Clearly is an

online retailer Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of t ...

contact lenses Contact lenses, or simply contacts, are thin lens (optics), lenses placed directly on the surface of the Human eye, eyes. Contact lenses are ocular prosthetic devices used by over 150 million people worldwide, and they can be worn to correct ...

eyeglasses Glasses, also known as eyeglasses (American English), spectacles (Commonwealth English), or colloquially as specs, are Visual perception, vision eyewear with clear or tinted lens (optics), lenses mounted in a frame that holds them in front ...

and sunglasses headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia. The company, founded in 2000, is a subsidiary of the French lens manufacturer

Essilor Essilor International is a French multinational corporation specialized in the design, manufacture and sale of ophthalmic lenses, optical equipment and instruments. It is the world's largest manufacturer of ophthalmic lenses. Founded in 197 ...

, which acquired it in 2014. Essilor merged with

Luxottica Luxottica Group S.p.A. is an Italian glasses, eyewear multinational corporation headquartered in Milan. As a vertically integrated company, Luxottica designs, manufactures, distributes, and retails its eyewear brands through its own subsidiaries ...

in 2018 to form

EssilorLuxottica EssilorLuxottica SA is a Franco-Italian Vertical integration, vertically integrated multinational corporation, multinational holding company registered in Charenton-Le-Pont and headquartered in nearby Paris. It designs, produces and markets opht ...

, thus making Clearly a subsidiary of the new entity. Clearly is one of the largest online contact lens retailers in North America, and the largest seller of prescription eyeglasses online in the world.Harnish, Verne
5 ways to get your business strategy right
''CNN Money''. April 6, 2011.Brohan, Mark
Groupon helps Coastal Contacts build awareness--and sales--in the U.K.
''Internet Retailer''. March 3, 2011.

History

Founded in 2000 as Coastal Contacts by Roger Hardy and his sister Michaela Hardy, who bought the keyword "contact lens" from

AltaVista AltaVista was a web search engine established in 1995. It became one of the most-used early search engines, but lost ground to Google and was purchased by Yahoo! in 2003, which retained the brand, but based all AltaVista searches on its own sear ...

, which meant that all searches for "contact lens" were accompanied with Coastal Contacts'

banner ad A web banner or banner ad is a Online Advertising, form of advertising on the World Wide Web delivered by an ad server. This form of online advertising entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. It is intended to attract web traffic, tra ...

s.Mitra, Sramana
Building A Niche E-Commerce powerhouse: Coastal Contacts CEO Roger Hardy
''Sramana Mitra''. November 12, 2010.Bitti, Mary
Clearly a Winning Strategy
. ''Canadian Retailer''. August 1, 2009. In the first day, they had 30 orders; within the first month, they had $68,000 in sales. In addition to their lower pricing, the firm provided same day fulfillment of online orders.Castle, Geoff
The 100-Mile Investor
''Business in Vancouver''. October 27, 2009. In 2004, Coastal Contacts raised $6 million in an

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investm ...

, which they used to expand into the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

and parts of Europe. In late 2004, they acquired a mail order contact lens business in Europe, LensWay. In 2006, they acquired two more companies: one in the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

and one in

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

.Anderson, Fiona
Doing business in China: know your customers
''The Vancouver Sun''. February 7, 2012. By 2009, the firm increased their revenue to $140 million. They moved into the

market in 2008. They source parts for eyeglasses from independent manufactures across the globe, but maintains control over final assembly. In January 2012, they shipped over 80,000 prescription eyeglasses, setting a service record for online sales of made-to-order prescription glasses in any one month. In 2012, the company had sold more than $1.2 billion in retail eyewear sales over the internet since inception and served more than 5 million customers. In 2014, French lens manufacturer

acquired Coastal.com and appointed Roy Hessel as CEO.[2
/nowiki>">">[2
/nowiki>''Vision Monday''. April 29, 2014. Hessel, a former venture capitalist, founded online eyewear retailer Eyebuydirect in 2005. Aside with his role with Clearly, Roy Hessel is also since 2016 VP of America for the Essilor Online division. In August 2017, he appointed a new Managing Director at Clearly to help him in designing and implementing the strategy of the company.
"newswire". September 8, 2017. In 2015, Clearly Contacts re-branded itself as Clearly, while also making brand name changes in other global markets such a
Australia
an
New Zealand
In the United States, they are known a
Coastal
In September 2017, Arnaud Bussières joined Clearly as Managing Director. He became CEO in January 2018. In 2018,

merged with the Luxottica, Luxottica Group to become the largest eyewear retail group in the world. In 2019, Clearly acquired Australian online retailer OzContacts. In 2022, Coastal.com, the brand's U.S. based website, was merged into Eyebuydirect.com.

Products

Clearly, then known as Coastal Contacts, initially exclusively sold contact lenses on their storefronts. As of 2017, the online store sells around 100 types of contacts, including daily and extended wear lenses, and coloured contact lenses.Jordan, David
Clearly Contacts CEO Roger Hardy
. ''BCBusiness''. November 3, 2010. In 2008, the company began selling eyeglasses and sunglasses. As of 2017, they sell glasses from over 100 brands. In 2012, they sold more than one million pairs of eyeglasses, making them the largest online seller of eyeglasses in the world.

References

{{Vancouver Corporations Essilor Eyewear retailers of Canada Companies based in Vancouver Online retailers of Canada Canadian companies established in 2000 Retail companies established in 2000 Internet properties established in 2000 Companies formerly listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange Online retailers of the United States Online retailers of Australia Eyewear companies of Canada