Mr. Thira Therdboonpaisan, owner of KEEPLOOK by Optometrists Eye Center, started as an employee in someone else’s company and became the owner of his own business. It’s not easy. If you’re not happy with the path you choose and love what you do, it’s hard to be successful. What was the turning point for an employee who wanted to start something of his own? And why did it have to be an eyeglasses shop business? Follow the clear life story from Mr. Joe Thira Therdboonpaisan in this episode.
When we talk about eyeglass shops, we may think of health services, whether it is measuring nearsightedness, farsightedness, astigmatism, or looking for light-filtering glasses to wear while looking at a computer screen all day. All of these are eye health services that all shops provide.
Many customers who walk into an eyeglasses shop, they don’t just want the clearest glasses or the best eye problem solving, but the glasses they choose must also look good, match their style, or give the wearer confidence. Therefore, Joe makes Keeplook Eyeglasses not just an eyeglasses shop that solves vision problems, but also gives confidence to customers who choose to buy and wear them.
The beginning of an eyeglasses shop
If asked about the starting point, Joe said that the people who started it were his father and mother because originally Joe’s family had an eyeglasses shop. Since he was a child, Joe had the opportunity to see what running an eyeglasses shop was like, what it had and what it lacked. This became the driving force that motivated him to go out and find what his family’s shop was lacking by deciding to study optometry.
“I didn’t pay attention since I was a kid, but I saw it too often.”
If we say that he started the eyeglasses business because he was interested in it since he was a child, that would be wrong. Joe said that since he was born, he had seen eyeglasses shops. At first, he was bored with them, so he chose to study marketing and then went to work full-time. But after doing it for a while, he began to question whether what he was doing was fulfilling the needs or not. In addition, he saw that his family’s eyeglasses business was still lacking something, so he started to look back at the eyeglasses business.
“Isn’t an eyeglasses shop just about vision?”
Due to Joe’s personality as someone who likes to talk and is interested in dressing up, when he started looking back at his family’s eyeglasses shop, he started to think that maybe eyeglasses shops are not just about solving vision problems. They can be combined with fashion or dressing up. When this thought occurred to him, he immediately turned back to study optometry.
“People who wear glasses feel more confident that they are not ugly when wearing glasses than when they do not.”
After graduating, Joe decided to open his own eyeglasses shop instead of continuing his family’s shop. The reason was that his family’s shop had been open for over 30 years, so it already had a specific customer group. Opening a new shop on his own would allow Joe to meet different customers. The target customer group that Joe considered was not just the group that wanted to fix vision problems, but also the group that wanted to look better with glasses. Therefore, he named the shop Keep Look, an eyeglasses shop that would make people who wear glasses feel confident and look just as good as when they didn’t.
The difference between a full-time job and owning your own business
Of course, there are differences between a regular job and running your own business. Joe said that regular work is more fun because he has friends who work in the same or different departments. Just stepping into the office, he meets many people. But being a business owner means that 80-90% of the time, he has to be at the shop, but he also meets many other people who come to him, namely, customers.
“It became more fun not from coworkers, but more fun when customers come in and we recommend something that suits them.”
Being a business owner who has talked to customers has shown different perspectives on wearing glasses. Some people just walk in and you can tell right away that they don’t want to wear glasses, but may have vision problems that may cause blurry vision or eye pain from staring at a computer screen, so they have to come into the glasses shop. Some people come in to change their personality, such as having a young face but because of their job, they want to increase their credibility or look more senior. But some people want to look younger, so they look for glasses that make them look younger.
From being an employee to a business owner who has to select employees
Joe explained that when Joe changed from being an employee in someone else’s company to being a business owner who had to choose his own employees, what Joe was looking for was not just expertise in the work but also someone who could talk about everything, give advice, get along well, speak the same language without having to explain much, and even if they were not good at it, they were ready to adjust and follow. Working with this type of person would be happier.
“It’s a business that combines art and theory.”
