How much do we donate?

We donate $1 from every product sold and 50%, or $5, from every Club Ellison membership sold to our "Give-Partners" Aravind Eye Care Systems. 

Do you have your Meet the Drapers appearance transcript?

Aristotle Loumis:    Hi. My names are Aristotle Loumiss. I’m the founder and C.E.O. of Ellison Eyewear. Ellison Eyewear is a socially driven, luxury eye wear brand. The first of its kind providing life insurance for every one of your purchases through our innovative club Ellison platform. What is club Ellison? Club Ellison is essentially insurance for your frames. It targets through the largest pin points unaddressed by the tens of millions of consumers every year. Think that you lose them or you break them or you simply might have someone steal them. Numbers in addition to the program, get access and become a part of a community that acknowledges and rewards their members for living their experiences versus punishing them. How does it work? You simply log on to Club Ellison. How does it work? You simply log into your Club Ellison account and you submit a claim or what we like to call it, tell us your story.

Bill:    Tell us your story.

Jess:    What do you do?

Aristotle Loumis:    You simply log in. How it works. You simply log into your account and you submit a claim or as we like to call it, you tell us your story. That story then ...

Tim:    Why don’t you just start over? [crosstalk 00:35:52] start over. Just tell us about your business.

Speaker 6:    casually. You’re in their [crosstalk 00:35:57]. It’s not shark tank.

Tim:    That’s the part I want to hear. Your story.

Aristotle Loumis:    How it works. You simply log into your Club Ellison account and you submit a claim or as we like to call it, tell us your story. That story then is shared to all of your community members. All right. I'm sorry. Could I get one of this guys, cheat sheet.

Speaker 6:    [inaudible 00:36:22]. You can pretend like the camera is not there.

Aristotle Loumis:    Yeah. Thank you guys. I appreciate it. How it works. How does it work? You simply log into your club Ellison account and you submit a claim or as we like to call it, you tell us your story you. Then that story then gets shared to your whole entire social network and we reward that story by offering you access to our entire collection of membership costs, which is 50% off full retail. 50% of full retail.

Tim:    You're trying to memorize it.

Jess:    Don't memorize it.

Tim:    Don’t do that. [crosstalk 00:37:01]. Just talk to your grandfather. Just pretend I’m your grandfather and you're trying to explain what you do. Start the whole thing over.

Aristotle Loumis:    The whole thing.

Tim:    Make it simpler and shorter.

Aristotle Loumis:    Hi, my name is Aristotle Loumiss. CEO and founder of Ellison Eyewear. Ellison Eyewear is a socially driven luxury eye wear brand that ...

Jess:    What does it do?

Aristotle Loumis:    My name is Aristotle Loumiss. C.E.O. and founder of Ellison Eyewear. Ellison Eyewear is a socially driven luxury eye wear brand. That first of its kind, provides life insurance for your Ellison friends. What is Club Ellison? Club Ellison is essentially insurance for your eye wear. What it essentially does is it protects you from the three largest pain points experienced by tens of millions of customers every year. The fact that you lose them, you break them or someone might steal them. All you have to do and how it works is simply log on to your club Ellison account, submit a claim or as we like to say, tell us your story and you're automatically rewarded for that adventurous behavior, by getting access to our entire collection and membership costs, which is half of membership pricing. Which is half of full retail.

Tim:    What’s the story?

Aristotle Loumis:    How it works?

Speaker 6:    You can look at your cheat sheet. We’ll [inaudible 00:38:24].Don’t worry.

Speaker 7:    [inaudible 00:38:26].

Aristotle Loumis:    Can we do that?

Speaker 6:    We can. [inaudible 00:38:31]. We get it.

Tim:    I think you're trying to memorize it and you know the subject.

Aristotle Loumis:    Yeah, I do.

Tim:    Why don’t you just tell us? Now get through it now. [crosstalk 00:38:43]. You’re almost there.

Speaker 6:    It’s okay. Take [inaudible 00:38:46] clean sheet, don’t worry.

Aristotle Loumis:    Let me do the first part and the second part and then I’ll stop.

Tim:    You’ve already done the first part.

Speaker 6:    You did the first part.

Jess:    Yeah, you’re good. We just need the end.

