Carole Riehl is a former French optician and the founder of Optic for Good, the first international label dedicated to sustainable eyewear. She has been recognized as a global expert in sustainable development within the eyewear and optical industry. Carole also led RecyclOptics, a non-profit organization creating circular solutions for optical waste, and raised environmental awareness through the COLD (Congress of Optical and Sustainable Eyewear) conference. She regularly spoke at industry events and advocated for transparency, life cycle assessment, and eco-responsibility in medical devices. Today, she focuses on supporting the well-being and empowerment of women entrepreneurs.

The Social Digest: Could you share the moment or experience that truly made you realize the optical industry needed a sustainability shift?
I’ve been an optician since 2001, but my environmental awareness in this field began in 2012. I had just closed my first ethical fashion business, which focused on fair trade and organic cotton, and was returning to optics. That’s when I wondered: Do eco-friendly glasses even exist?
In 2014, I launched the blog Les Lunettes Écologiques Magazine to find out — and to bring together all the eyewear brands working in this direction. That was the real turning point.

The Social Digest: What personal values continue to guide your work today?
Although I had to shut down the Optic for Good company recently, I remain deeply driven by three things: people, environmental respect, and finding meaningful, realistic solutions that serve both.

The Social Digest: What sets the Optic for Good label apart from other eco-labels or CSR initiatives in the fashion and lifestyle sectors?
When I started thinking about a label in 2018, I first looked at what already existed. Most initiatives didn’t address the specific challenges of the optical industry. That’s when I realized how poor the traceability really was — people literally don’t know what they’re wearing on their face. Optic for Good was born to respond to this lack of transparency with tools like product life cycle analysis (LCA) and ethical audits, fully adapted to our industry.

The Social Digest: Many consumers aren’t aware that most major eyewear brands belong to a handful of multinational groups. In your view, what effect does this concentration of power have on sustainability and transparency?
It cuts both ways. These conglomerates have the resources to implement real sustainability policies. But it’s often the smaller, independent brands who want to make that shift — because it gives purpose to their work and respects the craftsmanship behind eyewear. Sadly, they often lack the financial power to certify their efforts or meet strict regulatory requirements. And without that recognition, the most virtuous players are invisible.

The Social Digest: There’s a growing concern that “bio-acetate” or “eco-materials” are often used in marketing without real proof of environmental benefit. Have you encountered blatant greenwashing in the optical sector? Can you share an example?
Absolutely. One of the most common examples is the claim that a frame is “bio” simply because it’s made of bio-acetate. But in France and the EU, the term “bio” (organic) is strictly reserved for food products — not consumer goods. Using it this way is misleading and confuses customers.
France has a public guideline on environmental claims, published by ADEME, that outlines what can and cannot be said. The EU is working on similar rules — but unfortunately, political pushback is weakening these efforts.

6. Some luxury or designer eyewear brands produce in the same factories as cheaper brands, yet charge huge mark-ups. Do you think this undermines trust, or could higher margins actually help fund sustainability?
It’s hard to assess because of the lack of transparency. The same factory can produce multiple brands, but that doesn’t mean costs are the same — some invest heavily in R&D, design, or eco-innovation. But the real problem is that most consumers don’t have access to this information. Without traceability, it’s impossible to know what’s behind the price tag.

The Social Digest: The industry’s carbon footprint includes not just frames, but lenses, packaging, and especially global logistics. Which part, in your opinion, is the “dirtiest secret” of the eyewear supply chain?
Thanks to my involvement, optics was recently included in a major French study on healthcare decarbonization by The Shift Project. It’s a first step.
The biggest blind spot? Energy mix. If your frames are manufactured using coal-based electricity, the impact is drastically higher than in countries with low-carbon energy. Local production alone isn’t enough if it’s powered by dirty energy.

The Social Digest: If you had the power to change one regulation or law to accelerate sustainability in optics, what would it be?
Mandatory end-of-life responsibility for eyewear products. Right now, there’s zero obligation in our sector. Without regulation, brands can simply ignore the issue. If we enforced end-of-life management, it would force companies to track material composition, improve traceability, and ultimately design better systems.

The Social Digest: Finally, what message would you like to share with young entrepreneurs trying to combine business with ecological values?
Ecological entrepreneurship isn’t just an option — it’s the future of every industry. Even if we’re seeing global setbacks in environmental policy, we have no choice but to act. We live on a planet with finite resources. Business must learn to respect those limits — and thrive within them.

Here is Carole Riehl’s LinkedIn Profile : https://www.linkedin.com/in/carole-riehl-152a1736/

This interview was conducted by Vansh Shah, The Social Digest on 20/10/2025. If you have any interview recommendations or have a story that you want to share with our readers, get in touch with our editor Vedant Bhrambhatt, at editor@thesocialdigest.com