EMGEN OPTİK
Rooted Legacy
“In addition to being informed about developments of abroad with Silmo Istanbul, it is a source of benefit and happiness to exchange ideas with colleagues you meet from different provinces.”
Hello Mr. Burak, could you tell us about yourself and your story of meeting the optical industry?
I was born in 1979 in Istanbul. I am one of the fourth generations in my family born in Istanbul. In 2002, I graduated from Istanbul Bilgi University business faculty. In 2005, I completed the international business master’s program at Bournemouth University. After working in different sectors until 2018, I entered our family business. When I realized that we are a well-established brand as Emgen Optik, I realized that I should continue this legacy in the most ideal way. I am currently actively continuing my business life as the chairman of the board of directors of our company. Putting making money on the back burner, I re-entered university after the age of 44. I am currently a student in the department of opticianry. My biggest goal is to develop this brand like my grandfather and father and to hand over a strong company that can manage itself to those who will take over the flag after me.
Emgen Optik has a rooted history. Could you tell us about how and when your store was founded?
Emgen Optik was born when my great grandfather, Pharmacist Salih Necati Emgen, opened his first pharmacy in Üsküdar Square in 1901. The company started to focus on the eyeglass business after 1925. After Salih Necati Emgen’s death in 1948, his son (my grandfather) Rahmi Emgen opened the store in Beyoğlu Istiklal Street, which operated until 2003, focusing only on opticianry. Rahmi Emgen, who was a founding member and president of the “All Opticians Association”, now known as the “Turkish Optical and Optometric Professions Association”, which was established in 1951, also realized the first optical lens production. In the early 1980s, my father Necati Çetin Emgen, who studied business administration in Austria and also has an optician’s diploma, took over the flag from my grandfather and continued the activities of Emgen Optik at the same address for 42 years.
You recently moved your store from Istiklal Street in Beyoğlu, one of the historical districts of Istanbul, to a location in Beyoğlu. What are the reasons for not giving up on Beyoğlu?
As you know, the main street buildings where the stores are located on Istiklal Street, although they are very valuable due to their status as historical monuments, are buildings with high renovation costs that you need to take care of seriously in terms of earthquake risk. On this occasion, we started to look for a newer and larger store that would not leave the borders of Beyoğlu towards the end of 2022. Our criteria included a new building concept and a comfortable space where our customers could spend more comfortable and longer time. We are very happy and peaceful that we were able to achieve these criteria in our new store. As much as we can, we will continue our commercial activities in Beyoğlu, which we see as the place where we were born and where we stayed the longest.
Do you have products from every group in your store?
Of course, we display and sell the product groups that should be in every optical store. From optical & sun frames, optical lens, contact lenses, solutions and many other eyewear accessories, we work with many brands, both foreign and domestic. Currently, we cooperate with a total of 21 distributors from different categories. As we stated in the promotional advertisements of our new shop, we have been an eyeglass shop since the day we were founded. We do not sell any other products (such as watches) or provide technical support other than eyeglasses and its other product groups.
What are the most popular brands of optical and sunglasses sold in your store?
We usually work with big international distributors. In sunglasses, we mainly sell Versace, Dolce Gabbana, Prada, Bulgari, Emperio Armani, Rayban, Persol and Vogue from Luxottica group. Carrera, David Beckham, Missoni, Jimmy Choo, Mark Jacob, Polaroid are the most demanded products from Safilo group. At the beginning of this year, we started selling Gucci, Saint Lauren, Montblanc, Bottega Veneta, Balenciaga brands with Elit Optik. On the optical glasses side, Montblanc, Eschenbach (titanflex), Rayban, Dolce Gabbana, Silhoutte, Carrera, Vogue are the product ranges that stand out in the preference ranking.
How do you choose the brands of optics and sunglasses you sell?
We prioritize the demands of our existing customers and the availability of new iconic models. While we prefer classic models for our middle-aged customers, for our young and potential customers we prefer models with more vibrant colors and more iconic designs. Therefore, our brand choices are also formed in this direction. The main reason for our choices is brand awareness and production quality.
Designer brands are very popular in recent years. Do you also receive requests from your customers in this direction?
Although the popularity of designer brands has increased in recent years, we approach this issue with some caution. Because the shape and color of a pair of glasses are as important as their fit and their compatibility with the anatomical structures of the nose and behind the ears of the customers. We do not approve of a designer brand that has become popular with its abundant sharing strategies on social media but has a single-axis production. In addition to this, brands that rise rapidly on social media channels and lose their demand within 1-2 years are in the second plan for us.
What are your after sales services?
We continue to support our customers after sales. Especially during the sale, we advise our customers to come to us at certain intervals to eliminate deformations in the eyeglass frames that may occur in the future due to personal use. In addition to our spare parts support, we also offer services for the repair and maintenance of defective eyeglass frames, even if they did not buy them from us.
What role do you think the window layout and interior design of an optical store plays in sales? What did you pay attention to while preparing these elements in your new location?
In my opinion, the interior design and showcase of a store reflects the spirit of that company and its perspective on the customer. Therefore, the customer profile also forms and develops in this direction. As a company, we preferred to emphasize the differences to protect our brand integrity rather than adaptation to our location. As I mentioned before, we prioritize being sales-oriented due to our brand reputation. When we were discussing the new store design with our architect, I wanted only one thing: I wanted to see a concept of London Harrods in this store. Our architect also developed a different strategy based on the fact that we are an old company. As a result of this, I think we have brought a different interpretation to the classical optician concept consisting of white shelves with uniform, yellow led lights. Since we moved to our store, we have been receiving very, very positive comments and feedback from our local and especially foreign customers.
How would you evaluate Silmo Istanbul Optical Fair, which will be held for the 10th time with its new and larger service area, from the beginning to today?
Silmo Istanbul Optical Fair is really a very important organization. Unfortunately, our sector has a structure with different groupings that are not well organized today. At this point, Silmo Istanbul is an important platform that brings together all opticians in Turkey through suppliers. In addition to being informed about developments of abroad, it is a source of benefit and happiness to exchange ideas with colleagues from different provinces that you meet during booth visits.
Thank you very much for this valuable interview. Finally, could you tell us your comments on the transition of our magazine 4 youreyes to digital publishing?
It is an important project that needs to happen today, that needs to be analyzed very precisely and its continuity needs to be ensured. I believe that digital publication will be very useful for 4 your eyes magazine to reach more audiences and renew itself. In this way, I think that the opticianry profession and the eyewear sector will have a structure that can be measured and planned data collection with technical market research.
November 2023