Face Foundrie Plans To Nearly Triple Its Fleet Of Facial Bars This Year

Face Foundrie plans to reach many more faces this year.

The express facial bar concept expects to roughly triple its brick-and-mortar footprint in 2023. Currently, it has 22 locations in 13 states, five of which opened between November and December of last year. In total, 65 locations are scheduled to open by the end of 2023 in cities and neighborhoods across the country, including Atlanta, Philadelphia, Austin, Denver, Dallas, Raleigh, Phoenix, Seattle, Chicago, San Diego, Salt Lake City, Las Vegas, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach.

Michele Henry, founder and CEO of Face Foundrie, says, “We have a really aggressive growth path for 2023 that we feel we can navigate efficiently through the systems and operations we’ve put into place and how we’ve structured our growth in the past,” says 

Launched in 2019 with a single location in the Minneapolis suburb of Edina, Face Foundrie had expanded to three corporate locations around the Twin Cities by March 2020 when the onset of the pandemic put a temporary kibosh on launching the business’s franchising model. Expansion plans resumed in 2021, and the business sold 45 franchising units and grew 179% year-over-year. 

Twenty-five percent of new store openings in 2023 will be corporate locations, and franchise locations will make up the balance. Face Foundrie’s revenues are forecast to grow again by triple digits this year. Over 125 locations are anticipated to be open by the end of 2024.

Face Foundrie locations average in size from 1,200 to 1,800 square feet, but vary in format, allowing it to have freestanding street, indoor mall and high-end open-air shopping centers outposts. “We really try to acclimate to the location and to the areas that these stores go into,” says Henry. “We wanted to create a portfolio that franchisees could look at and say, ‘That looks like a location I want to replicate.’” 

In January 2022, Forbes reported that Face Foundrie had generated in excess of $10 million in revenue. Henry declined to comment on specific financial figures, but reports that the business has surpassed its 2021 revenues by “a significant amount.”

Face Foundrie is gaining momentum as facial bar service concepts heat up. Clean Your Dirty Face is expanding its franchised store fleet nationwide and in-house product line. Formula Fig will soon land in the United States with a Los Angeles location. Today, it has a four-unit network in Vancouver and Toronto. Glowbar has reeled in $10 million and has multiplied locations in New York and Connecticut. Heyday, an early mover in the facial bar space, recently raised $12 million to fuel franchise expansion in the U.S. It’s raised just over $45 million since 2015.

Face Foundrie hasn’t taken on outside funding, but Henry believes Heyday’s raise underscores the immense opportunity for express facial bars. “I believe in the saying ‘a high tide raises all ships’ and having competition in this field is good for everyone, especially the client,” she says. “The market is changing and clients are looking for ways they can get results while maximizing their time and discretionary income.” 

After a search for an approachable and affordable destination for facials in the Minneapolis area turned up empty, Henry decided to launch Face Foundrie in 2018. She says, “I really wanted to commit to a place that made people feel good, and ultimately it was a big leap of faith because this concept did not exist in our marketplace.”

Face Foundrie isn’t Henry’s first time trying her hand at entrepreneurship. In 2010, she launched Primp Boutique, a Minneapolis-based clothing boutique business, with a partner. At the time of her departure eight years later, Primp had grown to eight brick-and-mortar locations and $25 million in annual sales. 

Face Foundrie offers five different 40-minute facials priced from $69 to $79, depending on the market. Hydrafacial services are available for a flat price of $174. Customers can personalize facials with enhancements priced from $10 to $35 such as LED light therapy, scalp massage, facial cupping, jelly masks, lip masks, collagen eye masks, chemical peels and dermaplanning. Lash and brow services are also available.

Face Foundrie’s Sculpt Facial incorporating Hungarian massage techniques and facial cupping is a bestselling treatment. Dermaplanning and collagen masks are popular, too. Mixing and matching treatments to suit clients’ individual needs was top of mind for Henry as she conceptualized Face Foundrie’s service menu. She says, “I wanted a menu that would cater to just about anyone at any stage in their life or skincare journey.” 

Face Foundrie’s core customers are young professionals aged 25 to 40 earning on average $75,000-plus in annual income. Over 101,000 appointments were booked at Face Foundrie locations in 2022, and it has 5,000 members. Henry says its hands-on education and competitive prices keep customers coming back. 

“Keeping our price points approachable is really important in staying true to our core mission,” she emphasizes. “And we pride ourselves on hiring super knowledgeable aestheticians who are warm and welcoming to build personal connections and trust with our customers.”

Eight to fifteen aestheticians are typically on staff at a Face Foundrie location. The number of beds ranges from four to eight. Most of the company’s aestheticians are graduates of Savant Aesthetics Institute, a skincare school Henry founded a year ago as a separate business. Students aren’t automatically locked into future positions at Face Foundrie. However, Henry points out the school has helped tremendously in streamlining the facial bar business’s onboarding process.

Third-party brands like Grown Alchemist, Supergoop, Bioeffect and PCA Skin are sold on Face Foundrie’s direct-to-consumer website. In its locations, aestheticians exclusively use its new eponymous in-house brand for treatments. Launched in October last year, Face Foundrie’s product line has six stockkeeping units encompassing day cream, night cream, serum, oil, exfoliator and mask priced between $56 and $74. 

“We were trying to cater to every different skin type and any allergy with products that were multifunctional. We started with 10 SKU’s originally, but that was way too many,” says Henry. “So, we asked our team and our clients, ‘What do you truly need in a core routine?’ We ended up going through thousands of samples.”

Over 38,000 products were sold last year from the Face Foundrie line, per Henry. It accounts for 20% to 30% of the company’s sales. The Blue Stuff, a serum with niacinamide, hyaluronic acid and vitamins C and E, is the line’s bestseller. 

To open a Face Foundrie franchise location, the costs run from $200,000 to over $350,000, including an upfront $44,000 franchising fee. Ongoing fees include a 7% royalty fee and a 2% marketing contribution. Franchisees must have a net worth of at least $350,000 plus $150,000 in liquid assets to be considered. 

“We’ve been really fortunate with finding franchisees that really know their location and can speak to the community,” says Henry. “We’ve had some come out of the woodwork and pitch us on a market that they are very passionate about. It might not be that tier one city, but we still see the opportunity there. That’s a big reason why we wanted to franchise this.”

In addition to expanding its physical locations in 2023, Face Foundrie is focused on introducing a consumer-facing branded app in the first quarter. The app will enable customers to streamline appointment booking and contain unique information about their skin type and concerns. Face Foundrie’s product line will be enlarged with two releases this year. 

International expansion is on Henry’s radar after the company recently received an in-bound surge of interested global franchisees. Still, that’s likely a few years out as Face Foundrie prioritizes its burgeoning U.S. business. Henry says, “It’s certainly something we are excited about down the line with bolstered resources and additional personnel to help cover the bandwidth needed to take on such a vigorous endeavor.”