Bill:    You don’t have to start it over. It’s not one straight thing really. Start from [inaudible 00:39:00]

Aristotle Loumis:    Okay, yeah. How does it work? You simply log in to your club Ellison account, you submit a claim or we like to call it, tell us your story. Then that story automatically gets shared to your whole entire social network and there is a reward for living that experience. We then reward you with the whole collection and an exclusive membership pricing, which is half off full retail. Members also get to be a part of a community that acknowledges a rewards them for living in these experiences versus punishing them like other big brands. Second part. Now, you guys being an adventurous family yourself, I'm sure that you guys ... when was the last time you lost your sunglasses? Tim, Bill, think about the last time you guys went on a fishing trip and you were trying to get that big trophy fish. Maybe he won the battle or one of you guys went off board.

    Jess, maybe and you and your husband Brian went on an adventurous trip with your son Phoenix and your son decided to give your dog Archie one of the new sunglasses as his new toy. Joti maybe you're excited for your next billion dollar exit and on the way to that big ... the contract sign, you left your glasses in the cab. We are there for some of your most intimate experiences and we want to reward you for those intimate experiences. Now, while we feel it is important to look good, we also think it's equally important to do good. For every pair of Ellison sold, a membership sold, we give someone their eyesight back. We’re also giving our customers a tangible way to impact the communities around them, through a massive and philanthropic experiences while traveling the most beautiful parts of the world. I'll give you a quick example of what that looks like.

Speaker 7:    Hey fellows, we’re not stopping. Still rolling. Still rolling people.

Aristotle Loumis:    Now we believe that in the act of losing something, you're finding something greater in the process and material things should never hinder that process. I'm here to welcome you guys into the family and hopefully see the world through a different lens.

Jess:    Great.

Bill:    Terrific. Why don't you come, pull up a chair and-

Jess:    Have a seat.

Bill:    -we’ll ask you a few questions.

Joti Benson:    One question. How many glasses are you allowed to lose a year?

Aristotle Loumis:    We have a limited submission. You can make as many as stories and adventures you go on, that's okay with us. It's unlimited.

Bill:    Does the cost of your membership go up over time if you start losing more?

Aristotle Loumis:    We don't think they should be punished for living life. What we do is we charge a one-time $10fee for your membership.

Jess:    How do you get half of prices?

Aristotle Loumis:    How do we allow them to get the half of?

Jess:    Yeah.

Aristotle Loumis:    We own our own supply chain. I lived in Italy, in Greece for four years developing the manufacture and we’re actually one of the ... we’re the only one that could say we hand make our products in Greece. We’re the only manufacturer able to do that.

Jess:    You make all of your own products.

Aristotle Loumis:    Correct. In Greece.

Jess:    Are you wearing some now?

Aristotle Loumis:    I am wearing. These are actually blue tech and we've expanded our collection. These actually block 99.9% of all U.V. blue emitted from T.V. screens, digital devices.

Jess:    Wow and they look like normal glasses.

Aristotle Loumis:    Yes. They're 95% transparent and 99.9% protective against all digital devices.

Jess:    That’s great.

Bill:    When I go and become a member and I keep losing glasses, is it my responsibility then to do a social media post in order to get my new pair of glasses?

Aristotle Loumis:    That's part of the shtick. What we believe is that we're a group of rebels and adventurers and visionaries. We know that when you lost our product, is usually during an act of adventure. Being a part of this membership, we all share stories, thousands of stories. It is automatically integrated within the platform.

Bill:    It’s required to have a Facebook post to get my glasses.

Aristotle Loumis:    Correct.

Bill:    I get it.

Joti Benson:    How many users do you have?

Aristotle Loumis:    We launched the company, we launched club Ellison, we've been in business since 2014. Launched Club Ellison in 2016. Initially got 3500 members organically. 80% of those people organically came back and now we're-

Tim:    Each paid $10?

Aristotle Loumis:    Initially because we were testing it out, we wanted to see if this would resonate well so we were able to get a thousand that paid, but 2500 of those people organically came on, we saw that this is something and then we instill the $10 membership.

Bill:    You said only 18% stayed.

Aristotle Loumis:    18% of the 35 utilized our membership perks and came back to repurchase products. We're seeing that most of our customers, most of our Club Ellison customers are buying 3.5 products from us a year.

Bill:    What's the nonprofit connection here? Why are you doing that?

Aristotle Loumis:    I'm actually a dental student dropout. I initially got into this and coming ... and I met my father for the first time at 18 in Greece. Coming at the verge of entrepreneurship and this traditional life of becoming a dentist, I decided I was going to take a year off. I then joined Doctors Without Borders, found an eye organization giving people their eye sight back and then realized that this was an impact that I wanted to ...

