NEW YORK—National optical sales continued their downward trajectory with minimal declines in all categories over the course of last week, April 26-May 2, according to the latest Jobson Practice Performance Tracker. Starting just over one month ago throughout the U.S., decreasing optical sales continued for the fifth consecutive week last week with declines of -1 index point across the board for all service/product categories being tracked. This coincided with only a few states reporting an increase of cases of COVID-19, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.

Optical sales declines varied little on a regional basis over the course of last week, with all categories in all regions remaining flat or declining to a small degree. The only regional increase in optical sales was in the category of contact lenses in the Midwest, which grew at a rate of 2 index points.

Optical sales in all other regions for all categories being tracked ranged from flat (or gross revenue and frame units in the South, frame units and lens pairs in the West, and exams/refractions in the Northeast, to -3 index points for lens pairs in the Midwest and contact lenses in the Northeast.

The Jobson COVID-19 Practice Performance Tracker data is compiled by Jobson Research from GPN/EDGEPro and ABB Analyze data.

This index baseline was developed by Jobson Research from total sales from an average 7 days in the first quarter of 2019.

Click here to view the complete Jobson COVID-19 Performance Tracker