Are Ray-bans worth their hefty pricetag?

[Becauseicannes]

I am thinking of buying some aviators but they are pricey so just wanted to have any feedback from ray-ban owners as to whether they are worth it or have you found other sunglasses that are just as good.

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Hello, this thread is a little old and the links are out of date. Here's a new link to the products recommended by Mumsnetters:

Ray-Ban Original Wayfarer Sunglasses
Maui Jim Maui Starfish Sunglasses
Serengeti Sophia Sunglasses
Ray-Ban Aviator Polarized Sunglasses


MNHQ

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[BeeBawBabbity]

I got a pair of clubmaster ones for my birthday. And I have inherited a pair of wayfarers from my sister in law. They're quality lenses and feel so much better than my usual £20 pair from next or somewhere. Especially noticeable for me when driving.

However I daresay you can get good quality a bit cheaper. No idea what to recommend though.

[IvyWall]

I love them. Been buying them for over 20 years

[barkinginessex]

Yes definitely worth the price tag, I have some aviators and I love them.

[flightywoman]

I bought a pair of wayfarers in 1988, they were 70-odd quid then and I quailed at the price but they're still going strong - nice dark lenses, proper weight to them, well constructed and cooooooooool!

[fredabear]

yes, mine are wayfarers and I love them

[dontcallmelen]

Yy pp on wayfarers brilliant comfortable, great clear vision worth ever penny.

[CointreauVersial]

They are excellent quality, but if you are like me, and regularly lose/drop/sit on your sunglasses you are better off spending less money and buying a dupe.

[Glitteryfrog]

Are you going through an airport soon? I picked mine up in duty free.

[Glitteryfrog]

Are you going through an airport soon?
I picked mine up in the duty free for a bit cheaper.
They're lovely though :)

[Becauseicannes]

Thanks all, I am thinking Aviators as opposed to wayfarers as my face doesn't suit wayfarers. I am trying to avoid an expensive mistake. (Last sunglasses were Dior and I realise the price is just because of the name not super quality, although the shape of them is nice)

[Wotsitsareafterme]

I have aviators I think they are stylish and timeless I wear mine all the time.
My only advice is buy a solid case the one you get with them is flimsy and falls apart and they need the protection at that price!

[Likesshinythings]

You can get them here www.fashioneyewear.co.uk/designer-sunglasses/ray-ban.html for a good price. DF has purchased from them several times and says their service is good. I've used their london store and found them good too.

[SycamoreMum]

Yes.

[Paperblank]

Yes. I bought my first pair 18 years ago. They are still as good as new but not an especially fashionable shape but they are fab to use while driving.

I second getting a hard shell case and keeping them out of reach of children. My DNiece loves chewing on the arm of my sunglasses!

[Loafline]

They used to be when they were owned by Bausch & Lomb back in the day - back then they had fabulous quality lens, I think the orginal wayfarers still have the same lens, but now they are just a fashion brand. Try maui jim or serengeti for a great lens....but! i am still tempted by Rayban's new style mirrored wayfayers - lighter and smaller than the original. I might buy them for half the price in the US because i love their styling...but I wouldn't wear them all the time - i'd get a headache.

[LooksLikeImStuckHere]

I don't have wayfarers or aviators, just one of their 'high street squares' . Anyway, I love my Ray Bans. Fantastic quality, have had them 6 years and no damage compared to a cheap pair every year when they broke.

Expensive outlay but worth it.

[Loafline]

I used to sell sunglasses when i was a student - 20 years ago! The brand really has changed - it's the same as all the other designer brands....fashion led rather than quality led.

Copied and pasted from www.styleforum.net/t/103107/ray-ban-persol-made-by-luxottica-so-what


Well done, Luxottica, for wrecking what used to be a trusted brand. Obviously, when you bought this brand, there was no heritage covenant signed, to ensure the integrity of the brand, and so, we now have this proliferation of cheap, nasty plastic lenses masquerading under the once-respectable Ray Ban name.

Some 75% of so-called Ray Ban 'sunglasses' now, are not equipped with borosilicate glass lenses. Instead, the majority of this brand's wares have cheap, acetate plastic lenses which provide little, if any, protection from UVB/Blue Light.

Twenty-two years ago, the Ray Ban brand, in the USA, then not owned by Luxottica, introduced a series of poster adverts, proclaiming, rightly, the optical superiority of Ray Ban lenses. In the advert, two lenses were juxtaposed. The one on the left - the Ray Ban - passed every test in a straight-lines reflection test (cross-hatch squares, with no elipses). This showed the craftsmanship of zero-distortion Ray Ban lenses, even with steep base-curve aviator lenses, right to the frame-beveling.

