MELON SUNGLASSES 2025 PREVIEW

Retail Buyers Guide: Sunglasses 2025 Retail Buyer’s Guide
Brand: Melon
Interviewee: Neil Slinger / International Sales

How was the sunglasses market overall in 2024?
Its been a good year with a mix of “trends” and some old faithfuls performing nicely. It seems high performing sports models are still much sought after with customers partaking in a broad variety of sports be it on the mountains, biking, running and these designs also being worn in daily life too.

What new trends have you seen for sunglasses in board sports for 2025?
In the past years we saw a lot (and still do) see a lot of non performance focused eyewear – flat shapes, acetate material – but parallel to this we see a strong growth in performance models – so a snug fit, wrap around sun protection, large lens shields etc being important. Some of our strongest sales have also been in photochromic lenses on all models.

Which segment of your 2025 offering do you expect to sell best and why?
Photochromic. We are strongly focusing on our photochromic product offering – launching a broad range of colour photochromic lenses in our performance and lifestyle models – they key factor being they don’t look like typically goofy photochromic sunglasses from the outside – just from the inside out will you notice – photochromic undercover 😉

What new frame shapes and colours are in your 2025 offer?
We have our new JESTER performance shape, which is a combination of our long time successful Alleycat and our other fave the Kingpin. Taking the comfort fit of the Kingpin and using the lightweight half frame style of the Alleycat. We also introduced a fun full 90s throwback wrap model into the mix called the Dealer.

Which lens technologies from your 2025 offer are most in demand?
Vantage Photochromic…but not any old photochromic. We are mixing special lens bases e.g Trail base, snow base etc and combining them with a photochromic tech and a colour chroming on top – which hides the fact you are wearing photochromics – don’t worry those on the outside will not see your eyes peeking where they maybe shouldn’t be 😉

Have you introduced any new lens colours and tints in your 2025 offering?
We will be using tried and trusted lens colours on our new colour photochromic range.

Any noteworthy sustainable practices in your production and shipping processes this year?
We will be working this Summer together with the charity Sea Shepherd to launch a range of eyewear made from reclaimed and recycled fishing nets without any compromise on performance material qualities.

What are your marketing stories?
This Summer have 3 strong collabs running parallel. We continue our relationship with Iron Maiden, celebrating their 50 years anniversary with two new models including a hand crafted acetate limited edition model – cannot wait! We have our collab with Capcom’s Street Fighter 2 – which should get all classic gaming fans excited – to compliment the snow goggle line we also have a range of Street Fighter 2 lifestyle, gaming and performance sunglasses – with some designs representing the characters from the game such as Ryu and Guile. And finally we have our new collab with Sea Shepherd – being avid surfers in the team at Melon, the health of our oceans and its inhabitants is a priority. Our Sea Shepherd range will be made from reclaimed and recycled fishing nets while maintaining the performance qualities we are accustomed to.

How are you supporting retailers to sell this category?
As always at Melon thanks to our D2C business and NOS attitude we don’t put pressure on retailers – order what you feel comfortable with, if it works then reorder, if it doesn’t we can change it out – work together rather than against one another. Of course all our collabs come with POS to promote the marketing stories too. We even have a Street Fighter 2 arcade machine you can borrow 😉

Key Products:

IRON MAIDEN LAYBACK KILLERS:
A classic shape partnered with a classic Iron Maiden album cover art on the arms. A must for any Iron Maiden fan or those wanting a design different from the norm. Made from flexible TR90 material and impact resistant polarised lenses.

Layback Killers

STREET FIGHTER 2 KINGPIN RYU:
Release your inner Hadoken with this Ryu inspired Street Fighter 2 sunglasses design. A unique design featuring small Ryu details on the lens and his special move on the inside arm. Made from flexible Tr90 material, hypergrip rubber nose and arm grips and some of the best lenses on the planet.

Kingpin Ryu

JESTER:
The perfect blend of the comfy fit of our Kingpin sunglasses and the lightweight half frame of the Alleycat. Combined with a lifestyle friendly lens cut we have a sunglass that can do it all. Featuring hypergrip nose and arms, flexible Tr90 frame material and Zeiss Lenses.

Jester