I’m not that old. “My dad’s Oakleys”…

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pc817@reddit

I had the exact ones, lost a lens and years later the then away while lamenting what a dumb kid I was, never imagined they doubled in value, what a dumb world

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flerchin@reddit

Man I wish Oakley still made metal ones like this.

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Changoguapo@reddit

They went to shit after Luxxotica bought them.

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fossilreef@reddit

You just described the whole eyewear market

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Changoguapo@reddit

There are still some independent brands out there.

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Knappyone@reddit

Curious who? I like small companies that make good products. I like knockaround but they might be china shit.

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flerchin@reddit

r/sunglasses has the answers. Not cheap at all, but there's still nice sunglasses.

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CottaBird@reddit

Oakleys are still in fashion if you love NASCAR.

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Gullible_Rich_7156@reddit

$15 Counterfeit Minutes at the local flea market were the shit!

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FlyingAnvils@reddit

I had the same exact pair in college. Had to carry a stick when I wore them just to knock the girls off my leg. 😂

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Collapsonaut@reddit

Pssh. All of the cool dads wore Over The Tops.

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IlllIlllIlllIlIlI@reddit

Memory unlocked. I remember how cool these looked worn by the vampire commandos in Blade 2.

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shootemupy2k@reddit

Tried these on once and they just didn’t fit me. The only person they ever looked good on IMO was Michael Jordon who was actually on Oakley’s board of directors at the time.

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fer_sure@reddit

Were those intended for ear amputees?

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Tetris_Pete@reddit

What's that? Sorry, I can't hear you.

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wabawanga@reddit

Nice, looks like it provides a lot of support

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HookersForJebus@reddit

For when you got them heavy hanger eyes.

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blong710@reddit

Gotta lift and separate those tired dad eyes.

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segsmudge@reddit

I forgot about those. What a wild design 👀

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Scrapla1@reddit

Made famous by that dude in the olympics

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SandersDelendaEst@reddit

lol are you telling me oakleys are “in” again?

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Unique_Blacksmith247@reddit

I saved all year for a pair of these bad boys. Electric mustard and I think I paid like $150ish back in the 90s. My dad HATED them, but I was so proud.

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GravyPainter@reddit

I was always tempted to buy them, but then i saw others wearing them and was like, nah

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TheGillos@reddit

I had ones like this. I thought I would get a chick like Jean Grey because I thought I looked like Scott Summers.

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absentlyric@reddit

I avoided hanging out with guys that wore these, for some reason, they were the ones most likely to get drunk and start fights with everyone at parties.

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trumpsmellslikcheese@reddit

And now they drive Dodge Rams with Punisher skull stickers on the back.

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butters_fruit_bowl@reddit

Yeah it was a basic way to advertise to be avoided

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Boozy_Cat_@reddit

…at parties, at the lake, in the Walmart parking lot, at a kids baseball game, at church.

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kalitarios@reddit

I had the ruby ones with the dark gunmetal frame. It's all I wanted for Christmas and I kept talking about how much I wanted a pair. I finally got them in 2023 as a gift from my (then) wife.

I was so happy. I loved those glasses! I had seen them on someone earlier that year and I really wanted my own pair. I wore them all over for 2 weeks and they fit perfectly. I'm not one to accessorize much (I actually hate jewelry, watches or anything that hangs off me... sensory thing).

Then they disappeared. I had kept them in my car's sunglass holder. I went nuts looking for them. I got hollered at by her that I had lost them. She gave me shit for not being careful with her gift she bought me. She had me completely depressed that I lost the present she bought me and continued to make remarks in front of other people and any time I was trying to feel better for about 2 months after that. Eventually I just gave up on it, and we didn't talk about it anymore.

After we were divorced, she confessed that she had actually took and returned them before the return period ended and kept the money for her nails and hair instead. I was absolutely heartbroken during that time, but she was a piece of shit that physically and emotionally abused me and wore me down. She had me completely convinced that I had lost them, gas lit me into apologizing and used it as leverage to never buy me nice things again. Our mutual friends thought I was a piece of shit who didn't care about things people did for me and stopped buying me gifts all together.

Best decision I could have made was to finally walk away from that relationship. Hardest one, too.

I'd love to rock another pair, but it just brings back bad memories for me.

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the_most_fortunate@reddit

Sorry you went through that. Good on you for walking away. The situation sounds familiar to me, not that I’ve been through exactly that, but I dated a psychopath for 2 years. She did a number on me too. Anyway I’m in a much better place now. Thanks for sharing your story, it resonates!