Because an eyeglasses shop is not a regular job that may require skilled people, but this eyeglasses shop requires some creativity. Giving expensive glasses to customers does not always mean that they are expensive and look good. Sometimes, glasses with a lower price may be more suitable for that customer and also help the customer save on the cost of buying glasses. Therefore, people who come to work at the shop must be able to analyze psychology, give advice, understand and go in the same direction as the shop. If you give advice or teach something and the employee understands, it is the best answer.
The set goals
Joe said that he didn’t really set a big goal. He wanted to open 3-5 more branches within the next 4-5 years, but he planned to have the branches on the outskirts. He didn’t want to open in the city or the center of the city because there were already many optical shops. The location he wanted to open in was a residential area with many office workers or people who work full-time because this group of people needs more care and doesn’t have much time to take care of themselves. If there was an optical shop nearby, it would be a good choice for them.
Obstacles along the way
The eyeglasses business has a very high price barrier. People often think that it is a profitable business. But in reality, opening an eyeglasses shop requires a lot of money to stock up on products. And when the products are left over, they cannot be used for anything else. Therefore, the profits may be spent on having to use the money to stock up on products for sale.
“Some customers are more interested in price than quality.”
Optical shops outside have to fight with price barriers and also have price cuts in each shop like other products in general because some customers are more interested in price than quality. Therefore, it is more difficult to recommend products even though they want to choose the best for customers. Therefore, the shop must start to adjust and understand by focusing on customers who are willing to pay for quality. And if customers want cheap products, the shop will recommend by telling the truth about how the quality is different or what is more suitable for customers. Because even if the product is cheap, it does not mean that it is not good quality. The quality will only be in accordance with its price.
Impression
Keep Look Eyeglasses Shop is not an eyeglasses shop that advertises or promotes the shop a lot, which makes it so that there are few walk-in customers who come to use the service. Most of them come from word-of-mouth from customers. The shop takes good care of you. The price is not cheaper or more expensive than other shops. Many customers who have used the service before will come back to use it again. There was even a customer who bought more than 30 pairs of glasses in one year.
“The best thing is sincerity, taking care of you like family.”
The working concept that Joe told all the staff at the shop is that every customer who walks in should be taken care of as if they were our relatives, regardless of whether the case is cheap or expensive. We must advise them sincerely. Don’t just focus on selling expensive products. If it doesn’t meet their needs, there’s almost no chance that they’ll come back to use the service again. But if you sell cheap products and over-advertise, and they come back to complain, that’s not good either. Advise every customer as if they were our relatives sincerely about what’s most suitable for them so that they feel the most confident in wearing it.
Why choose Essilor?
Joe explained that the shop actually has almost every brand of lenses, but the shop mainly focuses on Essilor products because most people know that Essilor products are of very good quality and easy to adapt to, whether it’s in terms of products that are scratch-resistant, blue light-resistant, or lenses that change color when exposed to sunlight. Essilor has been famous for this for a long time, and both teenagers and older customers know this brand very well.
Message to the New Generation Salaryman Page
I would like all working people to pay more attention to their eye health because our shop often encounters cases of pseudo-myopia. Pseudo-myopia is temporary nearsightedness after working for a long period of time. If we do not know that it is temporary nearsightedness and decide to get glasses, the next morning when we wear the glasses, we will immediately have a headache because the actual value and the prescription do not match. If you can rest and get enough rest, if you still feel that your vision is not clear, then it would be better to think about getting glasses.
“The 20-20-20 rule of work prevents pseudo-myopia. Work for 20 minutes, take a 20-second break by looking at something about 20 feet away.”
KEEPLOOK by Optometrists
Address: 101 True Digital Park, 2nd Floor, Sukhumvit Road, Bang Chak Subdistrict, Phra Khanong District, Bangkok 10260 Tel. 095-6452464
Clear life , be happy with the work you do, love and stay with your work for a long time l Vision Mission.
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