As a leading distributor of wholesale sunglasses, we believe it is important for our customers to know as much as possible about the products they sell. Knowledge is power when it comes to convincing retail customers that you should be their go-to source for designer shades. With that in mind, how much do you know about polarized sunglasses?

Your primary focus may be on purchasing wholesale sunglasses at the best possible price so that you can turn around and sell them for a profit. We support you 100% in that endeavor. But many of your customers are concerned more about utility than anything else. They may ask about polarized sunglasses from time to time. More specifically, they may ask you how polarized sunglasses work.

In a phrase, it is all about the filter. Let us dig in and discuss how polarized sunglasses work in more detail.

Light Moves in Waves

Our industry credits Edwin Land for coming up with the first commercially marketable polarized sunglasses in the 1930s. Land knew that light moves through an environment in directional waves. The waves can move vertically, horizontally, or at any number of different angles.

This one fact explains why sun glare is such a problem. Light hitting the eyes from so many different angles creates the sensation of glare. If glare is intense enough, it can even be blinding. So the trick to preventing sun glare is to filter out some of the light. That is exactly what polarized sunglasses do.

A Filter in the Lenses

Polarized sunglasses have a filter embedded in the lenses. This filter reduces glare by preventing light moving in a particular direction from making it through. The easiest way to do this is to create a filter that lets in light waves of a single direction only. Today, the vertical filter is the most common.

A vertical filter blocks all light waves except those moving in a vertical direction. The vertical waves are the only ones that make it through the filter. Waves from multiple directions are no longer hitting the eyes, so sun glare is eliminated.

Why is the vertical filter the most common? Because our primary sources of sun glare in the modern world dictates as much. Think about it. Light reflecting off your car hood tends to move more horizontally. Likewise for water reflecting off a lake or river. It would make sense for the filter to not let those reflected light waves make it to the eyes.

What Polarization Does and Doesn't Do

This final point, what polarization does and doesn't do, is the most important thing for you to know on behalf of your customers. First of all, polarized sunglasses improve vision by filtering out glare. The consumer sees a clearer image through a polarized lens, an image with better contrast. This explains why anglers can clearly see fish in the water when wearing a pair of polarized sunglasses.

Here is the big thing in terms of what polarized sunglasses cannot do: block UV light. A polarization filter does not filter out UV waves. Rest assured that manufacturers have another solution in a UV filter. That's right. Polarized sunglasses that also block UV light have two filters embedded in the lenses: the polarization filter and the UV filter. But if a pair of sunglasses doesn't have that second filter, it does not block UV light.

Now you know about polarized sunglasses and how they work. Here at Olympic Eyewear, we hope you will make us your preferred choice for wholesale sunglasses for men and women. We have just what you need to keep your customers happy.