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-Gman_@reddit

What a bitch

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Pure-Mycologist193@reddit

The trouble is that the Oakley of yore was bought by one of the worst companies on Earth... Look up Luxottica sometime if you are curious.

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deephurting66@reddit

They got absorbed?? No wonder they are absolute shit now, Luxotica ruins everything it touches

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shootemupy2k@reddit

Oakley held out for a long time until Luxotica actually banned Oakley from all of their retail locations. Which naturally caused Oakley’s stock price to crater and Luxotica swooped in and bought them out.

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Quirky_Dog5869@reddit

Yep. I couldn't even buy new glasses for my 300 euro pair of sunglasses shortly after that take over. Store told me "they discontinued most lines and don't make the glasses anymore. The old factory still has quite a big inventory, but we are contractually not allowed to contact them anymore." But this is already an easy 20 years ago. I still mourn the nicest shades I've ever had.

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Ambitious_Jelly8783@reddit

ahhhh this makes sense... I was looking for some good sport glasses; and Oakleys are not what they were... I thought I was just misremembering....

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smurfkillerz@reddit

they didn't just get absorbed. If I'm remembering correctly, Luxottica, who owned places like sunglasses hut and all of the other popular lenses/glasses sellers tried to buy Oakley. When they refused, Luxottica refused to sell their product in any of their stores. Oakley was forced to open their own stores but by then it was too late and they had to sell to Luxottica. (This is all from memory so I may be off on a few facts) Luxottica is a cancer and inflates the prices of all sunglasses across the board. Their frames are made in the same factories as cheaper glasses but they pretty much have a monopoly.

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Big_Slope@reddit

Glasses too, my vision insurance is through Luxottica and the only place I can really use it to get glasses is as you can probably guess Luxottica owned stores.

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the_amazing_spork@reddit

As an ex-Sunglass Hut employee, who was there when Luxottica bought us out, I can confirm they are the absolute worst.

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Annhl8rX@reddit

Oakleys were one of those “I’m gonna buy some when I’m rich” kind of things when I was a kid. $100 for sunglasses seemed like an outrageous luxury purchase.

I only had one pair pre Luxottica, but they held on as a decent company at least for a while after the purchase. They reached out to me after a (positive) social media post I made about one of their products and asked for my address. They sent me a letter thanking me, and a free pair of glasses.

I also had a pair break when they were well out of warranty. I took them to an Oakley store to see if they could be fixed. The guy there said they didn’t do repairs anymore, but to submit a warranty claim anyway. I did, they approved it, and gave me $250 in store credit to replace them (which was double what I’d paid for the original glasses).

They used to have their own “outlet store” type website, Oakley Vault. I bought a bunch of clothes and stuff from there. When they started opening their own outlet stores, they shut it down. They had a “clear the vault” sale and everything was 75% off. I bought basically one of everything they had in my size. A huge portion of my wardrobe was Oakley for a few years. I still have a couple of the jackets I bought then, and they’re still great.

I haven’t had any of their stuff in well over a decade (their apparel went to shit so I stopped even going in the store), and I have no clue what their customer service is like now. I’d imagine it’s been long enough than any of the “real” Oakley people are long gone.

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hereforthelulzzzz@reddit

I still have a pair of these in a drawer. The rivets are loose and need to be refurbished.

I had a pair of Romeo’s first but they were stolen from a safe. I’m still bitter about that.

The biggest downside to these is if you put them on after leaving them in a car in the summer. It’s like holding the seatbelt buckle to your face

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Plugmyster@reddit

I had a pair of Ducati Juliettes, absolutely loved them, been at the bottom of my local wakeboarding lake for about 20 years, probably still good tho 😂

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CIarkNova@reddit

Your dad was a bicycle cop. Lol.

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-Gman_@reddit

Had the gunmetal gray and silver frames so that they were uniform appropriate. A gift to myself.

Left them at a friends house, they dropped them off and left them on my car and I drove away forgetting about them. Never saw them again and waited too long to replace them and they went extinct.

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KenPricoPrice@reddit

I was just reminiscing about those glasses after binge watching the first couple of Mission Impossible movies.

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MarvelousVanGlorious@reddit

https://i.redd.it/xk97fbg4r44h1.gif

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repdetec_revisited@reddit

lol. Those were like 300,000 back in the day

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zoey8068@reddit

I wanted these so bad. I worked at a ski shop that had a pair and got in trouble for trying them on all the time. I would tell people they weren't worth it so no one would buy them and I could get a bigger discount. Sadly they sold on a day I wasn't there.

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