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Frame Buyers Courses

Maximize your Dispensary's Revenue Potential with the Frame Buyer's Certificate Program

The Vision Council's Eyewear & Accessories Division and Eyecare Business are proud to partner to sponsor the Frame Buyer's Certificate Program at International Vision Expo. The  certificate program offers 18 hours of continuing education designed to maximize your dispensary's revenue potential. When you participate in eight or more hours of Inventory Management courses, you will receive a Frame Buyer's Certificate.   

Attendees of Frame Buyer's Certificate Program courses learn to select, manage, monitor, promote and benchmark frame inventory and gain the core business and financial skills needed to be an effective buyer. The skills and knowledge gained in these courses are invaluable to frame buyers and can be implemented in a dispensary immediately.

To obtain your certificate you must complete a minimum of eight hours of the designated Inventory Management courses.  Hours can be combined from year to year.  Courses include:

The Power and Profits in Sports Performance Sunwear
Sunwear, both plano and prescription, provide eye care professionals one of the best opportunities for revenue enhancement. There is increasing awareness on the part of consumers that the protection and performance enhancement offered by sunwear are a good investment. How can you be part of this growing market? Many of the popular technologies available remain a mystery to eye care professionals. Learn to embrace the rewards offered by these products and take your office to the next level!

How to Create & Implement A Successful Frame Buying Strategy: For Beginners
Learn practical strategies to successfully manage the frame inventory of an optical establishment. Topics covered will include: managing your inventory for profit, understanding your customer, categories of branded eyewear, establishing inventory levels and percentages, working with vendors, controlling impulse purchasing, establishing a budget, selecting and utilizing a computerized inventory system, understanding the value difference in frames, how frames are fabricated and more. This course will be a lecture format that will feature group activities to assist you in the learning process.

Merchandising Magic
Many of the three O's don't take a merchandising class along the path of their education. There are certain aspects and elements of merchandising that, if followed, will help spark interest in the practice and the product being offered. We will cover some basic merchandising principles that will help dispensaries and offices attract attention to their products and, in turn, increase their profits.

Retail 101
We will go over the five things you need to know to have a successful and profitable dispensary. You'll gain practical tips for utilizing the following key retail tactics: classifications of business, creating sales plans, inventory turn, merchandising and marketing. You will participate in a sample dispensary activity that will task you with applying the concepts learned to create a viable sales plan.

Want vs. Need: Creating Eyewear Desire
Is eyewear a fashion purchase or a medical device? If you position it as a medical device, your patients will only feel compelled to see you when they have a change in their vision. This could mean years between visits. Fashion, on the other hand, changes seasonally. When you understand how to communicate the fashion and image of eyewear, your customers will actually want to see you more frequently. We will include tips on how to buy and sell eyewear as a fashion item, and help shatter the "one pair does it all" mindset of your patients by introducing them to the eyewear wardrobe concept. Learn how to position eyewear as the must-have fashion accessory that meets the visual and image wants, needs and desires of your patients.

How to Sell Expensive Stuff
Take the anxiety and fear out of presenting top of the line products. Learn what motivates luxury buyers, and how to use that knowledge to increase your eyewear sales. Discover practical tips on buying, merchandising and selling high end products, as well as how to train your staff to be comfortable with them.

New & Now Frame Technology
We will discuss both common and exotic frame materials that are currently on the market. We will cover handling techniques for some of these materials that can be quite unique. Following material discussion, functional characteristics of a frame will assist you to determine whether or not a beautiful frame is a functional frame worthy of your offering.

Managing Your Frame Inventory
Is your current product mix focused on your patients' needs or random, emotional, nonstructural reasoning? Topics will include inventory control, board management, vendor selection/evaluation, returns and reorders. Every member of the office needs to understand how these decisions are made, how they ultimately affect the bottom line and what role they play in maintaining a major profit center.

Tapping Under-Utilized Profit Centers
Are you looking for different ways to increase revenue and improve your bottom line? We will explore the sales of popular-priced sunwear and readers, and how providing these products to your patients can not only improve your bottom line, but also patient satisfaction.

Benchmarking Your Optical Dispensary
Benchmarking is a very powerful business tool that most successful businesses use to identify problem areas in a business/practice. We will explain what benchmarking is, how to do it and why/how it can have a significant positive impact on the bottom line (profitability) of your business/practice. Attend this session and learn how to identify/analyze the key performance indicators (KPIs) of your business/practice, understand if the numbers are good or bad, and then develop a plan to improve the areas of opportunity.

Eyewear Pricing Strategies
Did you ever have a patient get sticker shock when you presented them with the cost of their glasses? I think we all have, and it is no fun when it happens. Do you have a strategy to manage these price and buying objections? If not, this is the course for you. Learn through open discussion why people buy, how to present fees, reduce price objections and buyer's remorse, and increase your patients' understanding of the value of their purchase. Fine-tuning skills in these areas will earn you credibility, reduce stress and confrontations, and help to establish a loyal patient base by meeting and exceeding patient expectations. Discover how attention to detail, bundling fees and preparation can earn you higher patient satisfaction ratings while helping you maintain your sanity and build profits.