It came to my attention some time ago that one can by ridiculously cheap prescription glasses on the internets, and I finally had a chance to try it out.

Some brief background: both Pete and I have always paid out of pocket for glasses and contacts.  I mostly wear contacts, and have a pair of backup glasses whose horrendously out-of-date prescription means I almost never wear them; I paid $300+ for them something like five years ago.  Pete has an equally expensive pair of glasses that he wears full-time, plus an old pair reserved for frisbee and similarly vigorous activities.  The anti-reflective coating started going bad on the lenses only a year or two after he bought them (and, of course, immediately after the warranty ran out); we went to Lenscrafters to get the lenses replaced, and even without the anti-reflective coating and super-light lenses and whatnot the replacements still cost over $200.

Our supplementary insurance here covers most of the cost of our eye exams, plus $100 off contacts and new glasses every two years.  I made appointments at a downtown optometrist who came recommended by a friend, found out what we’d need to order glasses online, read up on our insurance info, and ran some numbers on contact lens prices.

In Store:

My optometrist was indeed really nice.  Pity everybody else working at the store was a pain in the ass.

I went in to our local eyeglass boutique knowing that I’d buy contacts there if their price, minus the $100 I’d get back from insurance, was comparable to what I could find them for online.  Pete likes his current frames, and since he wears them full-time we figured it’d also be worth replacing the lenses there if they’d give us a reasonable price on them.

As soon as I was done with my exam, I started getting hassled by one of the sales associates to hurry up and buy some contacts.  Pete was still having his exam, and I told her I wanted to wait until he was back so we could both fill out the insurance claims together; she told me this was unnecessary, since it didn’t matter.  (And this wasn’t true: I’m on his insurance plan, so I do need his student ID number and stuff to fill out forms.  Also, we do get money back from our insurance on the exam, so telling me that I didn’t need to submit a claim was blatantly false.)  My gentle but persistent refusal meant that I got to spend an awkward 15 minutes in the corner of the store while Pete finished up, but I did have some time to eventually figure out that buying contacts from them, plus the insurance rebate, would cost just about the same as ordering them online.

When Pete came back from his exam, he was quoted a price of $180 for replacement lenses, scratch-proofing and anti-reflective coating included. Pete asked whether he could get them without the AR coating, but was told no, “they only come together–no way to separate them, see?”  That seemed steep, so he just asked for a copy of his prescription and PD measurement instead.  This was when it things got really confusing: the male sales associate got upset and started shouting that they’d charge us $40 to write out the PD, and at some point they decided that he could get lenses minus the AR coating, and the price magically dropped to $120.  This seemed like an okay price, particularly considering that we didn’t know how the cheap internet glasses would turn out, so we paid for the contacts and replacement lenses, making sure that we left with all of our insurance forms filled out.  Of course, neither the contacts nor lenses were in stock, so we left with a bad taste in our mouths and the knowledge we’d need to wait a few weeks and then go back.  (And, of course, it turns out that Pete’s $120 lenses do have the apparently controversial AR coating on them after all… thanks?)

Online:

You can find a good starting point for online glasses stuff at Glassy Eyes, including ordering basics and store reviews.  After browsing through a bunch of reviews, I decided I wanted to try out Zenni Optical.  The rough consensus seems to be that the quality of their outrageously cheap ($8 and up) glasses is comparable to that of other stores, but communication and customer service is spotty.  I decided it was worth the risk–compared to the $400 we’d spent on glasses in the past, ordering a few pairs for under $100 was a minimal investment.

As it turned out, the temperamental employees at the optometrist did give us a difficult-to-decipher handwritten copy of both of our glasses prescriptions, which was decoded with help from Google.  We did not have our PD measurements, but I wasn’t inclined to call the office back up and argue with them; you can measure it yourself, which we did using some post-its.  I measured my current pair of glasses to get an idea of their dimensions, then we both spent a lot of time idly scrolling through Zenni’s huge archive of frames.

Granted, you can’t try glasses on beforehand when you order them online, so there’s always an element of surprise. But what’s so great is that, when your glasses only cost $10, you can take a lot more risks with them than you would with a $400 pair.  My attitude towards glasses subtly changed sometime during grad school, when I taught for an excruciatingly fashionable professor who had a pair of glasses with amazing yellow and brown art deco swirls extending all the way up the legs.  “Wow, I like your glasses,” somebody commented at the first TA meeting.  “Thanks.  Aren’t they wonderfully obnoxious?” she replied placidly.  And obnoxiousness is something that, it turns out, I do prize in my eyewear.

Pete and I eventually ended up ordering six pairs of glasses: two normal and tinted pair of sunglasses for Pete; three pairs for me.  The total cost, including shipping, was $120 USD, and I should note that one of those pairs was a $40 rimless titanium pair for Pete that cost a whopping $40.  They arrived on my doorstep, fresh from China, less than two weeks after I placed the order, and the customs form was filled out in such a way that I didn’t even owe the delivery guy any money for duty.  Score!

The verdict?  So much easier, so much cheaper, and so much more fun than shopping in person.  All of the prescriptions seem accurate and all of the frames and lenses were in great condition upon receipt.  Articles like this one tout the personal assistance that your friendly!  experienced!  knowledgeable!  optical store can provide, but given my own experience, I’m (cough) overjoyed to leave that particular brand of hospitality behind me.

Careful readers will note that this is only four pairs of glasses, not six, but Pete has his new rimless pair and sunglasses with him at work.  L to R: Zenni 4619, 3851, 2276, & 4406.

I want to order more, but I think that future purchases are going to come out of my monthly frivolity budget.  And how cool is it, really, that I can now qualify glasses as an impulse buy?

This entry was posted on Friday, April 24th, 2009 at 11:15 am and is filed under bits. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.