Looking at labs: Maui Jim’s European move

Frame companies taking control of lens manufacture is a growing trend and but something sunglass specialist Maui Jim is no stranger to.

The Hawaiian brand has manufactured its own polarising, colour enhancing sunglass lenses and married them to its ranges of frames in Peoria, Illinois, for many years. A recent move into optical frames, a growing global business and a close shave with a tornado has prompted it to replicate that US lab in Europe.

A €10m investment has seen its Braunschweig distribution centre also become its European manufacturing base producing lenses for Europe and other regions as far afield as India, the Middle East and South Africa. The 15,000sqm site houses 5,000sqm of buildings and the 2,000sqm lab. In deciding to create a second lab a number of factors came into play says Martijn van Eerde, international marketing manager.