Could it be that “safety” will be the new “luxury”? How will the consumer define their priorities? What’s the opportunity to “rediscover” the optometrist and the role they play? How are leaders facing what used to be the theoretical and now is the harsh reality—how do they concurrently balance a multitude of critical—and at times opposing—needs and opinions of multiple constituencies?

As Vision Monday’s team was going through the process of reaching out to leading national and regional players in our optical retail world for our signature VM Top 50 U.S. Optical Retailers Report, we were still getting used to the process you are all coping with—living and working through a global pandemic. We know that are lives are changed. This crisis is a schism. A break. And, even though there are parts of the country that are slowly reopening their doors, we already know that the months and couple of years ahead are going to be something new for everybody.

We have been racing, as we #WFH, work-from-home, to keep up with the coronavirus news and developments, across every facet of our world and within our industry, with readers, their businesses, their professional selves, their personal concerns.

We also knew that while we reached out to gather information as we normally do, to tally the numbers and develop rankings of how the largest U.S. retailers came through 2019, everyone’s head and focus is on the absolute present, the here and now and, yes....what might be the New Now?

We talked to some of these leaders who took time to send us their thoughtful responses to just a few of the questions we posed to them about their outlook about the impact of this pandemic. We thank them.

And, yes, we managed to put together our annual list for 2020 about 2019, the calendar year past. Facing this new and unwritten future, let’s agree to look at the report as establishing a kind of platform from which things will inevitably change.

We hope you know that we here at Vision Monday and our colleagues at Jobson are with you. Email us, share some messages to us on social. Let’s use this time and occasion to learn from each other, work together in new ways and walk ahead to a new vision care and optical retail “future.”

maxelrad@jobson.com