presenting their prescription and communicating their needs to the opticians who listen attentively, customers can try on the pairs suggested to them. They choose their favorite frame without worrying about the price, because it’s the same for all, ie $69, whether it’s a generic brand or a recognized brand. This is a significantly lower price than what can be found in many traditional optician shops. An amount that the Man with glasses has not increased for 15 years.
“People are happy to come back and remember that for the same product bought five or ten years ago, they pay the same price. In a context of inflation, that positions us advantageously,” indicated Mr. Rochette, seated in his office where a poster of the Salon du livre anarchiste de Montréal is pasted.
While citizens are paying more and more attention to their budget and running for discounts, in 2022 Le Bonhomme à spectacles sold a record volume and increased its number of employees to 37. better”, recognizes the one who has adopted the title of community optician.
Savings for all
The idea being at the start to allow the poorest people to afford glasses, Mr. Rochette set his prices 15 years ago by adding $20 to the reimbursement charter provided for social assistance recipients. For example, since the provincial government reimbursed $50 for the frame, the optician decided to charge $69.
Today, however, the vast majority of its customers are not in very precarious situations. “People asked me if they were poor enough to buy from me. Pretty much everyone is poor enough to save $400,” said the businessman.
Note that the Man with Glasses is not a non-profit organization, but a business, even if it donates $10 per pair sold to community organizations. How does he manage not to increase his prices while making a profit and having given away more than a million dollars so far? He goes to frame distributors about six months after the others, he says, in order to buy unsold items from old collections cheaply. “They’d rather sell them to me than throw them away,” explained the man who hires experienced opticians on his team.
In collaboration with a distributor, Mr. Rochette also orders his own collections, i.e. he registers his brands Bullshit, Whatever and My grandmother on generic models.
” Bullshitthat’s what I think of branding. It’s a denunciation of what brands are creating as a price hike,” he said, holding up a transparent plastic frame.
More than thirty popular brands, including Ray-Ban, Oakley and Vogue Eyewear, are owned by the same multinational, EssilorLuxottica, which also owns lens brands, a distribution network and boutiques such as LensCrafters.
Off the beaten track
To also offer affordable lenses, Rochette says he saves on fixed expenses by not having branches. “A beautiful, brand new optician’s office, with an optometry room, costs you a lot of money even before you have sold your first glasses,” says the optician.
Le Bonhomme à spectacles has only one location, that of the Mile-End. His team then visits 65 community organizations in the Montreal, Laval and Longueuil regions every week. It also works with Cree communities in Nord-du-Québec.
Mr. Rochette stresses that accessibility to glasses is a public health problem. “Children go to school because their parents don’t have the money to buy them glasses,” he protested. Although the Régie de l’assurance maladie du Québec pays out $250 every two years for the purchase of glasses for those under 18, the latter often break their glasses before they can order a second pair. “We, for $250, we make three pairs. you have two [de rechange] “, assured the one whose importance of the mission was praised this year in the National Assembly by the former deputy of the Coalition Avenir Québec Richard Campeau.
The community optician deplores the fact that goods and services that meet basic needs are entrusted to private interests. He would like opticians to be rid of the imperative to achieve profits. In the meantime, Mr. Rochette is inspiring other opticians to adopt similar business models. He helped the Marchand de lunette, in Quebec, Mam’zelles lunette, in Estrie, and Madame lunette, in Lac-St-Jean, to start their business.
He points out that it is also possible to find glasses at reduced prices on the Internet, in particular on the Clearly site, as long as you are comfortable with this way of buying. Moreover, a little research on the Web reveals that there are a few other eyewear stores in Quebec where you can bring your prescription and get glasses at prices that seem particularly low.