Reframd: The Black owned brand reshaping the eyewear market
Interview by Inya Tennyson
Diversifying the ‘one frame fits all’ narrative by producing tailor-made glasses for everyone’s facial features. This is Reframd’s mission.
Reframd is creating a new generation of eyewear products that cater to previously overlooked communities. They produce tailor made glasses for everyone, inspired especially by low and wide nose profiles such as Black and Southeast Asian people. Reframd frames are digitally crafted around each customer, based on their unique face geometry. With this approach Reframd is believed to offer the most inclusive eyewear on the market yet.
I myself have always struggled with finding sunglasses that fit with my facial features. Most sunglasses I would try on in stores always seemed to look weird on my face or didn’t fit with my nose at all. I always thought it was a personal problem, but it turns out this is because most off the shelf (sun)glasses are made to fit white nose profiles, which I as a black woman do not have.
I had a talk with Reframd co-founder Shariff Vreugd and asked him about the Black owned business’ road to success. He shared some interesting insights on Reframd’s consumer targeted way of working and how the Black Lives Matter movement controversially drew more attention to their brand.
Offering new perspectives
In the summer of 2019 the South African-Malawian Ackeem Ngwenya and the Surinamese Shariff Vreugd met at an African food festival in Berlin. Product designer Ackeem was walking around on the festival site with 3D printed frames of glasses that caught Shariff's attention. “These are designed for lower and wider nose profiles”, Ackeem explained. As soon as Shariff tried on the glasses he was amazed by the comfort. Impressed by Ackeem’s work Shariff offered to help him out with his sales and marketing activities. Not much later Reframd became a two man show ready to shake up the market.
MOSAIKO: So Shariff, what sparked your business idea?
Shariff: My business partner Ackeem ran into a frustrating problem: He couldn't seem to find glasses that fit him just right. At first he thought that it must be because of him, but after he did some research it turned out that most off-the-shelf glasses are designed for white nasal features, i.e., narrow and high nasal bridges. Consequently, people with low and wide nose bridges (primarily Black and Southeast Asian) are wearing ill fitting glasses. We want to relieve these frustrating pain points and bridge - pun intended - the gap.
MOSAIKO: Is Reframd the first eyewear brand to tackle this issue and gap in the market?
There are some companies that offer an Asian fit for lower and wider nose bridges but there was no brand really focussing on Black people’s facial features with a user-centered approach. It’s like companies are almost saying without actually saying it that it’s not worth developing products for people that don’t have white nasal features, Shariff says.
MOSAIKO: What challenges did you overcome along the process of starting Reframd?
Shariff: As Black founders we wanted to focus on well fitting glasses for Black people. Our brand had a clear mission and a defined target group. However, we got some comments from people that are not Black but also ran into the problem of not being able to find correct fitting eyewear. Those were nice responses, but we also got some comments saying that “this is reverse racism”, claiming our product was excluding non black customers. As a result we decided to open up our demographics, making custom made eyewear for everybody, regardless of their race and nose profile.
MOSAIKO: What surprised you the most on the path of developing your brand and product?
Shariff: That must have been the sudden increase in attention we got after the Back Lives Matter protests in response to the murder of George Floyd in May 2020. The popularity of the BLM movement drew a lot of attention to our brand and I actually think that if it wasn’t for that, Reframd wouldn't be where it is right now. Which is bittersweet. In that sense I'm upset but also thankful in a weird way that this got us extra attention. Sometimes I feel like it’s ‘Black Lives Marketing’ instead of people really wanting to support the black community because many organisations just want to showcase how inclusive they are nowadays. On the other hand the BLM movement has also caused Black customers to be more aware of where they are spending their money, meaning supporting Black owned businesses that truly tap into their needs.
In June 2021 we set up a Kickstarter campaign to gather funding. We were very hesitant to launch this for Reframd, as Kickstarter is the world's biggest crowdfunding platform and the majority of its users are white men. We kicked off the campaign with our tagline being “Eyewear for Black people’s nose profiles” but we noticed that at some point the amount of pledges was stagnating and we might not reach our funding goal. I believe that there was something about our tagline that didn't really align with the values of most Kickstarter users. So during our campaign we actually ended up changing our tagline into “Eyewear digitally crafted for you” while still making sure to tell where we come from.
MOSAIKO: How are you able to tailor the glasses to every unique individual?
Shariff explains: We use the existing face ID technology that most people use daily to unlock their smartphones. With those sensors we can get a very accurate scan of your face. That 3D file is then loaded into our frame generating algorithm which Ackeem created. It adjusts the frame measurements to the width between your eyes and your temples, determining how the glasses will fit on your face. Based on the unique measurements we get, the glasses will be 3D printed for you. When ordering you can choose the frame style, colour and lens colour of your liking.
MOSAIKO: How sustainable is Reframd?
We produce all our 3D printed frames on demand, leaving us without any stock that can go to waste. We only get to production once we get an order, which is much better for the environment, Shariff says.
MOSAIKO: What does inclusiveness mean to you?
Shariff: As a small company you cannot focus on the whole world. We started with Black people in mind as our initial target group, and then further broadened our demographic faster than expected. Whilst Reframd is an Afropolitan eyewear brand designing products for overlooked communities, we believe it is essential to be inclusive to as many people as possible. Our frames and software are primarily developed for Black people’s nose profiles; however, our algorithm is able to make them fit to any nose profile. Next to that our price point is very affordable for glasses that are uniquely tailored. We could easily ask for more money for a pair of glasses but it’s important to us to make our products available for as many people as possible, also those that don’t have hundreds of euros to spend on well fitting eyewear.
MOSAIKO: What’s your ultimate goal?
There are many products which I think aren't inclusive enough for many people. Take band aids and sunscreen for example. Both of these products don’t blend in when put on dark skin tones. We want to be the company that is there for underrepresented consumers. We started with glasses because that was close to home but we see a lot of different and new opportunities for products that can be improved, concludes Shariff.
You can get fitted and order your personalised Reframd eyewear worldwide on https://www.reframd.com.