Bill:    Go ahead get it. Get it. Maybe it is a customer.

Aristotle Loumis:    It’s a customer. Another adventurous story. Hello I’m with the Drapers right now. Could I give you a call back? What I recognize is that I found that eye organization giving people their eyesight back and I thought this was very impactful. Then I looked naturally into an eye for an eye and stumbled across the largest monopolization of the eye wear industry. This is 45 years ago before it was C.N.N. covered and everything like that. I said why do a pair of these cost as much as that? There's no tangible reason for that reason. I said well, eye for an eye and then I stumbled into ... Greece was in the middle of a crisis, they were looking for opportunities to export. I said what better people to make sun glasses than people who are in the sun the most? The Greeks. Then dropping out of my pursuit at the dentistry, moved to Greece for four years, built a supply chain and then launched.

    The idea here is that we firmly believe that you should be seeing the world through different ends by impacting the communities in which you travel. Everything we do is integrated into our membership model.

Bill:    I like the viral marketing part of it. If you lose your glasses you have to be a little embarrassed in order to go ask for another pair and it starts to spread, but joining ... people are going to want the best pair of glasses, they're not going to necessarily just want to join a club just because we get the glasses back.

Aristotle Loumis:    Yeah, that was important.

Bill:    What if they want a pair of glasses that are not Ellison glasses?

Aristotle Loumis:    This is all the reason why we're able to provide this type of price at the type of quality that we provide is by bringing the manufacturing internally. We have over 70 styles. Ranges from all the most popular. My two partners or Exotic designers, which is the largest manufacturer and one of the top monopolies. We bring the trends and the desires in a variety that our customers are looking for while also bringing out social impact and I call the action to go on in life.

Jess:    What's the end goal here?

Aristotle Loumis:    End goal? There's multiple end goals. Obviously there's the perception, there's the goal for an exit depending on obviously it's a community effort with our investors should they decide to do that, but the idea here is to really disrupt this old monopoly, make an impact and have some fun in the process.

Jess:    Great.

Bill:    Who designed your glasses?

Aristotle Loumis:    You're looking at him. Me-

Bill:    You are designing glasses? That's a part of your business is being the designer of how these all look?

Aristotle Loumis:    Correct and that really comes from when we talk about mood boarding, that comes from the places that we travel. Whether it be Nicaragua, Italy Capri, Greece, we take some of that experiences and we put it into the design of the product as well,

Tim:    Was your idea in doing this very complicated thing to have fun or to make more glasses or to make a lot of money? What was your thinking?

Aristotle Loumis:    I come from a single mother of seven children. A natural idea in order to grow out of that status was to become a doctor and have an impact. I think as a medical background, it was my goal was always to impact people and I said to myself, how do I impact people the most? I thought that being a dentist there would be only [inaudible 00:48:06] how many people that I can affect. When I'm looking at this organization, I’m thinking about how many people we can restore their eye sight back and by coupling that with one of the now and most largest industries but there's a way that if we could couple these two together, not only could we make an impact, but we can also make a sustainable and profitable company. I learned the hard way that without money there's no mission. It's very important to make a profitable company, as it is to make an impactful company.

Jess:    What’s your relationship with your father like after meeting him at 18?

Aristotle Loumis:    Amazing. Me meeting my father is like you meeting my father. Never seen, spoke, anything. Getting off the plane in Greece, I was exposed to my culture, I was exposed to Greece. First time on an airplane, first time on a boat and he is the most interesting man in the world. He has been an entrepreneur, he's the second largest manufacturer and distributor of medical supplies. He got me in touch with manufacturing abilities, what it means to be an entrepreneur in a dying economy, not only in a thriving economy. He is everything. One of the most important things that he said to me that I always tell my members and my employees is that, in life all you need is one person to believe in you and he told me that, “I believe in you.” I took that and I ran with it.

Tim:    I'm curious about one thing. Your promotion picture up there has about 25 people in it and only one is wearing glasses.

Aristotle Loumis:    Yeah. It depends on whether it is a hot day.

Jess:    He said there’s people he’s helping with their eye sight.

Aristotle Loumis:    Yeah. Those are the people they we’re helping with their eyesight.

Tim:    They are all walking around without being able to see.

