How is the Ku Klux Klan like a Group of Opticians?

One of our main aims is to give out information about the true cost of glasses in Australia, and for that matter, the true cost of glasses anywhere else in the world.

Let's start by comparing the Ku Klux Klan and Opticians.

What might they have in common and how can it help you save hundreds of dollars on glasses?

It comes down to the power of information.

There's no need to write out a history of the Ku Klux Klan.  It's enough to say that a large part of their power came from the fact that they were a secret society and that these secrets generated fear.  They used secrecy of information to their advantage.

In this way the Klan are no different from Politicians or Real Estate Agents.  Or Opticians. 

What we're talking about is something called information asymmetry. 

We come across this problem daily when we have to deal with an "expert" who knows more than we do about something. And generally we're happy to pay for that information advantage - for someone's expertise.

Well that's what happened until the Internet came along and changed everything.  Suddenly information advantages started getting eroded in a number of industries - from insurance to the price of coffins.

We want to do the same with the Optical Industry.

So what secrets does an Optician know that you don't? And how can they use that information to their advantage? Here are some of their secrets:

• the average cost of frames in Australia is around $20
• the average cost of lenses in Australia is around $10
• yet, the average cost of a complete pair of glasses in Australia is around $300

Now, we're not knocking an Optician's ability to look after your eyes.  That expertise is worth paying for.

We're simply pointing out where the money's being made. Opticians are using an information advantage on the true cost of glasses.  And the bottom line is it's been costing you money.

Think what you could do with the extra hundreds of dollars you could save by buying through focalise.com.au. We think that's some information worth knowing.

Finally, we want to give a big credit to the idea behind this post to Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner who compared the KKK to real-estate agents (and others) in their excellent book Freakonomics.