Lifestyle

Wax bar to franchise powerhouse: How Foxy Box scaled a taboo service into a national brand

What started as a scrappy idea in Kyla Dufresne’s Victoria dining room has scaled across Canada through a values-driven franchise system now eyeing U.S. expansion.

By Irene Chuang /

Successful businesses often aren’t born from spreadsheets—but grow out of moments that resonate with consumers. For Victoria’s Kyla Dufresne, founder of Foxy Box Laser + Wax Bar, that moment came from personal frustration. Thirteen years ago, while bartending and putting herself through aesthetics school, she struggled to book a wax appointment. A thought struck: “Why isn’t there a place that specializes in this—fast, approachable, and fun?”

What began as a practical idea quickly evolved into a mission: to strip away stigma and create an experience that felt empowering and inclusive. Drawing on her bartending experience in customer service and hospitality—and fueled by determination—Dufresne set up shop in the dining room of her shared house. That marked the beginning of Foxy Box.

Learning the hard way

From the start, Dufresne set out to build something unapologetically different in the hair removal space: a brand that felt approachable and relaxed rather than clinical or intimidating. But bringing that vision to life came with what she jokingly calls her “Harvard education” in entrepreneurship.

In the early days, she hustled to find clients willing to let her practice. The idea of getting a Brazilian wax from a bartender-turned-beauty-entrepreneur felt taboo to many, and the service itself still carried stigma. The turning point came when she opened her first storefront in B.C.’s capital. With a clear separation between her nightlife persona and her new venture, strangers began walking in—seeking a service they once thought was only available in big cities.

Dufresne’s path was anything but linear. At one point, she rebranded Foxy Box as a full-service beauty salon—an experiment that lasted a year before she “burned it to the ground” and returned to her focus on hair removal. Later, selling her first franchise without a plan left her in what she describes as “complete chaos.” Instead of walking away, she hired a franchise coach, built the systems she lacked and came back stronger.

The real validation came when she opened her first and then second storefronts. “People were thrilled to finally have a no-judgment space for Brazilians,” she recalls. “That’s when I knew this could be big.”

Scaling with values

What sets Foxy Box apart isn’t technical expertise alone but the culture Dufresne has built around it. She started with little more than an idea and quickly surrounded herself with skilled aestheticians and business mentors, absorbing their knowledge and reinvesting it into the company.

That ethos has shaped the brand well beyond the treatment room. Foxy Box was among the first in its industry to drop gendered language from its services, and it has committed to sustainable practices through Green Circle certification. At its core, the company is about inclusivity—making sure everyone who walks through the door feels accepted.

For Dufresne, growth only works if it preserves the company’s values. To make sure Foxy Box’s culture carries through at every location, she and her team have built systems that guide everything from hiring practices to how franchisees navigate difficult conversations. Franchise partners aren’t just operators, she says—they’re an extension of the brand.

The vetting process is deliberate. Prospective owners go through a thorough discovery phase, measured against what Dufresne calls the “four C’s”: culture fit, capitalized, capable, and coachable. The careful approach ensures that as Foxy Box scales, it doesn’t lose the character that set it apart in the first place.

Franchise as proof point

Franchising raised the stakes for Dufresne. It wasn’t just about her own success anymore—she was responsible for supporting other entrepreneurs. Her advice to anyone considering the leap: join the Canadian Franchise Association for guidance and community.

Her first experience with franchising was a surprise. She assumed her earliest partners would be aestheticians, but instead the initial franchisees were a restaurant owner and his wife, frustrated with the thin margins of the food business. “Realizing that seasoned entrepreneurs saw value in what we’d built made me incredibly proud,” she recalls. It was proof that Foxy Box was more than a passion project—it was a viable business model.

Today, with 24 locations across B.C., Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec, franchise support is structured and ongoing. Partners receive coaching, proven systems and even emotional support—because, as Dufresne puts it, “owning a business is a rollercoaster.” Every week, the company circulates key performance indicators from all locations in a single email, encouraging accountability and a culture where franchisees root for each other’s success.

With a Montreal opening on the horizon and plans to expand into the U.S., Foxy Box is still in its early chapters. For Dufresne, the goal is simple: keep growing while holding onto the culture that started it all.