TSO Network Update - August 2018

Vol. 7, Issue 8 August 2018 Our Zeiss agreement just got better! Without prompting from our vendor relations committee, Zeiss has sweetened the pot with additional rebates to our already outstanding lab agreement. It seems that all but a few of our shareholder offices have committed their lab business to Zeiss and Zeiss is very content with this increase in business. The Zeiss reps will be going to our offices to explain the additional rebates that will result in more dollars going to our bottom line. Not only are the lab rebates and pricing outstanding, but the additional dollars and newly negotiated Zeiss Meditech agreement makes equipment purchases a lot more affordable. As in FREE, or almost free. For the few offices that have not taken advantage of this great opportunity, please ask your fellow OD’s how beneficial and easy the transition to Zeiss has been. This has shown the buying power we have as a group. We would like to form this type of partnership with our frame vendors. Our struggle with negotiating frame prices is the Chairman’s CORNER - Benny Peña, OD Partnerships inability to promise a specific volume to our vendors. We can explain how many offices we have and our combined total annual sales; but fall short on a committed number of pieces. We have discussed the thought of board management for a portion of all our opticals. On average, offices have 1000 frames on their boards. If we take a good look at our boards, we would notice that a majority of the product is similar. If we could all agree to allow 200-300 spots to be managed by one vendor, we could negotiate higher margins for these frames. It could allow us to form a partnership where everybody wins. As the Zeiss agreement has shown, our buying power grows exponentially when we fully commit to the vendor. It’s a great partnership when everybody gets what they want. Zeiss increases their sales, so we get better pricing. Lets us know your thoughts. The board of directors is looking forward making all our offices more profitable.