Zenni eyewear was one of the first online prescription eyeglass companies I purchased from just before the “Pandemic”. I was pleased with their products in the past, so when I had had a terrible experience with Goggles4U, I ordered my next pair from Zenni.

My eyesight is close enough to 20/20 that I’ve passed DMV tests but I do notice difficulty reading names on roadsigns at night. Since my 20’s I’ve worn a pair of prescription sun glasses when driving and since my 50’s I’ve switched to bifocals to read the GPS maps on my dashboard/phone.

I ordered a prescription bi-focal in an aviator style frame for use as night time driving glasses. These were great for the first 6-7 months. I slowly noticed that at night the street lights and oncoming headlamps got progressively more glaring. On a night time drive, I really had problems with this starburst effect wearing my glasses to the point that I had to take them off and squint the rest of the way home.

At first I thought my eyesight may have gotten worse. But when I wore an older pair of prescription sunglasses, the starburst glare wan’t present at night. I compared it with some other older pairs of bifocals I owned with the same result: there was something wrong with my “new” Zenni bifocals.

The glasses were over 6 months old and well past the 30-day money-back-warranty. But my older Zenni glasses didn’t experience such a decay in performance, which made me think there may be something wrong how the lenses were manufactured (China much?) I went to Zenni to find out.

I went to the Zenni.com and asked on their Customer Service, what could be happening to my glasses? Their Customer Service Rep immediately emailed me and recommended I try gently cleaning them with warm water and mild dishwashing detergent. I did that but this is the result; no improvement. I sent them these photos to explain the situation.

Then Zenni did something I didn’t expect them to. They apologized for the inconvenience and offered to send me the exact same glasses to replace these ones. The contrast between Zenni and Goggles4U’s customer service attitude was dumbfounding.

I agreed and waited for the glasses. I set up a pinpoint light source to mimic a night time headlamp and tested the new glasses against my old. And the new ones were crystal clear.

I asked the Zenni Rep what could have caused the smearing of light (chromatic bberration) and she said that based on the photos I sent, their technicians believe the glasses were undergoing “Crazing”. This is a degradation of the lens coatings due to excessive heat or chemical reaction.

I don’t know what could be causing the crazing. I live in San Francisco where a “heat wave” is anything above 75ºF so I doubt excessive heat. Moreover, I’ve always kept my driving glasses in my car, but my older prescription glasses never experienced crazing? Perhaps it was the new “carbon microfiber” cleaning tools I’m using now? So far I’ve not found any blogs or posts relating to damage caused by these cleaning tools.

In the end I’m glad this video ended well. I got a brand new pair of glasses from a company I liked before the experience, and absolutely gush about afterwards. I’m not sponsored by Zenni but I sure wish I was.