Innovation

“We wanted to give back to the society since we first started the business. It is our business model. We think that everyone deserves a better eyesight in life, including our customers and the underprivileged”, exclaimed TaiHau. With that, they created the “One-for-One” Donation Campaign, where Pott Glasses will donate one pair to the underprivileged for each pair of glasses sold. In the past 3 years, Pott Glasses had given almost 600 pairs of glasses to the underprivileged.

The two founders of Pott Glasses began with the simple idea of factoring in the donation cost to the price of glasses which is RM295 (approximately A$90) under the One-for-One program.

“We self-initiated this program to give back to the society in our way rather than joining the NGO in Malaysia. We also benchmark ourselves with overseas companies such as TOMS Shoes”, said TaiHau. TaiHau also mentioned during the interview that the source of supply chain of the program is mainly in the urban poor underprivileged.

Inspiration

The idea of the business began with a back-packing trip in Europe, where TaiHau spotted a handicraft shop selling glasses created from used skateboards. This prompted him to start a business in Malaysia that aimed to redefine the experience of buying glasses. Besides that, he foresees the potential benefits to enter the e-commerce market and thus, decided to start a business venture with his his childhood friend, Eden.

During the interview, TaiHau mentioned that he believed that the marketplace does not consist of only the buyers and sellers, but also the society. This reminded him to incorporate the CSR element into the business. The motivation behind the Donation Campaign was to create more positive impact to the living conditions (via vision) of the underprivileged. TaiHau also commented that he hopes this campaign is able to engage more business partners to join and support the campaign.

Overall impact

“The One-for-One Donation Campaign helps to bring in more customers”, said TaiHau. As it is uncommon to relate charity to SMEs businesses, the idea was not acceptable at the start.

Despite this, Pott Glasses continues the efforts to give back to the society to make customers notice that there is this kind of business model around as the customers are mostly students. TaiHau also claimed that students tend to have vision problems, due to many hours on digital devices, bad reading habits under low light condition, etc.

During the conversation, TaiHau mentioned that one of the biggest discoveries happened in one of the one-for-one event is that some students would move their chairs to the front of the class, and some would stay at the back to copy the work on the board – it is because they could not see. Thus, he realised that vision correction has become very important to city dwellers.

“The journey may seem exhilarating and fun, but there are also downsides that many do not forsee”, TaiHau added. TaiHau said, “In the short term, we must take in the losses that we did not expect, such as expenses, logistic problems, closing the store, anything that affects the business operation when they are doing the campaign.” However, in the long run, the campaign brings brand awareness and increase the number of customers base for the company. TaiHau also asserted that both short-term and long-term effect are equally good because the campaign did impact the people positively.

Business benefit

Because of the One-for-One Donation Campaign, it had increased customer retention, employee wellbeing and opened up a new market for the company. “The minimum quantity of order increase and we discover that customers want more choices than a decent design”, added TaiHau. This has resulted in an increase in sales and spurs the company to continuously strive for improvements.

Social and environmental benefit

During the interview, TaiHau mentioned that the business model actually works such that they actually helping the community while making money. When they are performing the campaign, they try to make it equal to everyone and improve the eyesight of the communities because they just could not see clearly enough. Moreover, Pott Glasses is dedicated to bring quality and modern design glasses whereby helping customers to choose glasses that complement their look. “We make sure that the fitting of glasses is good and come in nice design”, said TaiHau. He hoped that he could give students confidence on not just the vision but also the look.

Interview

Tai Hau Aw, Founder