Reducing Waste in the Eyewear Industry

It’s no secret that the fashion industry is one of the biggest waste offenders against sustainability. Annually, the clothing sector alone consumes a staggering amount of natural resources. Consider that, on average, manufacturing a single cotton shirt requires around 2,700 gallons of water. That’s equivalent to the amount of water needed to sustain a human being for up to three years.

Similarly, the eyewear sector’s impact on the environment has been well-recorded.

In 2023, Eyewear Intelligence reported that over four million pairs of glasses are thrown away annually just in North America. Aside from this, up to 75% of acetate used during the manufacturing process for eyewear ends up being wasted. These numbers are at odds with the growing awareness regarding the need for more manufacturers, especially in high-demand ones like fashion, to be more sustainable. Even consumers are demanding more eco-friendly initiatives from eyewear labels, with as many as 75% of respondents in a related Eastman research survey saying so.

As such, while the eyewear industry still has a way to go before it can be fully sustainable, there are already laudable efforts being made by key entities in the hopes of reducing waste. Here are a few of them:

Adopting greener delivery methods

With the advent of online shopping, many consumers have turned to eyewear ecommerce platforms for their needs. While this is undeniably more convenient and prevents unnecessary travel-related gas or electric consumption, it obviously requires various delivery methods.

Unfortunately, the transport of goods is responsible for about 37% of all greenhouse gas emissions. Not to mention, there’s the waste involved with the packaging materials, like plastic mailers and bubble wrap for item protection. In light of this, some eyewear retailers have begun adopting greener delivery options. Case in point, there’s Glasses.com. Known as a trusted online glasses provider, hosting top brands, including Ray-Ban, Oakley, and Coach, to name a few, this site also offers responsible shipping. Through this, deliveries are fulfilled by logistics partners using sustainable solutions that aim to reduce climate change. This includes calculating carbon emissions offset by climate protection projects such as reforestation, wind power, and more. While this may mean that deliveries take a little longer, they help shrink eyewear’s greenhouse emissions as a whole.

Encouraging eyewear redistributing

Although eyewear has been designed to be usable for many years, most consumers base the usability of their pairs on how trendy they are. As such, if a new style comes, any eyewear they deem outdated will likely be ignored or thrown out. Consequently, around 250 metric tons of eyewear ends up in landfills every year. To cut down on this waste, many eyewear insiders are introducing new ways to give old specs and sunnies new life. One of these efforts includes redistributing functional yet unwanted eyeglasses to those in low-economy high-demand areas. This is the exact initiative that award-winning optician Ruth Perrot continues to champion among African communities. Along the same vein of direct redistribution, chain store Ace & Tate has also rolled out a system wherein customers can return their frames to get them refurbished and sold for less in secondhand stores.

Using sustainable materials

Last but not least, many eyewear brands are making the switch to more sustainable materials. Unlike virgin ingredients, which take more time to process only for a lot to end up in waste disposal centers, sustainable materials are often based on existing waste products. For instance, in 2023, Timberland Eyewear introduced bio-based acetate sunnies in its latest collection. This means that between 30 to 80% of the frames are made using reworked plastic. As an added bonus, using sustainable materials in eyewear is becoming increasingly appealing for discerning shoppers. In the same Eyewear Intelligence survey noted above, 60% of respondents there said that brands using sustainable materials are ones they’d be more loyal to.

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