Formula Fig Teams Up With Debut To Launch Biotech-Powered Products In The Professional Channel

Formula Fig is gearing up to launch a product line, which for the first time in the professional beauty channel will feature biotechnology-derived active ingredients from L’Oréal-backed startup Debut.

Called By Formula Fig, the line is slated to arrive on shelves at the high-end and high-tech facial concept in the third quarter of next year before broadening its retail reach a year or two later. It will start with four to five products that could include a cleanser, essence, mask and two serums with an average price of around $80. Founded in 2019 by CEO Jessica Walsh and CFO Anita Chan, Formula Fig currently has seven locations in Canada and the United States and is testing the products in its treatments.

“We didn’t launch product early on because we wanted to be very thoughtful in how we launched it, what we were launching, why we were launching it so it wasn’t just a flash in the pan,” says Walsh. “We’re going back to our foundations. At Formula Fig, we’re very much medical-led, and we believe in products that are clinically based.”

Joshua Britton, CEO and founder of Debut, says, “Biotech is a way to increase her position in the professional market and provide a level of differentiation that is very unique. She’s the first to do it, and we hope that many, many more will follow. There’s so much science that goes into it. It belongs in the professional segment. If you look forward to 2025, you’ll see both indie and major brand adoption of biotech and now professional.”

For a beauty industry dependent on natural ingredients and petrochemicals imperiled by or rendered unfavorable because of climate change, biotech has emerged as a promising generator of stable. eco-conscious ingredients, and funding has poured into it. Last year, Debut raised a $40 million series B round led by BOLD, L’Oréal’s venture capital fund, to exceed $70 million in total funding. The company estimates its ingredient production requires 99% less land and water than the production of standard beauty ingredients.

However, for contemporary beauty consumers, sustainability isn’t as persuasive an inducement to buy as results, and Debut is placing skincare performance at the heart of its proposition as it tries to appeal to brand clients serving them. Its entrance into the professional market, where results are paramount, showcases its ability to offer ingredients and manufacture products premised on it.

“Those who amplify the performance of biotech over sustainability will ultimately be successful.”

“The brands who are going after sustainability as the anchor are incorrect,” says Britton. “I think biotech is inherently sustainable, but can deliver higher performing ingredients, and those who amplify the performance of biotech over sustainability will ultimately be successful.”

Along with usage in treatments, Formula Fig has been working with Debut to develop products with pre- and post-treatment functions for consumers taking them home. They’re expected to have claims involving the reduction of wrinkles and recovery periods, wound healing and soothing or anti-redness.

Walsh says about three-quarters of By Formula Fig’s initial products will incorporate Debut’s ingredients. One ingredient will be naringenin, a biotech version of a polyphenol typically from citrus fruit powering Debut’s in-house skincare brand Deinde. Others Formula Fig will be able to be an early mover on. Debut’s intellectual property pipeline is packed with 7,000 proprietary ingredients. Encompassing its launch products, Formula Fig has a suite of some 15 products ready to go.

In a survey of U.S. consumers, market research firm Mintel found only 20% have heard of biotech’s role in beauty. At Formula Fig, Walsh says, “I don’t know if right now our guests are there yet. They will be in a few years. Everyone will be in a few years, and I quite like being ahead of the curve.”

Although Formula Fig is the first brand in the professional beauty channel it’s teamed up with, Debut’s client roster contains over 100 brands. The company has inked an agreement with L’Oréal on more than a dozen biotech ingredients set to replace conventionally sourced ingredients in the conglomerate’s skincare, haircare, color cosmetics and fragrance brands. Skincare has been Debut’s core category to date, but it’s spreading across categories and is creating biotech-driven fragrance molecules.

Brands can’t have exclusivity on Debut’s ingredients, according to Britton. To access the ingredients, he says they must manufacture their products through its custom and white-label contract manufacturing business unit BiotechXBeautyLabs. The unit outsources manufacturing to partners and can execute minimum order quantities as small as 5,000 to 10,000 pieces or as large as hundreds of thousands of pieces. Britton projects it will hit $100 million in revenues in the next five years.

“I quite like being ahead of the curve.”

The United States Department of Defense has awarded San Diego-headquartered Debut $2 million to draw up business and technical plans for the construction of a domestic bio-industrial manufacturing production facility. The company may receive up to $100 million in follow-on awards as part of a program to spur onshoring foreign production. Incoming President Donald Trump’s proposal to increase tariffs on foreign goods could facilitate production onshoring, too.

At BiotechXBeautyLabs, Britton says formulation is free and brands obtain ownership of their formulations. He figures the cost to manufacture at it is equal to or under the cost to manufacture at its competitors. BiotechXBeautyLabs employs contract research organizations in the U.S. to run clinical studies on the formulas it handles.

Formula Fig is in the midst of pursuing a series A funding round with the goal of securing $12 million by the end of the opening quarter of 2025. It previously raised $575,000 from friends and family. For investors in physical beauty concepts, products are often viewed as profit boosts that can connect the concepts to customers even when they’re not getting a treatment and have the potential to extend its business beyond their four-wall environments.

While it hasn’t sold its own products so far, Formula Fig has experience retailing products—30% of its business is via retail—and educating people on them during treatments, where it’s learned brand names, efficacy and price points are key purchase considerations. It cherry-picks products from roughly 50 brands for its discovery-oriented retail assortment. Venn, Retrouvé, Saltyface, Margin, Juna, Somerset Moss, Epara and Sofie Pavitt Face are among the brands.

Formula Fig’s sales grew 40% last year. It has 3,500-plus members who receive a range of perks, from discounts to event invitations, and conducted 400,000-plus treatments throughout its history. Priced at $165 for members and $185 for drop-ins, its most popular treatment is the 30-minute All-In with diamond-tip microdermabrasion, ultrasound, microcurrent, LED light therapy and an ultrasonic skin slider.

Formula Fig’s seven locations are concentrated in Vancouver, Toronto and Los Angeles, and it intends to add two locations in 2025 and seven within the next three years. Last year, Walsh told Beauty Independent that New York and London are possibilities for expansion. Formula Fig’s locations have three to five treatment rooms completing about 15 services per day. Nearly 60% of its customers are 25- to 35-year-olds, and it plants its first location in an area where they’re concentrated to garner a foothold with trendsetters and then subsequent locations can skew older for greater retention.