NewYork, 15.05.2017

Daily contact lenses surpass monthlies in US sales, account for 38% of market

GfK point-of-sale data shows US sales of daily lenses have grown 21% in one year

Point-of-sale (POS) data from GfK shows continued strong momentum for daily contact lenses, helping to drive overall dollar growth in the US soft contact lens market. But the number of new contact lens wearers remains flat overall.

GfK’s contact lens POS panel captures sales data from eye care practitioners throughout the US, providing the industry with a detailed, consistent understanding of essential trends and emerging categories.  
In January 2017, for the first time, monthly sales of daily contact lenses surpassed those of monthly lenses in dollar volume, reaching 38.1% market share – up from 31.5% in January 2016. In 2012, daily lenses accounted for just 17.9% of the market.

In the US market, the daily lens segment continues to grow at a faster pace than any other modality, increasing 21% in dollar volume year over year. New products and innovation continue to drive daily lens sales surges; in 2016, 42% of the growth in the daily category was from product launches in the prior year.

GfK data also shows that the average price of a single daily lens has increased by over 10 cents since 2012, driven in part by the growing prevalence of higher-cost multifocal, toric, and silicon hydrogel lenses within the modality. Daily multifocal lenses alone grew 45.4% in 2016 over the prior year, with more than three quarters (77.9%) of that growth driven by products launched in 2015.

New wearers needed

The continued momentum in the contact lens market does not mean new wearers – those who are prescribed lenses for the first time or after a lapse in use – are flooding into the space. In 2016, new lens wearers accounted for just over 21% of all contact lens fittings, according to GfK’s FITS panel, which tracks optometrist visits; that figure is down slightly versus the prior year and is in line with a four-year trend of contraction. Growth in total wearers was also negative, down 0.3% in 2016 over 2015.

“We’re currently in an upgrade market,” said James Kennedy, Business Group Director for GfK’s POS Tracking (Optics) team in North America. “Getting wearers into the category and keeping them in lenses is an ongoing challenge for the industry – which makes consistent innovation a must. Until just this year, the daily toric category had not seen a new product since 2014, and the category is ripe for growth. This segment will definitely be an area of focus for our clients and retail partners.”

While the daily contact lens segment continues to experience growth across the board, weekly/biweekly and monthly lenses are progressively declining or remaining flat in sales. The weekly/biweekly segment was down 2.8% in 2016 compared to 2015 – following a pattern of consistent single-digit declines for the category over the past nine years.

The monthly contact lens segment represents a large piece of the market that has been growing slowly but consistently. Sales increases in the category were slower than usual in 2016, though, registering less than a 1% rise in dollars over the prior year. The lack of new products entering the market in 2015 contributed to this slower growth. The second half of 2016 saw a deluge of new products in this space and could portend a growth rebound in the coming year.

“The prevalence of subscription programs for daily contact lenses has likely boosted growth, and we are looking at this trend more closely,” Kennedy said. “As more eye care practitioners participate in these types of programs, we expect to have a sharper understanding going forward of how subscription programs influence the trends, especially towards annual supply purchases.”

Toric lenses ready to take off?

Through its FITS panel, GfK measures patient fittings for contact lenses, using records provided by thousands of opticians nationwide. FITS data often gives insight into trends months before they appear in POS data. During 2016, for example, the FITS panel showed more patients switching to daily contact lenses from weekly or biweekly SKUs (switching was up 9,9% over 2015); a similar FITS pattern of switching from monthlies to dailies also emerged, with switching up 12% in 2016 versus 2015. 

According to GfK FITS data, toric contact lenses were the only category to increase in wearers from 2015 to 2016 (up 3.6%). As other lens types saw growth in daily lenses at the expense of their reusable counterparts, toric experienced upticks in daily, monthly and weekly lenses year over year (18.7%, 2.0%, and 1.7%, respectively) – indicative of a true increase in toric wearers. This pattern, combined with the new set of toric products slated to release throughout 2017, may aid in patient retention by supplying the astigmatic patient base with more options.

“Toric lenses present unique challenges for manufacturers,” said Steve Honovich, GfK’s Client Service Manager, “so innovation does not come as quickly in this category as it does for sphere and multifocal. It appears that astigmatic contact lens wearers may soon be flooded with a bevy of new options. Combine this with the true increase in toric wearers reflected in the GfK FITS panel, and the toric category could be primed to explode in the coming year.”

GfK’s Optics point-of-sale (POS) panel in the US captures contact lens purchasing data from brick-and-mortar opticians, independents as well as large chains. The company also maintains a FITS panel gathering prescribing information from optometrists. The two panels in combination provide a unique resource for manufacturers and retailers, measuring trends in the industry, as well as new product launch metrics/exposure.

To learn more about GfK’s Optics POS and FITS panels, please contact James Kennedy at james.kennedy(at)gfk.com.



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