Okay, I'm going to write off my chest, because I kept it for so long for myself. I love Oakley, but Oakley from 1996-2007, not the current Luxottica. In fact, I hate Lux aka Sux. After all those reports about being a quasi monopoly in 60 minutes and Adam ruins everything, even so after the merger as EssilorLuxottica, the stink still remains. They killed all innovation that made Oakley Oakley, with radical designs and their philosophy. Sux caters to the lowest common denominator for the average Joe and trying to price gouging with low quality O-Matter and shifting production to China. Luxottica rides on the coattails of Original Oakley by re-releasing Romeo and Juliet, while I find the new 3D printing approach interesting, it will never be the original X-Metals. Because they don't have new ideas left to offer. Jim never should have sold Oakley, although I can imagine that otherwise Sux coerced him in to submission for distribution spots.
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Luxottica's Oakley vs. No Oakley
- Thread starter Camdaddy22
- Start date
While I do like and appreciate the older stuff, I like some of the new things, even if they seem blah to enthusiasts.
Some of the newer items have some signs of life but most of it is boring. I just buy what I like. My last two buys were a Ridgeline and a Holbrook XL. I wanted another white shield frame and the Ridgeline suited me just right at a solid sale price. I bought myself a Holbrook XL because I wanted a matte tortoise frame at a reasonable price.
Would I pay MSRP for those frames? Definitely not. They aren't really worth it.
I accepted Luxottica for a long time and they are going nowhere (besides being a subsidiary of Essilor). They make what I like and I'm fine. I just pass on the dumb things and I move on.
I agree with these sentiments . . . there are several Lux decisions that I hate (discontinuing watches, abandoning the essence of the brand's style), but I have noticed in recent years and SOME edginess being brought back to some of the designs. Nothing like the heyday of X-Metals and OTTs and Medusa's, but certainly better than since they acquired the brand.
One frame I am particularly fond of is the Split Shot. I especially like the integrated retention leash. The colorways have been awesome as well.
But I do long for the X-Metal days, and as someone else said, 3D printing them will just not be the same (though I am willing to give it a shot).If you are waiting for Oakley to go back to the same styling of 20 years back, the truth is Oakley is not the brand for you any longer. The brand has moved on. And this occurred way before Lux bought them. It occurred slightly when the OO and Why line was released and found it sold extremely well. It happened when more fashion and lifestyle oriented glasses started dominating the line with releases like the Dartboard, Eye Patch, Montefrio, Gascan, Twitch and many others. It started when Oakley got into aviators such as the Warden and eventually Crosshair.
As long as the current generation of consumers and its athletes are wearing the current product, that is what you will get. And Oakley just had a fantastic financial quarter which means it is selling well enough.
Oakley will always look to it’s past and sporadically re-release some old stuff but what you have right now is essentially what you will get.
So if the crazy stuff previously released under the Lux banner such as the Jawbone, Jawbreaker, Kato, Tailend, Shocktube, Madman, Elite line and others do not do it for you, chances are the future stuff will not do it for you either.
mderose451
Oakley Beginner
@Oakleyg makes a good point. It like vintage cars vs modern cars....as classic as the Corvette or mustang are they both had some bad, bad, years. People still collect them. It's still a decent product. Take maserati for example. A coach built premium luxury sports car. Hard to find in north America until the 80s, super popular in the early 200s. Now owned by fiat, who owns Chrysler. A 50k maserati is a chrysler 300 with an Italian designed sheet metal....no different than what we are saying about lux....people are going to keep buying for the aesthetic, and the nostalgia.
SharkSugender
I should Work at Oakley
- 3,621
- 1,823
never bought anything new from oakley except for the mask and their new lens tech. Even their shirts suck now, thin as a sheet of kleenex SharkSugender
I should Work at Oakley
- 3,621
- 1,823
Hahaha but seriously though, the thickest shirts i had in the 90s were oakleysI never bought their clothes... I'm bigger than a house
I never bought their clothes... I'm bigger than a house
Same! I do have a few items but by and large it’s unwearable.funnyboymatt
Oakley Beginner
- 18
- 53
90s still rule
Can’t get on board with newer onesSimilar threads
