When the Kiwi optometrist decided on a very different business model, many in the industry thought he was a little crazy. Now they are thinking he might be more than a little right.
You would have heard the one about the pub with no beer. But have you heard the story about the optometrist with no glasses?
While Slim Dusty famously sang that there was “nothing so lonesome, morbid or drear than to stand in the bar of the pub with no beer”, the optometrist with no glasses can report happy clients, happy colleagues and a very happy bank manager.
And Mr Alex Petty, owner of Bay Eye Care in Tauranga, New Zealand, doesn’t see his venture as simply a bizarre experiment or quirky outlier; he’s convinced it’s the future of the industry.
Before we can get to that future, we need to understand a little more about his past, and the motivation – some of it existential – that has brought him to this present-day, alternate ophthalmic universe.
Petty’s own focus on optometry as a career began with the lack of focus in his own vision.
Severe myopia as a young child meant plenty of trips to the optometrist.
“I’ve always had eye problems myself, which meant that I’ve always been exposed to someone peering in my eyes as a kid and a teenager,” he says.
And the New Zealand-born youngster was also exposed to plenty of different methods as the family travelled extensively in the wake of his civil engineer father, who worked on wastewater projects around the globe.
Petty might have been given a wider view of the world but, sadly, the optometry of the day had a narrow field of view when it came to combating myopia – it was single vision glasses, glasses and more glasses, with contact lenses added to help with sport.
“Anyone who’s practised through the 90s and early 2000s will know that, unfortunately, there wasn’t that knowledge about myopia, that there was actually a way of controlling that excessive eye growth.
“I was gutted a little bit that I missed the boat in terms of myopia control being an option and I kept getting stronger glasses, stronger contacts and ended up being very short-sighted by the time I was in my mid-teens and, probably not surprisingly, having three retinal detachments.”
That didn’t dim his enthusiasm for optometry, however.
A strong interest in maths and science, and a “really healthy respect for being able to change someone’s life in terms of giving them vision” led to optometry studies at the University of Auckland, from which he graduated in 2010.
University drove a passion for some of the more interesting aspects of optometry; a passion that took flight as his passport bulged and education broadened in trips and clinics around the world, including to South America and the United States.
Petty and Rachel, the woman he would later marry, ended up in Adelaide, where he worked with well-known Australian optometrist and contact lens authority Mr Lachlan Hoy, who opened the Kiwi’s eyes even more to the possibilities of the profession.
As a young myope, Petty had gravitated towards contact lenses.
“Having that freedom of sight without having a frame on your face is something I think, for a child especially, was huge.”
Later, as a professional, his work with Hoy strengthened that passion and fuelled greater interest in orthokeratology and other special interests.
Hoy became something of a mentor as the pair introduced the little-known intense pulsed light (IPL) device at the time, and established the first myopia control clinic in South Australia.
The boy who had previously only known single vision correction for his eye condition was now the man with new tools to help treat it in future generations.
“Lachlan was a trailblazer, and still is in his own right, so working in that environment certainly highlighted to me how those areas could become a big part of a practice.”
The nagging voice of change
Petty was starting to get a sense that things could be done differently.
“The specialisation side of things was really probably the engine room of Lachie’s practice,” he says.
“And we were talking, on a Friday night after a busy week, and he said, ‘look, if I could do things again, differently’ – because he had bought into a big, established practice – ‘I’d buy a few pieces of really important equipment, and I’d just see patients, just do contact lenses, just manage ocular disease, low overheads, and that’s how I’d do it.’”
It was a throwaway comment – two professionals ruminating on their paths in the industry.
But it stuck.
And after Petty and Rachel moved back to New Zealand, and he struggled to find the right role in Auckland, that idea began to nag once more.
It grew louder when his bank manager suggested that, rather than buying into an Auckland practice, he could maybe target opportunities further south and go out on his own.
That chorus for change grew even more when they moved to Tauranga and he considered his options there.
“There were really nice, established optometry practices, with great clinicians and a collegial group,” he says. “But no one was really fitting or doing ortho-k in a big way, no one was fitting scleral lenses, no one was doing dry eye in a really comprehensive way with things like IPL treatment. And these were all things that had been my bread and butter over the last few years.”
That conversation with Hoy jumped into his head once more.
The chorus had become a crescendo.
Even the bank manager was in tune.
So in 2017, Petty set up the Bay Eye Care consulting practice in a single room at a GP’s clinic, specialising in the use of contact lenses, orthokeratology, myopia control, ocular disease management, dry eye and glaucoma.
It was just Petty, plenty of high-end diagnostic equipment, an IPL device and not a single pair of specs.
His reputation grew, as did word of mouth and referrals from GPs, ophthalmologists, even other optometrists lacking his specialist skills.
And a few years later he was moving into his own, bigger three-room clinic, with two consulting rooms, and one equipment and testing room.
Since then, he’s also taken on another optometrist, Mr Aidan Quinlan, and office manager Ms Georgia Crawford.
But interestingly, and crucially, no dispensing staff. The only things dispensed are contact lenses, drops and solutions, good advice and treatment support.
Petty has no regrets. Only positives. And plenty of people keen to pay for his services.
“It’s about charging what you’re worth, making sure that you have the technology, equipment and the treatments that drive patients to your practice, and then making sure patients see the value in what you can offer them.”
All of which are laid out in a comprehensive list of consultation fees, most of which must come from a patient’s own pocket because New Zealand does not subsidise much of what Petty offers.
Another thing he does not have are high overheads.
“We don’t have dispensary opticians or front-of-house staff choosing the frames,” he says. “We don’t have money kept in stock; we’ve got a much smaller footprint with consulting rooms rather than a big floor for glasses, so our costs are much smaller as well.”
Revenue can be a tricky topic to discuss, but Petty is happy to offer two thumbs up when asked about the profitability of his business. And he reports his bank manager is also happy.
So successful is this “different way of thinking” that Petty believes it’s the future of the industry.
“Optometry now, especially our areas of medical knowledge, really doesn’t align very well with retail,” he says.
“I think those are two completely different things.
“If we look at optometry in 30 years’ time, I think it’d be very much optometry managing eye disease and offering management of eye conditions, and opticians managing the glasses and frames.
“The dispensers would be worth more, the optometrist would be worth more to a patient, and I can see that being very successful.”
Nothing has been able to shake Petty’s resolve. Not even an existential crisis.
When he was diagnosed with rectal cancer four years ago, the then 33-year-old father of one, with another child on the way, had plenty to think about as he endured surgery and three months off work.
The “heartwarming” support of his patients made him realise he was on the right track, and a desire to spend more time with family encouraged him to double-down on the business model and hire the extra optometrist, allowing reduced hours at the clinic.
When he started down this alternative path, many colleagues thought he was crazy. Now they look on with envious eyes.
The optometrist with no glasses – maybe that could become a catchy tune.
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