MASAJ raises £1.5m led by FIGR Ventures and Sorven Capital
This article covers MASAJ, a female-founded bodywork healthtech startup, which has raised £1.5m in a seed funding round to accelerate studio openings and hire staff as it seeks to professionalise massage services in the UK. The funding aims to support the roll-out of standardised studio-based massage services and improved career conditions for therapists in the UK wellness sector.
MASAJ, a female-founded bodywork healthtech startup, has raised £1.5m in a seed funding round to accelerate studio openings and hire staff as it seeks to professionalise massage services in the UK. The funding underlines investor interest in consumer wellness models that pair consistent guest experiences with more stable careers for therapists.
Why it matters
Massage in the UK is a fragmented, largely unregulated market estimated to be worth at least £1.5bn a year. That fragmentation has left a gap for a trusted, repeatable brand delivering consistent quality at scale while also addressing the precarious, gig-style work many therapists face. MASAJ’s model aims to tackle both problems: standardised service protocols for guests and improved working conditions and career support for therapists. The round takes MASAJ’s total funding to £2m.
Inside the product
MASAJ runs high-street studios offering bespoke massage treatments delivered to consistent standards. Since launching in March 2021 the business says it has delivered more than 110,000 hours of massage across three studios, the latest opening in Islington in June. Customer metrics include more than 15,000 five-star reviews on Fresha and Google, a 40% monthly return rate among customers, and 43% revenue growth year-on-year in FY24/25. The company highlights a 90% therapist retention rate compared with an industry average of around 70%, and lists partnerships and collaborations with brands such as Nike, Gymshark and Home House.
Who are the investors?
The seed round was co-led by FIGR Ventures and Sorven Capital, with participation from angel investors including Giles Brook. FIGR Ventures becomes the first women-led fund on MASAJ’s cap table, and Managing Director Fiona O'Callaghan will take a board seat. MASAJ says the proceeds will fund team growth, additional London locations over the next 12 months and provide working capital to sustain rapid openings.
In the announcement, Fiona O'Callaghan, Managing Director at FIGR Ventures, said:
Over the past decade, we've seen hyper-specialist brands transform one beauty and wellness category after another – but the massage industry was a huge gap, until MASAJ. Scarlet and Alice understood that the sector was in deep need of transformation and professionalisation and that's exactly what they're doing. When you treat therapists with care, they're better set up to do their best for guests, building the consistency and trust that means they keep coming back – the foundation for a standout, scalable business.
In the announcement, Mark Philip-Sorenson, Founder & CEO at Sorven Capital, said:
Massage has long needed the same professionalisation we've seen sweep through the rest of wellness. Scarlet and Alice aren't just building studios, they're building a career path, turning what's been a gig-economy job into a role that's meaningful and valued. That's rare, and it's exactly the kind of team, with clear goals and real ambition, that we back at Sorven. We're excited to keep supporting them as they take this model to all corners of London and beyond.
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Founder perspective
In the announcement, Scarlet Amies, Co-founder & CEO at MASAJ, said:
London's wellness market is fragmented, with no trusted brand delivering consistently high-quality massage at scale. We set out to fix that – with modern, welcoming studios that offer a crucial place for stillness, where every guest gets a brilliant treatment every time, and where therapists get stable, well-supported careers rather than gig-economy instability. This funding will help us bring that to many more corners of London. When I set out to find aligned investors, my dream was a fund as invested in our mission as in our margins. We have two in FIGR and Sorven – mission-driven funds who truly understand the product and the gap in the market, and back founders with more than capital. They're hands-on, engaged and perfectly aligned with what we're building.
Amies positions MASAJ as both a consumer brand and an employer proposition: the product promise to customers is consistency and quality; the employer promise to therapists is stability and a career pathway.
The bigger picture
MASAJ’s raise sits within a wider trend of consolidation and professionalisation across wellness categories — nails, brows, blow-dries and facials have seen specialist chains emerge over the last decade, but massage has lagged. The company’s customer retention and therapist retention metrics help indicate product-market fit in a large but fragmented category.
The deal also reflects growing interest from healthtech investors and consumer-wellness backers in businesses that combine operational standards with improved worker conditions, a combination that can support repeat usage and stronger unit economics.
This funding round and intended London expansion will be a test case for whether a repeatable, studio-based massage model can scale across the UK and then into European markets where similar fragmentation persists.
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