NoIR Insight

The company was founded by entrepreneur A. Brooks Gleichert in 1972 under the name of Recreational Innovations, selling sunglasses with Ultraviolet (UV) and Infrared (IR) protection. UV blocking sunglasses were common, but IR protection was new, and offered relief from eye strain and fatigue by reducing the heat energy of the sun. These "No InfraRe... d" or NoIR glasses found a niche medical market with the visually impaired, and over the next 20 years, rather than compete in the high-end fashion sunglass realm, NoIRs provided relief and increased mobility for those with low vision conditions, for post-operative cataract patients and for PUVA psoriasis treatment patients. The company name changed in 1973 to NoIR Medical Technologies to more accurately reflect its medical focus. At about the same time Brooks bought an old 34-acre farm in South Lyon, MI, converting the farmhouse and barns into sales offices. His insistence that the company be a quality-of-life business made for a unique, relaxing sales, packaging, and shipping environment, with a casual dress code, a couple of horses and many dogs on the farm. Despite (or due to) the seemingly pastoral environment, the company grew, and the special lenses found additional technical applications in leak detection and forensics. In 1992, Brooks founded NoIR Manufacturing and brought manufacturing in house in a nearby industrial park: injection molding, anti-scratch coating, lens cutting and assembly, sewing of glasses cases and even private labeling for customers. By 1996, the high-tech eye protection line found a new market: laser safety eyewear. NoIR Laser Company was formed in 1996 as a partnership between Brooks, his wife and his three adult children, who all left successful careers to join the 'family business'. In the next 25 years, NoIR leveraged its technical strength of molding laser absorbing dyes into polycarbonate, and the primarily women-owned company became a laser safety leader in the surgical, dermatology, research and development, military, ...Read More