US Senate panel examines contact lens pricing

A meeting of the US Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee looking into unilateral price policies of contact lenses was told this week by 1-800 Contacts that price minimums would push up the prices for consumers.

This week’s hearing aimed to determine whether these policies limited competition and led to raised prices for consumers by eliminating the ability of retailers to discount.

Setting a price floor was illegal until 2007 when the Supreme Court deemed manufacturers could set minimum sales prices in some cases.

Reuters reported that Alcon set a minimum price for some product in June 2013, Bausch+Lomb followed and Johnson & Johnson was in the process of implementing a similar policy.