Aristotle Loumis:    There you go, yes. We were building for 18 hours and I'm sure that was just the time they took it out, but every one of these trips for example, at the beginning of the trip ... so we actually put people in these uncomfortable positions where they got to actually explore. If I could recreate that time when I met my father, being exposed to a culture I’ve never been exposed to, scenarios and situations, that maybe they will become visionaries. My idea is to put on these trips myself and it's in two parts, philanthropy and fun. At the beginning of the trip, how much of an impact we make there. At the end of the trip, we explore the beautiful corners of the earth. At the beginning of the trip I gave ... that was Nicaragua so it was 80 people.

    I gave everybody a pair of sunglasses and I said, “Okay guys, trust me, let's go on this adventure.” At the end of the trip, out of the 80, 32 people lost their sunglasses.” We have our camera guys-

Tim:    Really? [inaudible 00:50:23]

Bill:    Surfing, building, [inaudible 00:50:27] someone steps on it and people ... where we have our videographers to then take videos of them and those are commercials. We utilize this not only when we're allowed to be able to pride these amazing $200, $300 products that sometimes as low as 50 as a member because we cut out the traditional distribution. We cut out all the marketing that goes into the models, the Mercedes and this and put on the stack. I want to know your stories and we use them. When we go on these trips, not only do we make a little bit of money off that but we make a tens of thousands of dollars through the marketing.

Bill:    What’s your specifically spend ... why your company's special is that it's this insurance thing with the social media right, but don't you think that's something that Ray ban or any of these guys could just go do and then it's a feature for them and then you never really then ... you never get off the ground before they just take it over?

Aristotle Loumis:    That was very interesting and one of the things that I experienced with one eye, for people that are not understanding of the eye wear industry in itself, it's one of the largest [inaudible 00:51:28]. What they do is they own the rights and licensing to some of the biggest brand names. Oakley,. Ray ban, Gucci, Prada and they also limit distribution. The sunglasses that’s a provision of fluoride. As an infinite designer, I can’t go and start knocking on these doors. If you're a Nike, Nike doesn't own foot locker and doesn't own D.S.W. There is those distribution opportunities. For us, there isn't that so we had to bypass all the traditional and go direct to consumers. In doing so, what I learned ... we did launch the Club Ellison. That came from me selling out my car. One by one I personally fit over 6000 people's faces and I recognize that when you get a product from me, you want to support an entrepreneur. 1 to 200, by Friday you get it.

    By Monday I'm getting a call saying, “Hey, listen man. The dog ate my homework kind of thing, they told me this adventurous a story of how the lost their broken.” Hoping to get a hook up and eventually our lab got a reaction out of it. I said , “Okay, enough with the storytelling, I'll give it to you for coming back.” What I recognize is that we are there for some of people's most intimate moments and we want to take advantage of that.

Joti Benson:    How are you going to scale the acquisition of consumers? Direct to consumers because what most people go through, some distribution channels. It's all online?

Aristotle Loumis:    Yes. That was another big thing is how do you actually get the touch point because the [inaudible 00:52:43] Parkers of the world, they're paying a massive amount to acquire their customers a loan because in the end, we call it the fifth factor. You try it one before you buy it. If Exotic owns all of the distribution, how do you do that? I'm fortunate to have a brother who has over 500 employees at one of his shops in Chicago. I went in there and we did a basically a trunk show in the office. This is an opportunity where I was able to distribute 200 to 300 glasses at a single time, generating anywhere upwards of $25,000 to 30,000 in one sitting. Talk about Club Ellison, get the product on their face and once you leave, you'll see about 20% of those people within the next coming weeks ordering more. Now to answer your question, how does the Exotic not just flop on an insurance model if you will because they will.

    They’re a publicly traded company and their goal every quarter is to raise the costs. By doing that, they're going to dramatically cut all their profits nearly in half, which is something that they're not going to do. It's easier to acquire a company like us versus replicate the model.

Bill:    We're going to have to wrap up. What's the deal? What are you offering to the crowd fund and what are you ... how much money do you need?

Aristotle Loumis:    Absolutely. We're looking, we're seeking $250,000 at a $4 million evaluation. This has been consistent the last year and we're willing to do another round to get more people on. We firmly believe that making a strong community is ultimately going to be what is going to be our differentiator in our growth model. We want to give the same terms that we did before to both not only you but also to the people watching.

Jess:    Great.

Bill:    Terrific. Now it's up to you.

Jess:    Vote. Up, down or fund him.

