Science-Backed Skincare Brand Mark Los Angeles Launches Retail And Spa Distribution With Formula Fig

Mark Los Angeles, the luxury skincare brand rooted in the principles of pharmaceutical science, has made its brick-and-mortar debut at Formula Fig.

The seven-unit high-tech facial chain has its $48 E.Q. Gentle Cleanser in its backbar and retail assortment, and its $108 E.Q. Rescue Serum is joining the cleanser in the retail assortment. “People really need to interact with it in person,” says Mark Menning, co-founder and CEO of Mark Los Angeles. “Having Formula Fig as that launch partner is right on the money for us.” 

Mark Los Angeles’s premiere at Formula Fig kicks off broader plans to expand its retail presence. The brand has tapped strategic growth consultancy KSJ Collective to steer its retail strategy. It aims to land in at least five to 10 independent boutiques or aestheticians’ offices before partnering with a mid-sized multi-brand retailer. Although the brand has entered the Amazon fray, the giant e-tailer isn’t a priority yet as it focuses on four-wall retail partners first. 

The goal for Mark Los Angeles is to eventually generate 70% to 80% of its revenues from retail. According to Menning, in the early goings for the brand, retail is performing more strongly for it than its website. 

After decades of tinkering in the laboratories of pharmaceutical giants DuPont Pharmaceuticals, Amgen and Gilead Sciences, where he specialized in developing drug delivery systems, Menning launched Mark Los Angeles with COO Dee Khalsa last year. The brand’s products combine plant-based flavonoids, a class of compounds such as epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), a component of green tea, and quercetin, which is found in fruits, vegetables, leaves, seeds and grains, known for their antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and antiviral properties, with a delivery system called XDF or Transdermal Flavosomes to enhance their effectiveness. 

Mark Los Angeles’ formulas are designed to address breakouts, brighten skin tone and reduce fine lines, wrinkles and inflammation. In a crowded skincare market, it’s betting that XDF will help it stand out from competitors. The brand invested in clinical studies prior to introducing its products. It discovered, for example, that 74% of clinical studies participants saw acne and breakouts reduce from using E.Q. Rescue Serum daily for 6 weeks.

“You have peptides, you have collagen, hyaluronic acids, ceramides, all of those do not penetrate the skin,” says Menning. “If you want to really effect change in the skin, you have to do it sub-epidermis. That’s where we’re penetrating…We’re about 300 nanometer penetration depth. Average skin depth is about 600 nanometer.”

A 2024 nominee in Beauty Independent’s Beacon Awards program for its skincare, Mark Los Angeles has filed for patent protection on XDF in the United States and 50 other countries. Attorney fees have cost the brand between $100,000 and $200,000 to date. Menning is adamant that the value of patents will outweigh the costs of securing them. “It’s important to have long-term value-add for the company,” he says. “If I couldn’t patent anything, I don’t know if I’d venture into this because I really want something truly unique.” 

Priced at $18 each, Mark Los Angeles’ latest products are Lip Rescue Serum and Lip Health Balm. They’re formulated to combat cold sores with a complex of five flavonoids and keep HSV-1, the virus that causes cold sores, from spreading. The lip products were tested on 25 people who applied them every three to four hours as their sole cold sore treatment. The testers reported 100% faster healing and that their healing time was cut in half to as little as one day.

Mark Los Angeles plans to leverage the lip products’ comparable affordability to hop on TikTok, where affordability is a particularly strong motivator for sales. Anti-aging and eye cream products are in the brand’s product development pipeline. 

In 2014, after leaving Gilead, Menning segued into entrepreneurship with Nucleo Life Sciences, a pharmaceutical services company providing drug products to corporations like Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson. He sold the business to CoreRx, a pharmaceutical contract development and manufacturing company, in 2021, and it since was rebranded as Bend Bioscience. 

At Gilead, Menning helped launch Truvada, an antiviral drug approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration in 2004 for the treatment of HIV infections before it was approved again eight years later as a preventative medicine. Not without its controversies, Truvada racked in more than $36 billion for Gilead by 2019. 

So far, Mark Los Angeles has relied heavily on Instagram to build awareness and educate customers on the science behind its products. Menning is focused on creating forward-facing videos to explain it and share clinical study data and before-and-after photos. Khalsa admits brand recognition is Mark Los Angeles’s biggest challenge and partnering with professionals and fellow brands is a strategy it’s pursuing to raise it. 

Mark Los Angeles isn’t in a rush to bring investors to its cap table. Menning’s previous experience taught him that delaying investment can be a good move. He held out on reeling in outside investment when he was operating Nucleo Life Sciences. He says, “I’m glad I did because, at the end of the day, I was able to drive that process and court suitors for acquisition, which I did all through my network.”