Hi, this is Dr. Scott Morris. This is February of 2026 and my column called the end of retail as we know it. And we're going to address how retail AI will impact tomorrow's eye care retail industry.
So let me be blunt. The traditional optical dispensary is in what I feel is the early stages of an evolutionary collapse. I'm not saying the optical today is dead yet. But if it doesn't transform, it will cease to be the financial engine that it once was for this industry.
There is a series of AI subtypes converging into what's known accurately as retail AI that is impacting all parts of the global retail landscape. Retail AI is not just changing the way businesses approach inventory management and marketing. It is drastically altering human purchasing behavior. In the process, it's not just improving the shopping experience, but it's also cannibalizing the middlemen who've all had their hands out for a piece of the purchasing dollars.
This includes product sales reps, the distributors, and the retailers themselves. Now, as of note, I care businesses who have a retail component to their business. And we are one of those middlemen. And we are at the beginning of the agent at commerce area era where consumers don't shop, their disillegions do is our industry prepared for this.
And how do we prepare for what could be a revolutionary shift in retail? Let's break it down. This era will feature two major distinctions from our current model. First is the operation of retail AI.
And the second is a greater shift in consumer behavior that retail AI will induce. Let's address retail operations first. Retail AI is about to gut the buy and hold model in eye care. Opticals that used to be defined by their board space will be seen as archaic and relatively inefficient.
In the future, carrying inventory will be viewed as a liability, not an asset. Distributions already starting to shift to hyper localized micro fulfillment, think Amazon. AI predicts localized demand spikes, perhaps a surge in high index blue light lenses in the tech heavy zip code. And move stock before the order is even placed.
There will also be a move away from slow movers as algorithms dictate what hits your shelves based on the predictive needs of the local agentic population. Now that's not what the humans are doing is what the agents are suggesting the humans are doing. Now if AI knows 40% of your local patients will need progressive lens updates in Q3, that inventory may just arrive in time. We're also going to see a move from search bars to shopping agents.
The most violent shift isn't going to happen in the exam room. It's not even going to happen really in the retail optical. It's happening in the palm of the consumer's hands. The era of searching, you know, manually googling the best aviator frames is dead.
Retail shifting from a pull model, where consumer seek information, to a push model, where personalized suggestions are delivered proactively by the rapidly evolving personal shopping agents, also called PSAs. We're moving from tolerating an inefficient product purchasing process to an era where consumers expect a product to provide an experience. Retail AI will be a fundamental in this experiential shopping experience. We're renting a generational transformation process and moving from scrolling, searching, and browsing to an agent driven zero click curate experience.
These agents don't just know the consumer. They possess deep lifestyle contacts and will be the portal of how people interact with the world. These PSAs will track the likes and dislikes of this or in this case, their consumer. They'll know the calendar like an upcoming hiking trip or the bank account is this a good month, or even biometric stress levels.
That's a concern. And in the eye care world, gone will be the library of frames patients have to try on. Instead, their digital twin will allow them to virtually try on any frame made anywhere at any time. Their agent will negotiate with global inventories, run a 3D virtual fitting against micron accurate facial scans that their virtual twins have.
And present a, here's your final two choices, selection. Mathematically, guarantee to fit their face and their vibe. All, unrequest. And this won't necessarily need to happen within the four walls of an optical.
It can be in the comfort of their own home. Much like we all buy clothes, electronics and food and well, pretty much everything right now. This experience is starting to happen across the global landscape and consumers are becoming accustomed to this zero click purchase experience in all other areas of global retail. Our 45 minute frame styling session will be viewed as a quaint or chaotic and maybe irritating waste of the bygone era.
The remnants, which we may not see again, are not much different than the consumer going to blockbuster to pick out a movie or a department store to try on clothes. Are we any of us doing that? So, what about a game plan? I mean, how do we compete?
The optical, the future will need to be an experience that incorporates heads up displays, virtual inventories, virtual reality, personalized lenses and a global marketplace mindset. The dispensaries that survive will stop trying to compete with AI's efficiency and start leaning into what AI cannot do, a high touch, clinical intervention and physical verification. In other words, we're going to stop in quotes selling frames and we're going to start providing in quotes a visual experience. In the near future, we're going to need to consider enhancing how our consumers see the world and how the world sees them.
I know there will be some of those who read this or hear this and choose to ignore or condemn this as futuristic heuricy. Well, there were executives at JC Penny, Sir's, Robock and Blockbuster who thought the same when this little company called Kadabra entered the marketplace at the beginning of the digital shopping area. Later, when that company rebranded as Amazon, those executives were wondering what happened as the world around them changed almost overnight. So, here's our reality check.
The controversy isn't whether AI is coming. It's here. It's whether you're willing to take the steps, adopt and evolve or fight, complain and eventually also wondered what happened. Just something to think about.