Karin Stehr is an eyewear consultant with a passion and enthusiasm for independent design labels, much like our own. A former optical store owner, she has a wealth of knowledge about specialist optical retailing and loves the idea that she is able to inspire other opticians to fall in love with the independent eyewear collections – as she has. Her next unique launch are guided tours of the optical shows….
How have you developed such a passion for independent eyewear? Before starting in the eyewear business, I worked in a container leasing company. It was a great international atmosphere, but containers are just often dented, rusty or dirty. As a person with a sense of aesthetic and style, I couldn’t do that forever. When my husband wanted to start his own optical business, I knew: this was the right place for me. I had no idea about the profession at the time, but beautiful glasses fascinated me from the beginning. As early as 1989, we bought several independent brands for our new shop.
Tell us about the shop you owned. Why did you sell it? In 2005, I founded our second shop, Bellevue (Hamburg, Germany) because I wanted to focus exclusively on independent eyewear. For many years, this was my absolute dream job. I had a team that covered all the professional skills. I was able to live out my passions, my creativity and my strengths in customer advice, marketing and purchasing.
Of course, administration, controlling and organisation were also part of my tasks right from the start. In the last few years, however, I had to invest more and more time and energy in these areas of work. At some point I realised that as an entrepreneur I no longer felt as free as I had in the past. In the end, Covid-19 was not the reason, but it was the occasion to rethink my life planning. I wanted to start again and use all my experience, my contacts, my whole network within the independent eyewear segment as a basis for my new consulting work. I wanted to really enjoy my work again. Pictured above: Karin Stehr wearing Gotti frames (www.gotti.ch)
What are you working on now? I inspire and advise independent opticians to create their own individual and unique collection of independent brands. Today, it’s about having and communicating a distinctive positioning. If you have a personal affinity for it, independent labels are ideal for this.
Do you have an affinity with particular brands? Why are they so special? Of course, over the years I have come to know and appreciate some brands and the people behind them very well. I have a very trusting, friendly relationship with some of them. No matter whether they are designers or the creative heads of their companies: they are all passionate about what they do and extremely consistent in the implementation of their vision.
I know many others more fleetingly and always have the same spontaneous impression. They are creative, demanding people. They have a broad horizon, are open and communicative. I am very happy that I can now get to know many more of these exciting people through my new work.
How do you inspire other people to have the same passion as you regarding creative, artisan eyewear? I think there are many more opticians who would love to sell independent labels as well, but don’t dare to throw out the supposedly safe, well-known fashion brands. Many also have the desire to no longer be dependent on the global eyewear industry, to have a different, more attractive offer than the neighbouring shops. I show them the versatility, the stylistic range, the authenticity of the independents. This makes it possible to put together an individual selection of collections for each shop, perfectly suited to the location and the customers.
It is particularly inspiring to get to know the people behind the brands and to be personally introduced to their history, design philosophy and future prospects. That’s why I’ll be offering guided tours of the major trade fairs in future, which I’ll tailor perfectly to requirements beforehand. This way, even newcomers can quickly and deeply immerse themselves in the independent cosmos. Every personal trade fair conversation with a founder, owner and/or designer, and even more so every visit to a headquarters or even a production facility, inspires and inevitably leads to wanting to share this exciting background with one’s customers.
What frames do you wear personally, and has your eyewear journey along the way included many different styles of frames? Are you wearing bolder frames than ever before? I am one of those eyeglass wearers who has a large personal collection and wears them all. In total, I have, reasonably correctly glazed, about 30 pairs of glasses and 20 sunglasses. There is at least one of every brand I have had in the store during that time. I have collected them for about 20 years, some of my earlier treasures are unfortunately now lost.
Besides the basics in black, grey and silver, I like to wear more unusual shapes, materials and colours. I choose my frame daily to match my clothes and mood. I love bold styles, but with my relatively small and narrow face, I don’t like a look that is quite so radical on me. In suitable weather, I almost always wear a La Loop glasses chain so I have my sunglasses with me all the time.
Give us your top tip on what you believe is super hot in 2023? It took a few months, but now I love the revival of flat, angular shapes, especially in sunglasses. I still have a cool red and white Face a Face, which is about 15 years old. I’m having them re-glazed now! To find out more about Karin’s work at True Eyewear visit https://true-eyewear.de