Today, 25% of Russian residents suffer from visual impairment, and the rapidly growing computerization of the country gives reason to believe that this figure will only increase. In such realities, the most favorable conditions are created for the development of the optical industry.
In addition, now glasses are not only a correction tool, but also an attribute of style, which means that there is no doubt that the products offered will be in demand. How to open an optics salon? How much does it cost? How to establish trade and bring the business to the level of good income? Read about all this in the article.
Legal base
Theoretically, you can open a salon, being in the status of an individual entrepreneur. However, practice shows that you should start by registering as a legal entity (LLC), because, most likely, you will need a license. Optics cannot work without it. There is an exception: if you are just going to sell ready-made glasses, you do not need a license. But then the circle of customers will be quite narrow, respectively, do not expect good profits.
If you want to offer customers corrective glasses and lenses that match the doctor’s prescription, you will need to equip a special cabinet (workshop) for the manufacture of glasses and, of course, purchase a license to engage in medical activities.
Its design will require numerous permits. These are constituent and registration papers, sanitary and epidemiological conclusion, documents for equipment and premises, documents confirming the qualifications of optometrists and so on.
Yes, the list is scary. In this regard, many aspiring entrepreneurs, who do not fully know the information on how to open Optics, begin to think about the services of legal agencies, which, incidentally, are not cheap. Although in fact, you can assemble a package of documents yourself in three to four weeks. In this case, you will only pay government fees.
Choice of premises
As you know, finding a suitable room should be even before you engage in obtaining a license. And where to open the optics salon? Here, too, it all depends on the range of services that you plan to provide. Experts recommend placing such objects in shopping centers, in the immediate vicinity of large shops, in the central city streets.
If diagnostic services are not included in the business plan, an optics salon can have an area of 40 square meters - this is quite enough, because you can provide a fairly wide assortment of goods within a relatively small space, while storage facilities are not required.
It’s a completely different matter if you conceived immediately to position yourself as a large salon offering services for the diagnosis of vision and making glasses to order. In this case, you can not do without additional territories. According to GOST, only a diagnostic room should have an area of at least 18 square meters. But it will still be necessary to equip the premises for the workshop. Moreover, all facilities must meet sanitary standards and requirements. fire supervision.
Before you open the "Optics", you need to properly arrange the room. Design should be thought out in advance.An abundance of light, a stylish interior, good shop windows - all this creates the atmosphere of a professional salon.
Difficulties should not scare
Many businessmen thinking about how to open Optics ultimately abandon this venture, fearing difficulties. And in vain! Most entrepreneurs, who nevertheless implement their plans, eventually gain a foothold in the professional optics market and open entire chains of stores, where, in addition to directly selling corrective vision tools, diagnostic services are also provided and orders for the manufacture of optical devices are accepted. Moreover, the production itself is usually taken out to one of the peripheral branches, where the cost of renting a room is lower.
Assortment formation
How to open an optics store, you already learned. No less significant is the question of which models of vision-correcting devices to sell in it. Here, everything again depends on the format chosen by you. When focusing on middle-class consumers, it is necessary to form the most extensive assortment, which allows satisfying the needs of people with different incomes. In addition to corrective glasses, contact lenses, sunglasses, eyeglass cases, eye-developing exercise equipment, chains and other accessories should also be sold.
Separately, it must be said about sunglasses, because their presence in the range allows you to significantly increase profits. Such optical devices can be put on display in February, because already in March, the sun begins to shine brightly, and peak demand for glasses is reached in April.
Equipment for Optics
The diagnostic room must be equipped with at least the most necessary devices: an ophthalmoscope, a keratometer refractometer, a sign projector, and a slit lamp. You will also need a set of test lenses and more.
On average, such equipment for Optics will require costs of 350 thousand rubles or more. A professional line for assembling glasses, including devices for drilling and painting plastic lenses, lens processing machines, a diopter, an ultrasonic cleaner, a centralizer, etc., will cost between 1.2 and 1.8 million rubles.
Staff
In the salon where diagnostic services are carried out, a competent ophthalmologist who can give recommendations on eye care and the selection of corrective instruments should conduct an appointment. Ideally, this specialist should also be a contact specialist in order to be able to write out contact lenses. As a rule, two doctors work in shifts at Optics.
In the room where optical instruments are sold, experienced sales consultants should be present. Their task is to help customers choose a frame for glasses, a brand of lenses, as well as advise on any other issues. Therefore, such workers are required to know everything about glass and plastic lenses from a wide variety of manufacturers.
The salon also needs a director. He must have a professional pharmaceutical education, experience in the specialty, an accreditation certificate.
If the store will have two doctors, two sales assistants and a director, then the cost of labor per month will be at least 150 thousand rubles. About forty percent of this amount will have to be paid to the state budget as tax deductions and payments to various funds.
Points collector
Among the employees, we did not include the master, who is engaged in the manufacture of prescription glasses. In a professional salon, of course, you can’t do without it. How qualified a specialist you require will depend on the quality of the equipment.
So, if you have a modern semi-automatic or fully automatic lens turning machine in your arsenal, the skill of the master may be low, a person who is interested in technology and is able to make something with his own hands will cope (with minimal training). If the salon has only a cheap manual machine, then to work on it you will need a highly skilled craftsman, which is now very difficult to find.
Activities with children
Want to increase your income? Then open an office in the optics salon, where classes with children with vision problems will be carried out.In every city, unfortunately, there are many children with astigmatism, myopia and other pathologies. But you can help them not only surgically, but also with the help of special sets of exercises.
Modern treatment programs allow you to train eye muscles and slow the loss of vision in babies, get rid of strabismus. Parents are ready to pay any amount for this opportunity, and queues are arranged in such rooms. You will need a separate room, some equipment, but not as expensive as for the diagnosis and assembly of glasses, and one or two nurses in the state.
Finally
So, the question of how to open “Optics, today sounds very relevant. The domestic market in this segment is not yet full, as a result of which the trade in optical devices, correcting eyesight, their manufacture according to a prescription, as well as carrying out diagnostic measures, can be called a promising type of business. If you first understand all the intricacies of the case, choose the trading format correctly, overcome all the initial difficulties, then you will surely become the owner of a profitable optics salon, and possibly even a few. Good luck
