HANDS ON - Eye on Equipment
Tackling Myths
by Susan P. Tarrant

Every day, reps for edging manufacturers head out into the optical landscape to talk to ECPs about why it makes sense for them to do their own lens edging instead of sending everything out to a wholesale lab. Many are open to the possibility, while others remain reluctant. Why?

"They're not bringing it in, either because of that myth that they heard and believe, or because they just haven't seen a cost analysis of what in-house equipment can save them on their wholesale lab bills," says Jay Cohen, director of professional sales for Gerber Cohen.

So what myths still exist among ECPs regarding in-office edging equipment and the viability of it working for their offices?

THE TRUTH: You can do as few as three to five jobs a day and still have in-house edging make sense. The more jobs you do, the more savings you'll reap, obviously.

But getting to the point where the equipment pays for itself with impressive savings left over can happen at well under 10 jobs per day [see sidebar, page 32].

"All equipment vendors will work with the ECP to determine their individual savings potential," says Lisa Smith, national sales manager for National Optronics. "In some cases, it's several thousand dollars per year. But in many cases, it's tens of thousands of dollars. That's when we see the wheels turning in ECPs' heads."

By paying a lab to do everything for them, ECPs are "spending a fortune, and it's going in someone else's pockets," says Cohen.

Plus, being able to turn lenses around in the same or next day will help increase business, as it allows ECPs to recapture those Rxs that "walk" to the nearest one-hour shop.

MYTH: IT ADDS HASSLES

THE TRUTH: The truth is that modern equipment is easy to operate and allows the operator to do other tasks while they are cutting lenses.

A complete lens job, from spotting on the lensometer to blocking to edging and insertion, takes about 10 minutes, estimates Thomas Fefer, ABOC, FNAO, western U.S. sales manager for Santinelli International. For an office that averages five lens jobs a day, that's still less than one- hour's worth of work.

"Plus, it's a stop-and-go process," Fefer adds. "You can do a job, or even part of a job, stop, tend to something else, then come back to the equipment later."

"A lot of people still have a picture of an old, pattern edger in mind with they think in-house edging," says Cohen.

That laborious machine, he reminds us, has given way to the modern patternless edger that "does everything for you, including drilling. And while this is going on, you can be doing something else."

THE TRUTH: "The purchase of an edger is all the employee you need," states Fefer.

He explains that it's not until an office reaches 20 jobs a day that an extra worker needs to be hired. Even then, he adds, the addition will not break the budget. The savings realized by the practice is more than enough to pay that new person.

For years now, equipment vendors have strived to make their machines easy to operate with very little hand-holding needed from the operator, as well as quick and efficient to run.

The result is that ECPs can dedicate an existing staff person (or themselves) to run the equipment in addition to other duties.

"Most [equipment] companies can even train people who don't have a lot of optical experience," says Smith. "It's a matter of taking service to a higher level."

And with only 10 minutes needed per job, the equipment operator is free to spend most of his or her time running the dispensary, being the optician, working the front desk, or examining patients.

MYTH: NOT ENOUGH SPACE

THE TRUTH: "We had a guy set up his edger in a closet," says Fefer. While that may be an extreme case, it disproves the myth of an in-house lab necessitating a 20x20-foot space.

"Technology has allowed us to make more compact and smaller footprints," Fefer says.

Many edgers are all-in-one units that need little more than a one-foot square space. Any portion of a back room will do, as long as there's electricity and room for the operator to keep a job tray next to the machine.

Another space-related myth is that the equipment is too messy and noisy for an office. Not so, say our experts. While most edgers introduce water during cutting, it is recirculated through an attached tank that only needs emptying at the end of the day.

Some people like the fact that patients can hear the machine. Notes says Bret Davis, president of Briot-Weco USA. "The patients will ask, 'What's that noise?' It's a way for practitioners to start a conversation about what they're doing to keep quality control in-house and the steps they're taking to provide better customer service."