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NEW YORK—Cohen’s Fashion Optical’s story is based on 90 years of history. Founded by Jack Cohen in 1927, the store started as a small pushcart business, selling ready-made glasses to New York City’s Orchard street merchants.

As the demand for eyeglasses grew, the family outgrew the pushcart business and went on to open their first retail optical shop on the corner of Orchard and Delancey streets, on the Lower East Side. After Jack Cohen decided that eyewear should also be fashionable, the company began hand-dying the eyeglass frames in different colors and according to the company, Cohen’s then became the first optical retailer to sell fashion eyewear in New York City.

Ninety years and over 100 stores later, Cohen’s has remained true to its philosophy while also catering to all generations of eyeglass wearers. “Different age groups respond to marketing messages differently,” stated the company’s chief marketing officer, Sheila Haile. “We tailor the message and the medium to the audience. Everyone brings a different set of expectations to their interaction with the brand, so we focus on meeting the expectations of each audience first, then focus on where and how a particular audience prefers their messaging.”

In keeping up with the Millennial generation of buyers, Cohen’s remodeled its original Lower East Side store in May of 2016. Adding a new façade, custom fixtures, lighting, tables, displays and furnishings, the Orchard and Delancey location created an environment that encouraged interaction with product.

To mark the event, the reopening of the store was accompanied by an in-house collection—The Collective—inspired by Cohen’s very first frame and designed for young adults, college students and emerging professionals in need of prescription eyewear.

Cohen’s Fashion Optical has also made charity a part of their story. In December of 2016, the company worked with iHeart Radio on a social activation campaign that included a booth at the iHeart Radio Gift Giving event at One World Trade Center. The campaign included a custom snapchat filter, blog posts social media ads, as well as custom radio spots. The company also donated gifts to the Bristol-Myers Squibb Children’s Hospital at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Jersey.