EB Web Exclusive
Thought Leadership >> A U.S. Expansion in Sight

In the Thought Leadership column of EB’s May 2021 issue, New Look Vision Group president and CEO Antoine Amiel sits down with EB’s Erinn Morgan to discuss the history of the company, its plans for the future, and more.
 
Here in our EB Web Exclusive, we share more from Amiel on his background in optical, how New Look Vision pivoted during Covid-19, and its innovative strategies to advance the field of optometry.

You joined New Look in 2012 and became president and CEO in 2015. What is your own background in the business and eyecare/eyewear arena?
Antoine Amiel: I actually have an extensive optical background. My first job was with Varilux corporation in Florida working for Mike Daley. I don’t think one could have wished for a better mentor at the outset of an optical career. I am forever grateful for the time with Mike.
 
After that, I moved to Asia for about 15 years, working for Nikon corporation. Everything Nikon makes has a lens inside, so it’s really a lens company. It’s really an optical company at heart.
 
How has New Look Vision pivoted during the Covid crisis to protect its patients and staff, survive, and even thrive by recognizing the opportunities for change?
Amiel: Covid, for us, was a reaction, and we went about it with three principles. The first one was participation, so we closed 90% of the stores very quickly and sent our store staff home, shuttered the factory, and moved all offices to remote work within 10 days. That was really to participate in the effort to the community to stem the spread of the virus.
 
The second was protection. We protected our employees financially. We topped up any government program that became available. We also moved to protect the company, so we went into cash conservation and opening a discussion with our lenders.
 
The third was responsibility. We really felt as eyecare professionals that we had a duty to the community to keep an access to eye care and eyewear for those in emergency situations, so we kept about 10% of the stores open. We launched a program we called “Guardian Angel.” Our pledge was to replace any broken eyewear for any frontline health care worker in 24 hours. If they didn’t have insurance coverage, we would cover the cost. From mid-March to mid-May, we replaced about 5,000 pairs. Medical personnel were in very high demand, and it’s obviously a job that’s difficult to do without proper sight.
 
That was the first part. Then, when we felt we had organized the company and were supporting the community, we turned around and started to imagine what restart would look like—then started to work on it. We had, for a while, prior to Covid, this idea that operating by appointment would probably be an interesting option. Therefore, we went with that. We designed, like everybody else, all-encompassing health and safety protocols. Then we rehearsed in stores. Every store rehearsed before reopening. We were ready to reopen essentially the first day it was allowed. Because we had rehearsed and because we had understood that productivity, especially in the clinic, would be lower, we had weeks and weeks to practice and finetune. So, we reopened with a fairly decent productivity—or a small productivity loss from pre-Covid. 
 
How is New Look Vision supporting and growing the vision care and eyewear markets with innovation for the future?
Amiel: I think the answer to that question must reflect our commitment to optometry. We’re very keen supporters and investors in everything that is doctor centric. For example, we pioneered tele-optometry in Canada. Tele-optometry is now part of the regular operation for us. We invested, quite significantly, in an EMR system which is completely integrated into the retail system, which is groundbreaking. We’re investing quite a bit in innovative research together with colleges and universities. We are very much involved in AI applied to medical imagery—basically, helping diagnoses based on digital images. We also have contributed to neuro-optometry and all of the branches under that, through the colleges.
 
Also, the face scan is actually a great support for optometry because it’s timesaving, and the integration of that into the pretest is something that started from a retail objective. Because it is integrated into the journey, which includes the clinic, it’s a major contributor to that. It’s really the spirit of the company, which is doctor centric. All of our endeavors, one way or another, translates into expanding the eyecare market.