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Inside Ulta Beauty’s Big, Bold Year

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Inside Ulta Beauty’s Big, Bold Year

The specialty beauty retailer is the recipient of the 2026 WWD Honor for Public Beauty Company of the Year.

Ulta Beauty kicked off 2026 as so many do in the new year: doubling down on wellness.

The specialty beauty retailer, which is the largest in the U.S., in January unveiled its new Wellness by Ulta shops-in-shop, giving the category an expanded assortment, new educational resources and more dedicated retail space across select stores. The aim? To keep Ulta at the cutting edge of not just beauty, but personal well-being writ large as category lines continue to intersect.

It’s a goal that the Bolingbrook, Ill.-based retailer has remained steadfast in, if its year-to-date performance is any indication.

For its second quarter ending Aug. 1, Ulta topped Wall Street estimates on both the top and bottom lines, reporting that net sales increased 8.9 percent to $3 billion, driven largely by increased comparable sales, the retailer’s 2025 acquisition of Space NK, and sales from new stores.

For full-year 2026, Ulta forecasts net sales growth to be between 6.7 percent and 7.2 percent.

This momentum comes after a challenged 2024, which saw Ulta lose market share for the first time as competition in beauty retail intensified. The company began its steady recovery in 2025 as chief executive officer Kecia Steelman took the helm and kicked off its Ulta Beauty Unleashed strategy, and today, the fruits of that labor are in full swing.

“It’s not just a strategy, it’s a way of being and you can feel it through the entire organization,” said Steelman in an NRF Big Show keynote in January.


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