My favourite soil is Pro Mix Organic Vegetable & Herb blend. I start in 500 ml pots (peanut butter tubs really). Used to be I'd up pot to 1 litre pots 3 or 4 weeks later, then to 3 litre for about 4 weeks, then to 10 litre a few days before flip. No nutes needed until about half way through flower.
Growing outside the plants go through the nutes in the new soil in about 2 weeks, so I use Mega Crop now instead of continuously up potting. Go from 1 litre to 15 (that's about 4 gallons).
I prefer growing straight in the ground outdoors though.
I agree with
@Wattzzup. As long as you don't go nuts and buy cactus blend or something from the dollar store most soil will be pretty comparable. I've never used FF soils though. Not sure where it's even sold up here. Amazon wants $75 for a 42 litre bag of FFOF, while I can get a 28 litre bag of the Pro Mix I mentioned for $9 at Canadian Tire.