The man who found specs appeal on the web
[James Murray Wells] has rattled the high street by offering cheap glasses via the net, says Sarah Ryle
At the age of 21, Jamie Murray Wells can claim to have disturbed the peace of two of the high-street's four dominant players in the spectacles market.
Specs may be prosaic, but, with contact lenses, they are worth £4 billion a year, most of it divided between Boots, Specsavers, Dolland & Aitchison and Vision Express.
Murray Wells, an English graduate, rattled the status quo when he began selling glasses on the internet at prices that he says reflect their actual cost to retailers - about £7. Now he is adding contact lenses to his Glassesdirect website, pledging to undercut the average high street price of £24 for 30 pairs by 50 per cent. He reports 1.5 million visits from customers, of whom 21,500 have bought glasses from him.
Specsavers and Boots led the charge against him, but his foray into this previously quiet corner of retail triggered an unusually personalised attack, which is still playing out...
Murray Wells... said he was 'completely surprised' by the reaction to his internet venture...
He used his contacts (his father is an investment analyst) to carry out market research, found a supplier who would make a prototype pair of glasses, signed up an optician and added a volume supplier. Despite the first supplier pulling out - 'for no good reason', he says - he has set up a 'solid supply stream' and now has 10,000 frames in stock and a 'pile of letters from satisfied customers'.
He is able to do this because consumers have a right to pay £17.50 for their eye test from any optician, who then has to supply a written prescription...
The market will no doubt decide this one. It may be that opticians begin lobbying the government for a revision of the standard eye-test charge. Murray Wells believes that honest pricing would be an improvement on the status quo.