Building an eyeglass empire

When Andrea Stein was looking for glasses, she tried on at least a dozen frames before deciding on a pair of tortoiseshell ovals by Ogi Eyewear. "I love them," she said. "They fit my face shape, they're lightweight, and they've stayed on trend."

She was shopping for a look, not a location. But Stein, who lives in Plymouth, ended up with a pair of glasses designed in her hometown.

Ogi glasses are sold around the world, from Germany to Israel to Canada. They're available in 4,500 stores nationwide and 225 stores statewide. But few of the brand's many fans know their maker is a Minnesotan.

That could be because David Spencer started his company quietly and never needed to raise his voice.

All in the family

The son of an optometrist, he'd owned and had been running Specs, a high-end glasses shop in Minneapolis, for more than a decade when he decided to design his own frames.

If his approach was gutsy, the aesthetic was Minnesotan: designs that he describes as "naturally simple and pure. I don't junk things up with extra decoration," he said. "It's classic shapes with color on the back."

To introduce his glasses to a wider audience, he'd hang a "gone fishing" sign on the door of his Hennepin Avenue store and make cold calls to other optical shops. It didn't take him long to learn that his competitors wanted what he had to sell.

"People spend so much time worried about their shoes, but any casual observer will see your face first as they look at your eyes," said Spencer. "Your choice in eyewear says a lot about you."

In 1997, Spencer left Specs to form Ogi Eyewear. (The name came from Spencer's son Braden, now 14, who would say "Ogi ogi ogi" to prompt his parents to sing "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.")

In the early years, Ogi was a bone-thin, one-man operation.

"I was the shipper and phone answerer," he said. "I didn't even have a table, so I used to ship on my knees."

To break into the national market, he'd scan the Sunday newspapers, then fly to the cities with the lowest airfares and start knocking on doors. The strategy worked. "If you tell people you got on a plane and made cold calls, well, I think they took mercy on me," he said.

But mercy had nothing to do with his success, according to James Spina, editor-in-chief of 20/20, an eyewear industry magazine.

"[Ogi] has a unique, fashionable, stylish approach to the eyewear that does not get too trendy," said Spina. "It is very classic, but conscious of fashion and they're very good at evolving their style."

Kevin Cunningham, the owner of I Ware Northeast in Minneapolis, has carried Ogi ever since Spencer started the company. "They're a little more fun," said Cunningham of Ogi's design. "I see them being copied all of the time, which is always a good sign."

They're also affordable. Most Ogi frames sell for less than $300, which makes them "fairly priced for terrific quality," according to Spina. And that has made Ogi recession-proof. Even during the recent economic downturn, business has been booming, said Spencer.

Seeing into the future

Bold colors have always been a signature of Ogi Eyewear. But Spencer uses those colors carefully. Tortoise frames might have lime green on the back or a frame with gunmetal fronts might have hot pink at the temples.

He also seems to have an uncanny ability to see what's coming next. The hit TV show "Mad Men" has spawned a strong retro vibe, but it didn't catch Spencer by surprise.

"Fortunately, I saw it coming before the show and was one of the ones making them when demand went up," he said.

The 1970s are hot on the heels of the 1960s, according to Spencer, who predicts that glasses will get bigger and more like the first pair of glasses he wore: "They were a big, plastic, double-bar pilot shape that typified the late '70s, We're making a sunglasses version of it this summer," he said.

But Spencer doesn't look to TV alone for inspiration. He dreams of frames, he said. And he has a quirky habit of studying the people he meets.

"I look at people's heads, always mentally design for different shapes and forehead sizes and cheekbones," he said. "It's creepy when I stare, but my wife will go up and explain why."

So it's entirely possible that the next Ogi frames will be inspired by you.

But you probably won't hear about it. Not from Spencer, anyway.

Sara Glassman • 612-673-7177