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Taking a bet on the net

Twelve months ago, Scottish contact lens maker daysoft took the decision to start selling direct to the public through a consumer-facing website. Chris Bennett looks at the impact on the firm and the lessons learned one year on

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What it did was build a website that offered its 58 per cent and 72 per cent water content daily disposable lenses as direct replacements for other companies' brands at a price of just £12.99 for 36 lenses. It also offered to pay a rebate to its independent practice clients if their customers chose to buy online.

Biggest decision ever

'The big fear for us was that all of our practice customers would walk. It was a big decision for us last year, about as big a business decision as I have ever taken,' says daysoft chairman Ron Hamilton. But he needn't have worried. In its first year, the venture has seen the value of daysoft's contact lens business rise by 80 per cent and the negative feedback from its traditional customer base has been negligible.

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