NEW YORK—The national average for gross revenue at ECP locations decreased last week, April 3 – 9, when compared with the previous week at a rate of -7 index points. That places gross revenue at a level 1 index point below where it was at this point in time (Week 15) when compared with last year (2022), 4 points above the same period in 2021, 99 points above 2020 (when COVID stay-at-home restrictions were in place), and 13 points above 2019, according to Jobson’s most recent Practice Performance Tracker.

All optical sales categories were down last week when compared with the previous week, at rates of -7 index points for gross revenue, -6 index points for exams/refractions, -7 index points for frame units, -7 index points for lens pairs, and -4 index points for contact lenses. When comparing last week’s optical sales with the same period last year, all categories were down with the exception of one, with the highest increase of 1 index point for gross revenue to the greatest decrease of -8 index points for frame units and lens pairs.

The other categories decreased at rates of -4 index points for exams/refractions and -5 index points for contact lenses.

With all optical sales categories decreasing last week, only one of the categories still reached a level at or above an average week in 2019—the index baseline assigned a value of 100 for this Optical Business Tracker. These ranged from a high of 113 index points for gross revenue to a low of 86 index points for contact lenses. The other three categories reached 94 index points for exams/refractions, 99 index points for frame units and 98 index points for lens pairs.

Jobson Optical Research selected 1,500 optical locations that have been operating and reporting their sales to its partners, GPN and ABB Analytics, since 2019. The index has been rebased to an average week in 2019. Going forward, this new index base will be used as an arbitrary benchmark and assigned a value of 100.

Click here to view the complete Jobson COVID-19 Performance Tracker