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Bernell Corporation was started by Bernard Vodnoy and his wife Elsye in 1954. After selling the company, it ran into financial problems. In 1997, the company's assets and name were purchased and the company was rebuilt by Charles Shearer OD, Craig Andrews OD, and his wife Judy. Andrews and Shearer were classmates in Optometry School (IU 1979). Dr. Shearer had been a consultant with Bernell since graduation.
Bernell is the world leader in visual therapy equipment, and is a division of Vision Training Products, Inc. headquartered at 4016 N. Home Street, Mishawaka, IN 46545. The company is run by Al Martin.
The company has distributors in 32 countries and sells 30 percent of its products outside the US. Bernell sends out a yearly catalog and sells by internet at www.bernell.com Bernell was approached by Nike in 2010 to sell their strobe goggles for them. The company wanted their product introduced through optometrists. We sold them for almost a year prior to their selling the strobes themselves on nike.com Unfortunately, a new vice president replaced the one in charge who had retired. It was not his project and the goggles were damaged by perspiration affecting the electronics so they dumped the program. In 2015, a group of employees who had helped develop the strobe and sensory station were able get the rights to their designs. The new Senaptec strobes are much darker than the original and are more water resistant than the originals. They became available in April 2016. see http://www.bernell.com/product/STROBE/1182 The Sensory Station is available at http://www.bernell.com/product/5356/Software