Bill:    Terrific.

Aristotle Loumis:    Thank you guys so much. I appreciate.

Bill:    Great. Thanks so much.

Jess:    Thank you.

Aristotle Loumis:    I actually drove here. I’m on a 30 days, 30 trip to where I went to Google and twitter so I just drove 20 hours here [inaudible 00:54:34].

Jess:    That was amazing. You did a great job. Thank you.

Aristotle Loumis:    If you guys don’t mind, here’s for you.

Jess:    Oh my goodness, are you sure? Thank you so much.

Joti Benson:    This is for you.

Jess:    I’m so excited.

Aristotle Loumis:    This is for you. Enjoy.

Tim:    Thank you.

Jess:    Thank you so much.

Bill:    If they’re sun glasses, let’s put them on for ... those look good on you. You look very sharp. [crosstalk 00:55:01]. Wow. I think you-

Joti Benson:    I think what I like-

Bill:    -he knew exactly what you want.

Joti Benson:    What to do for me, yes.

Jess:    Totally.

Bill:    This is something [inaudible 00:55:08]

Joti Benson:    What I like about ... I've been wearing glasses since I was a kid and these are very nice glasses. That's one thing I would say. The pair of glasses is good. For me what I don’t like, everything. The story was just a bit too many things going on there.

Tim:    Complicated.

Joti Benson:    Just too many moving parts but I do think what he is passionate about building a good pair of glasses, trying to help people there, building a community and the social aspect. I do think just so many complications in the business is very hard. It’s very hard to build a business when you have so many moving parts and so many things. That would be my concern.

Tim:    I agree 100%.

Joti Benson:    I like the glasses though.

Bill:    That's exactly my problem.

Tim:    He's a good guy but this is not going to work.

Jess:    I think his story is amazing. Don’t say it's not going to work, it could very well work. I think I’ve seen a lot of companies that are chipping away at the Exotic market because Exotic basically manufacturers all sunglasses, all jewelry, all anything that you can manufacture in mass. It’s an enormous market so I have seen quite a few trying to chip away at that and I think that's a good business. It is very complicated. I like that he's basically having his customers sell for him. I don't still totally get the membership element and why I would pay for that but he has a great story.

Tim:    That’s the point. You have to be focused as an entrepreneur. You got to do one thing really well at some of the success.

Jess:    I think he just didn't explain it very well.

Tim:    This is very complicated. He can't do it all well.

Joti Benson:    I see an exit but for him of ... he has figured out to make a nice stylish set of glasses but he has to figure out some community element to it that will create some brand about it. He can take that on, build on it and sell to Exotic or something but I can’t see that many moving parts and complications that to be like a billion dollar business. That needs focus-

Jess:    We need to simplify.

Joti Benson:    -simplify that.

Bill:    Until I put on the glasses which are really great glasses by the way, I was feeling this is probably not going to work but then I saw, then I put it on the glasses and I'm seeing the world through a whole [inaudible 00:57:22] glasses and I’m thinking that-

Jess:    This doesn’t feel like a business-

Bill:    -that there are some real positives here. One is the companies are always beating down the customer when they want to return or they want another pair of glasses. He's realized that just if the customer tells the story of how they went and puts it on the web, suddenly they're marketing his glasses. It's all positive.

Jess:    That’s smart.

Bill:    That's an all positive thing. I was concerned that somebody else could come and take it.

Jess:    I feel like there are quite a few people doing this. I can already think of three off the top of my head-

Bill:    That are doing social media that way?

Jess:    That re doing social media that way and trying to do a sun-glass company, chipping away at the Exotic market.

Bill:    Yes. It's a simple idea that could easily be knocked off. I’m a little concerned about that but what do you guys all think? We'll do the thumbs.

Jess:    Yeah. What do you think? Okay. Thumbs up, thumbs down, thumbs all around. I think I’m not investing but he's great. He's great and I think we just need to give him some good business advice.

Joti Benson:    I do agree. I think he has a lot of potential but got to operate it like a business.

Bill:    I like the glasses.

Joti Benson:    The passion is there but the business is not there yet.

Bill:    I really like the glasses.

Jess:    Yeah I like the glasses to. I would be-

Tim:    I like the glasses.

Bill:    From this side.

Jess:    I’d be a customer.

Bill:    I don't know how well they look but they look ... from my end, they look great.

Jess:    I’d be a customer, not an investor.

Tim:    Me too.