The other lense featured in the advert was a 'how not to make a lense' lens: it had wavy lines reflections (not unlike looking at tiling at the bottom of a swimming pool on a windy day), indicating the tell-tale bowing and distortion of a badly-made, cheap lens.

This advert, over two decades ago, showed the superiority of Ray Ban, optically. It gave the impression that opthalmologists would be proud to recommend such glasses to customers, for general wear, and in UV-intense environments.

Just over twenty years-on, and the Ray Ban name has been sold down the river by a buch of craven idiots at Luxottica, with the collusion of a young, receptive audience who are clueless about what constitutes a good pair of sunglasses.

Every single pair of the 'new' plastic-lensed Ray Bans I have looked at suffered from bowing and distortion to a greater or lesser degree. This means that the majority of Ray Ban 'sunglasses' today constitute the cheap, plastic, inferior trash which Ray Ban adverts of 1985 so rightly castigated. Those adverts implied that, if one purchased such cheap, distorted lenses, then one was being defrauded, and ripped-off, and ill-serving their eyesight by such a purchase. So, doesn't the new developments in Ray Ban lenses mean that you, Luxottica, are guilty of all these things?

Luxottica love these plastic lenses: they're profitable in the extreme, because they're made in cheap contract-toy-factories. No one is going to convince me that the protective properties of the Glass Ray Ban RB3027 or RB3025, are shared by the Paris Hilton 'bug' Ray Bans featured in the new, flashy rayban.com website. You will notice that not in the website, nor in the catalogue given to optical store-outlets by Luxottica, will you find a definitive statement about the composition of the lenses, beside the photos of the 'sunglasses' featured. Luxottica Oakley play this game, too, with a made-up name for polycarbonate and plastic lenses, which conceals the provenance of the materials-used.

And the advertising strapline for the past two years, promoting this junk? 'Ray Ban, Genuine since 1937'.

Genuine what?

This is advertising fraud, and it is consumer fraud; if the latter, gullible lemmings that most of them sadly are, could discern the difference between well-made glass lenses (such as Serengeti Sedona, Maui Jim Glass, or Oliver Peoples VFX-glass), and rubbish such as Luxottica is now promoting, under the once-admirable Ray Ban moniker.

Shame on you, Luxottica.

The ocular chic of the new frame styles cannot hide the trash-lenses they encircle.

As I walked down a very sunny Oxford Street in London, last week, I could see people in designer 'sunglasses' such as Tom Ford, Miu Miu, over-rated distorted Oakley Gascans...and the new Ray Bans, squinting behind their lenses. These people paid in excess of £150 each a pair for these pieces of junk...and they're SQUINTING? I had no such visual discomfort in my Serengetis.

Again, shame on you, Luxottica, I fully expect your marketing putzes to wreck the Persol brand, yet, with plastic lenses. Go on, do it. You did it to Ray Ban, so why stop there?

END.

[Magicalmrmistofeles]

Yes they are. Just don't sit on them in the car

[Iwasbornin1993]

Definitely worth it, I love my aviators.

[Twinklestein]

Definitely. I have Ray Ban 'Vagabond', I don't like the Aviators and Wayfarers. My other sunnies, are all Dior and both brands are such good quality they really last.

I have a pair of Dior that I've had since my 20s - they've never got scratched, broken, or lost a screw.

[PippiLicious]

Yes. Definitely worth it. Unfortunately.

[Greenstone]

Wow interesting post Loafline. I got some black wayfarers last year and adore them because they go with everything but I'm not kidding myself, I'd heard the quality was not what it once was and so they're really a fashion thing for me.
Are Oakleys really gone down the toilet also? I bought a pair maybe 10 years ago and they really felt like the business in terms of the lenses. Who does make good sunglasses still?

[chickydoo]

Got my first pair 25 years ago, wouldn't wear anything else

[chocomochi]

Watching as I need a new pair of sunglasses. Have a pair of Maui Jim (bought about 5 years ago), but realise they are starting to give me headaches. Does anyone else get this?! DH thinks it's to do with the curvature of the lense..?

Interesting comments re quality of Raybans. And yes, the Dior/Chanel ones do look lovely (and flimsy!).

[Twinklestein]

If you go through the whole Dior and Chanel catalogues some are flimsy and some are really tough, it depends on the design.