Great success for the 5th Assottica Congress





Record attendance and excellent results for the 5th Assottica Congress titled “Contact lens & Customer retention” held in Florence on Sunday, September 30th and Monday, October 1st 2007. Almost 600 opticians from all over Italy attended the meeting.

It was a major achievement for the Companies which have organized the Congress and which are members of Assottica “Contact Lens Group” (Amo Italy, Bausch&Lomb, Ciba Vision, Coopervision, Johnson&Johnson Vision Care, Sauflon, Schalcon, Alcon by Visioncare Italia)

: indeed, the Congress once again proved to be a highly-appreciated appointment and an excellent reference point for contact lens updating.


While keeping the characteristic structure which has always made the Assottica Congresses quite unique in this sector, the 2007 edition showed some important novelties.


First and foremost, the presence of Nicoletta Carbone, a great expert in information and communication, who was given the hosting task on both days of the Congress.


Nicoletta Carbone, who is a scientific journalist hosting the only daily radio programme on health and well-being in Italy, wove an ideal common thread among all important training moments of the Congress.


This year, a poster session was also introduced to give participants the opportunity of presenting their scientific contributions: it was highly successful and had 15 posters on display.


The Congress opened with a warm welcome address to all participants by the President of Assottica “Contact Lens Group”, Giuliano Nannini, who introduced the topic chosen for the 5th edition of the Assottica Congress, namely customer retention.
In the optician’s work, contact lens practice is ideal to develop customer retention. Buying contact lenses is not a spot experience but is repeated over time.


The first speaker was Emiliano Ricci – astrophysicist, writer and scientific journalist – who in an impressive paper titled “Galileo, the telescope and customer retention” stressed how important the language is to get hold of a complex and competitive marketplace and made reference to an old model, i.e. that of Galileo, a bright scientist and perfect marketing expert for the Copernican theory.


The series of papers devoted to relational capital was introduced by Mario Silvano who is regarded as the “father” of Italian trainers in selling techniques. In his paper titled “The Customer’s value over time” – rich in stories, experiences and practical suggestions – the speaker explained how to ideally build dynamic and fruitful relations focusing on the Customer’s expectations and needs.


Prof. Desmond Fonn, Director of the Centre for Contact Lens Research at the School of Optometry, University of Waterloo (Canada) – one of the greatest experts in the reaction of the eye to contact lenses – and Prof. Maurizio Rolando – a world expert in tear film and cornea who teaches at the Eye Clinic, Department of Neurosciences, Ophthalmology and Genetics, University of Genoa – were given the task of introducing the major topics of scientific research in contact lens practice.



The lectures of these two great experts were followed by the paper of Anna Sulley, Past President and Fellow of the British Contact Lens Association, who covered the theme of “Customer retention in contact lenses” where she presented and explained to the participants a series of strategies which are targeted towards meeting the Customer’s expectations and achieving Customer satisfaction thus increasing the contact lens business.



After a busy Congress day, on Sunday night a pleasant Gala Dinner was organized at Istituto degli Innocenti, an Institute located in the heart of Florence which opened its impressive venue exclusively to host the social event of the 5th Assottica Congress.


The scientific presentations started again on Monday morning with Robin Chalmers, Professor at the Indiana University School of Optometry (USA) and consultant for clinical trials, who in her paper titled “How can clinical science help us retain wearers and avoid drop-outs?” devoted special attention on Customer relations trying to identify and assess the critical points in contact lens use and management.


Great interest was shown by the audience in Monday’s plenary session focusing on field experiences in daily practice reported by
some participants, namely Nadia Zuppardo, Guido De Martin, Giovanni Delogu and Marco Pastorelli.

It was an important way of exchanging experiences which ended in a panel discussion during which the personal experiences reported by their protagonists suggested some reflections in the audience and showed how success in daily practice is closely related to some key concepts: customer loyalty, quality, trust and professionalism.

The presentations continued with Giancarlo Montani, Professor at the Degree Course in Optics and Optometry at the State University of Lecce, who made an in-depth analysis of the importance of questionnaires aimed at monitoring comfort and assessing the effects of lens fitting.

Giancarlo Montani was also awarded a prize for the best poster selected by an ad hoc Scientific Committee made up by Anto Rossetti, Davide Brambilla and Stefano Aquilini.

Indeed, together with F. Romano and M. Martino, this speaker was the author of the poster titled “Quantitative analysis of corneal staining by means of an image analysis software”.


Combining their expertise and competences on the “Pattern of complications associated to contact lenses“ Robin Chalmers and Anna Sulley talked about how to propose the best solutions in terms of contact lens materials and type of wear, by making the best use of the information on the risk factors associated to contact lens wear.

Finally, Prof. Desmond Fonn ideally closed the technical and scientific presentations with an extremely interesting paper addressing the future frontiers of contact lens practice: “In search of the ideal contact lens. How close are we?”.


The topics covered in the plenary session and others of special interest were further discussed in the technical and scientific workshops held by the speakers Robin Chalmers, Anna Sulley, Vittorio Roncagli, Stefano Barabino, Giorgio Parisotto, Monica Tabacchi, Silvio Maffioletti, Roberto Pregliasco and Antonio Calossi which saw broad attendance by the participants.


At the end of the Congress Emiliano Ricci made an “unscheduled” presentation and said good-bye to all participants in the 5th edition of the Assottica Congress by means of a passionate and striking lecture on the observation of the vault of heaven using the oldest astronomic instrument, i.e. our eyes.

Rome, October 8, 2007

(Source: Assottica “Contact Lens Group”)