As most of you know, I wear glasses -- even though I forget them more often than not. I don't have a reliable case for my glasses and only had a single pair, so unless I planned to keep them on my face at all times, it was kind of a bad idea to casually drag them with me places. To make matters worse, my health insurance only covers a single pair of glasses every ten years. Which means between the day I get my glasses and the ten years after that I damned well better be really careful with them.
To make matters worse, the frames covered by my insurance are inexcusable to anyone who does not live in a TARDIS. We're talking throw-backs not from the 90's, but the 80's. Thick round things in shades of taupe and faux animal horn. I could probably get away with wearing them, since I'm rather well known for my not giving a shit, but I shouldn't have to. Besides looking hideous, they're also heavy. With my tiny nose, heavy glasses just won't work as they'll simply slide right off my face.
Luckily the last time I went to the optometrist, the guy was super nice and gave me an employee discount so that I could get these frames:
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| Nothing fancy. |
Rather than these frames:
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| What the fuck? |
And they still cost me about $150 out of pocket. That's with just a regular lens and no fancy coatings such as scratch-resistant or anti-glare. So you can perhaps comprehend why I don't want to take them on vacation with me. If I forget them, or drop them off of a boat, I don't really have the cash to replace them. That's when a friend of mine suggested I look into a website she had heard about through an acquaintance.
Zenni Optical.
Now, I was extremely hesitant about this service at first because you could allegedly buy a pair of glasses for $6. If that doesn't make you skeptical in this day and age, you might have something wrong with you. So I hesitated for a while and then couldn't get my optometrist from back East to give me my prescription, so I hesitated a while more. Then I finally just went and got my prescription renewed out here and went ahead and bit the bullet.
I chose frames on the cheap end, just in case I was about to get screwed out of my money, and input my information. My total, with anti-glare coating, came out to be under $15 which also included shipping. I fully expected that at this juncture, I would pay them and then never hear from the company again. Which wouldn't have been a huge loss. I paid by credit card and could easily reverse the charges if I had to. It isn't rocket science.
About twelve days later however my package arrived. In it my new glasses, a cleaning cloth, and a case. Not bad considering I paid less than I would for a fast food meal. The glasses look nice, certainly like I paid more than $6 for the frames, and seem hardy enough. The anti-glare coating actually makes them easier to see with than the pair I paid $150 for. All in all, this is a website that I will be using again and would recommend to any of you who wear glasses.
As for the shopping experience, the hardest part (aside from picking which frames I wanted as there is quite a wide selection) was deciphering my eye prescription and measuring my own PD -- which is the distance between your pupils measured from the center of each. The prescription I decoded with help from Wikipedia and the PD was easily handled since the website itself has a guide to assist you in getting an accurate measurement. Even so I was still a little nervous, mostly about my prescription being entered incorrectly, but when the glasses arrived I could see out of them perfectly, so Wikipedia must've managed to explain it all well enough.
In summary: Zenni Optical is an easy to use website with fantastic selection and pricing. There's really no reason not to order from them if you wear glasses. If you've ordered from Zenni Optical yourself, whether due to this review or on your own, I'd love to hear about your experience.
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