Fielmann AG is a German eye-wear company. The Fielmann stock is listed in the German MDAX index and at the northern German regional HASPAX index. With 5% of all optical stores, Fielmann achieved a 21% sales market share and a 53% market share in terms of units sold. Fielmann is market leader in Germany and Europe's largest optician.
History
In 1972 Günther Fielmann established the first store in Cuxhaven. He recognised a gap in the market for eyewear for consumers using mandatory health insurance as payment, as these customers often faced a disappointing lack of covered choices in frames. At the time, there were only six plastic frames for adults and two for children. In 1981 Fielmann signed a special agreement with the Esensstatutory health insurance company and designed 90 fashionable and high-quality metal and plastic frames in 640 varieties. This was the end of an era with unitary health insurance glasses in Germany. In 1984 Fielmann started an advertising campaign with the slogan "Mein Papi hat keinen Pfennig dazu bezahlt! " From 1987 to 1990 Fielmann expanded his share in the quantity market from 11% to 16% and at the time held 3% of all eyewear stores in Germany. Fielmann has been listed at the stock index since 1994. In the same year the company with 294 stores and 4,986 employees made a turnover of DM 868 million and a pre-tax profit of DM 80.5 million. In 1995 Fielmann took over Pro-Optik AG of Basel, Switzerland, with its 6 Swiss branches. The Fielmann shop in Zurich's Bahnhofstrasse gained an annual turnover of €16 million. With 4% of all German eyewear stores, Fielmann increased its market share from 32% to 38% from 1995 to 1998. 1999 brought about the market entry to Austria and 24 branches were opened there until 2007. In 2001 the non-profit Fielmann-Akademie was established, which bought Plön Castle from the government of Schleswig-Holstein in 2002 and opened a training centre for optometrists there. Since 2005/2006 bachelor's and master's degrees in optometry are being offered in cooperation with the University of Applied Sciences Lübeck. After several years of refurbishments the castle was re-opened for visitors in 2006. In 2002 a large production and logistics centre was opened in Rathenow, Brandenburg, where 5 million spectacle frames are being shipped per year. After the cancellation of eyewear products from the catalogue of Germany's mandatory health insurances, Fielmann together with HanseMerkur insurance company offers a Zero-Cost Insurance provision. On 6 January 2009 Fielmann's stock indexing advanced from SDAX to MDAX. Since Marc Fielmann became CEO in 2018, the company has announced plans to dedicate more than 200 million to the international expansion and digitization of the group, investing in national market leaders such as Optika Clarus and technology companies such as the augmented reality application provider FittingBox.
Other activities
Fielmann plants a tree for every employee every year. In 2009, chancellor Angela Merkel, minister-president Peter Harry Carstensen and Günther Fielmann planted the one-millionth tree in Büdelsdorf.
