SomEyewear relies on the reinterpretation of metal

Umberto Valentini (sales director Italy): "we have attempted to make it fashionable, colorful and cheerful" When examining the situation in the eyewear industry on the eve of Mido 2014, Umberto Valentini, Sales Director Italy at SomEyewear, did not hide the fact that "our sector is certainly much more fortunate than many others". "Of course"– he added - "great changes are taking place but they also produce huge opportunities; the important thing is to know how to grasp them. These difficult times have created in consumers a different approach to buying a product that is more associated with rationalization, quality, real value and the enhancement of a personality that is not stereotyped and free from the usual clichés. This is why products like ours that are absolutely new, innovative and stylistically refined immediately interested and impressed Italian opticians; now more than ever before, they feel that they are central to their work, capable of proposing to customers the product they most appreciate without feeling constrained by somebody or something. For these reasons, it is a time of great enthusiasm for our company in the certainty that we have got it right and, more to the point, at the right time".   - So tell us about the new developments you will present at MIDO this year. "The new development we will present at the fair is actually ourselves, our company, our idea, our EBLOCK, a product that is innovative and fascinating from a technical and commercial point of view, and, last but not least, it is also trendy. We are confident that the public will realize its value and the huge opportunity offered by our concept".   - Shape, color, material. What will be the successful factor for eyewear 2014? "Material first and foremost. In my opinion, attentive customers should aim at metal. We've been presenting acetate, injected, etc. for too many years... and all its possible combinations have been visited.The best informed consumers who replaced their glasses once every 2 years will have had 3-4 pairs of glasses in "plastic", so now they want to explore new materials with other thicknesses, other colors that convey a change, something different. The stores themselves have dozens of offers in acetate to present to their public but they have almost no metal; this is why we have aimed at this material in the belief that it is certainly up to date and, above all, that it will attract the attention of consumers in the near future. Of course, we have reinterpreted this material to make it fashionable, colorful, cheerful and not, as is often the case with metal products, cold, sad and impersonal".