Just over a year after buying back his namesake haircare brand, WWD has reported that Frédéric Fekkai is reintroducing it to the market.
The brand new line, now sustainable, clean and vegan, is today launching in Target, target.com and fekkai.com. It will then be rolled out to broader mass retail and various international markets, including the UK, France, Canada, and Asia later in the spring.
Since it was founded in 1995 as a joint venture with Chanel, the Fekkai brand has undergone a large number of changes, including acquisitions to Catterton and Procter & Gamble. Last year, it also partnered with private investment firm, Cornell Capital, to acquire Fekkai Brands – the joint venture created by Designer Parfums and Luxe Brands that purchased the business in 2015.
And with Fekkai himself now back in charge (and aided by Blue Mistral CEO and beauty industry veteran, Pierre Lampert), the brand is said to be completely reinvented and “ready to languish no more.”
“We’re very proud – we’ve been working very hard with a lab to develop a formula to replace the [original] Fekkai line with the same purposes and same great performances, but without silicones, sulfates, parabens and phthalates,” Fekkai told WWD.
When the brand originally launched in the mid ‘90s, Fekkai said it had different goals, seeking to bring the very high-end, high-performance, salon-tested formulas to consumers. Now, although consumers still want high-performance products, he believes they are “far more concerned than ever” with ingredients.
“It’s not a trend, this clean beauty,” he said. “I look at myself and how my life has changed in the last five years – I’m vegan, I banned plastic in my house three years ago. There are no plastic straws, no plastic cups in the office.”
Although Fekkai declined to discuss sales figures, industry sources have estimated that the brand could generate US$50 million of sales in its first year. The price point is currently at $20 per product, which is at the higher end of the mass market.
