Welcome to In the Loupe, a Blog about Magnifiers

Welcome to In The Loupe, our blog about Magnifiers.

Magnifico (The Magnifier Company)

By way of introduction, Magnifico was established in 1999 as a small company selling magnifiers online. Our range includes everything from a traditional hand-held Classic Magnifier, to Fresnel Lenses, Linen Testers, Loupes and Magnifying Lamps. We also supply helpful carefully-selected, helpful Low Vision products like our Needle Threader and Liquid Level Indicator.      

Everyone can make life easier by using one of our magnifiers!

Of course everyone knows that magnifiers are great for reading books, enlarging stamps, studying maps and enlarging tiny insects. They are invaluable as magnifying aids for the blind, and for those with impaired or low vision. Magnifiers are great for elderly users – or indeed anyone over the age of 40 who finds their eyes no longer focus as quickly as they used to. And there are also countless professional uses for magnifiers – archivists, science lab technicians, production line inspectors, crime scene detectives and beauty therapists could not manage without them.

• For reading, maps, art and craft, beauty work and viewing images
• For DIY, repair, industrial and medical inspection and some outdoor tasks
• For ‘spot’ tasks like reading mail, contractual documents, food packaging, medicine jars, instruction manuals
• For many other tasks around office or home

“Kill them with kindness”

This blog is dedicated to the memory of the greatest friend our business ever had -the late Joe Zalman, owner and president of the famous US magnifier company UltraOptix.

It is probably no exaggeration to say that without Joe’s help Magnifico may never have got off the ground. We came across the fabulous UltraOptix range back in 1999 and placed a small opening order covering perhaps a dozen or so lines. These lines formed the backbone of the Magnifico range, along with several under our own brand. There was nobody better than Joe at finding great magnifiers and it is a testament to his expertise and product selection skills that virtually all the original lines we started with are still going strong today.

Joe was incredibly loyal to us and always gave us his time so promptly even though we must have seemed like the tiniest of minnows by comparison to his giant US customers like Walmart and Staples. His philosophy was to “kill people with kindness” – the perfect way to deal with any problem, sometimes irrespective of cost. Time and again he would win over people with a simple approach that is easy to praise but sometimes requires an awful lot of pride to swallow!

We were so sad in early 2017 to hear that our lovely friend had passed away after bravely enduring several years of failing health. We miss his kindness, his humour and his generosity and hope the words on these pages convey the same enthusiasm for magnifiers that we always shared with him.