Eyecare Business connects with Hayley Martin, owner of Once Upon a Charm Eyewear, for The Inside View—a video series dedicated to exploring overarching conversations taking place across the eyecare industry. Here, she discusses strategies to help kids love their frames so they'll actually wear them.
The transcript below has been lightly edited for clarity.
Hi, my name is Hayley Martin. I'm the founder and owner of a children's eyewear line called Once Upon a Charm Eyewear.
Eyecare Business: What is the connection between kids loving their glasses and wearing them?
Hayley Martin: Well, first of all, I just want to say I love that you've even asked me that question because it really is so important for a child to love their glasses in order for us as parents to get them to wear their glasses. Early in the process of our design, we did a lot of market research and a lot of focus groups, and that is what we heard over and over and over again: just how hard it is to get kids to wear their glasses. I mean, we heard crazy stories of parents checking in with teachers at the end of the school year and the teacher having no idea that the child was actually a glasses wearer. So essentially the child would get into the car wearing their glasses and somehow between getting out of the car and getting into the classroom, those glasses would quietly come off and get tucked into the backpack, and then a whole year of learning was done without the glasses, which obviously we don't want.
So that connection is super key and critical. And I think it can be done in a couple different ways. One, we want to make sure a child feels emotionally connected to their glasses. A big way of doing that is color. Children between the ages of between, let's say, about 3 years of age and 9 or 10 are fiercely loyal to their favorite colors. They’re team pink, team purple, team green, team blue, and they're adamant about their favorite color. So that is one way to get them feeling emotionally connected to their glasses is the color of the frames themselves. Another way is something unique about the glasses, something that speaks to them as children. Maybe you've got a sparkly little one in the family and having some sparkle on the acetate might do well.
Our brand decided to go a slightly different route. We created a charm attachment system with these little interchangeable charms that snap in and out of the frame very easily. All of the charms reflect imagery that children are naturally drawn to: think fairies and rainbows and mermaids and unicorns. The idea really is—whether it's through a charm or some sort of cute logo or design on the temples, something that the child connects with, feels excited about, that emotionally resonates with them—that is key to getting them to not just tolerate wearing glasses, but actually really enjoy wearing them.
EB: How can practice involve children in the frame selection process while also helping parents make practical decisions?
HM: There are 3 stakeholders in that room when a frame is being chosen. One, as an ECP, you're primarily concerned about fit as well as whether or not a prescription will do well in a particular frame, whereas a parent is more considering durability and in some cases value. The child, though, is concerned about none of those things. They are primarily thinking about aesthetics, right? They're looking at the frame thinking, "Are these cute? Are they going to look good on me? Are my friends going to like them? Are my friends going to tease me for wearing them?" Unfortunately, teasing still happens, so that's sort of at the front and center of a child's mind, and the idea of trying to really engage the child as an ECP and make them feel like they're involved in the decision-making process, make them feel like they have some agency, can go a long way in terms of them accepting the glasses that they choose and really being excited about wearing them.
A couple of things that can be done to accomplish that. One is go back to color. You may want to ask them what their favorite color is, and that will help kind of narrow down the board in terms of the frames that are proposed as solutions. Secondly, and this won't add a ton of time to the appointment, we're talking about 1 or 2 minutes, but ask the child what they like to do outside of school. Do they like to play soccer? Are they into flag football? Are they into gymnastics or ballet? Not that this is going to have a huge bearing on the frame selection, but it really does give the child this sense that they're involved in the process, that you're getting to know them as a little person, and that they have some agency in terms of the frames that are being chosen for them.
EB: What are some simple ways practices can make frame selection feel less clinical?
HM: What I'm seeing a lot of practices do today, which I really love, is printing out an 8 and a half by 11 piece of card stock that says something like, "My first frames," or, "My new frames," and encouraging parents to take a photo with the child holding the card stock paper. And I love this for so many reasons. We document our children's lives, everything from their first steps to their first tooth being lost, their first day of kindergarten, the first time they ride a bike. I mean, all of these are moments that we celebrate, right? Introducing the frame selection process, whether it's the child's first frame or their fifth frame as sort of a mini moment of celebration, I think, really goes a long way in making the whole experience feel less clinical and more memorable.
EB: What trends are you seeing in children’s eyewear today and where do you think the category is headed?
HM: I'm really loving seeing what's happening in the industry today. I think with more and more kiddos being diagnosed with myopia, unfortunately, we're seeing more children in frames. When my child first started kindergarten, for example, she was 1 of 2 children wearing glasses, and at the end of grade 2, she's now 1 of 7. So we're seeing more and more children coming to school with glasses. The idea of the industry recognizing and seeing pediatric eyewear as its own distinct category is something that's really exciting for me. I think there's a lot of great work being done by brands in terms of anatomical fit. I think in the past there's been this inclination to simply scale down adult eyewear into smaller sizes for children. But I'm really starting to see the industry veer away from that and think more about what a child would wear, what a child would love, and what a child would emotionally resonate with. I think that goes a long way with helping a child feel comfortable in their glasses.
For example, right now, a trend in the eyewear industry for adults is large, bold, eccentric, unique eyewear frames. That's not necessarily what the average child wants, right? They don't want to be going into a classroom and the first thing their classmates see is their glasses, right? They want something a little bit less obtrusive, something a little bit more them. So I love that the industry in general is starting to really see children as their own distinct category and design with a child-centric, child-first approach.
Read more about Once Upon a Charm frames here.
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