Glow Recipe, the Korean-inspired skincare brand built on Sephora’s shelves, will launch in about 1,000 Ulta Beauty stores and on Ulta.com on Dec. 6, the brand said in a Nov. 10 release. The Glow Recipe Ulta launch starts Nov. 17 with an eye mask sold first on Ulta’s TikTok Shop.
The release calls this the brand’s first major retail expansion since its 2017 debut. Ulta is landing a brand that helped define Sephora’s skincare aisle, and its own sales mix shows why skincare is where Ulta needs help.
What the Glow Recipe Ulta Launch Includes
The new Fresh Slices Eye Mask, $36 for 60 patches, goes on sale Nov. 17 exclusively on Ulta Beauty’s TikTok Shop. That is 60 cents a patch, or $1.20 a pair, a calculation from the price. The full assortment, priced from $8 to $48 with Ulta-exclusive kits, arrives in stores Dec. 6, and a Glass & Blur Lip Duo follows Dec. 27.
Christine Chang and Sarah Lee founded Glow Recipe in 2017 and serve as co-CEOs. The brand is sold in more than 3,000 doors worldwide, including Sephora in the U.S., Canada, Europe and the U.K. “Ulta Beauty is where so many people discover beauty,” Chang and Lee said in the release.
Why Ulta Wants More Skincare
Ulta’s own numbers explain the deal. In its second-quarter report in August, skincare and wellness fell to 24% of net sales from 25% a year earlier, even as total net sales rose 8.9% to $3.04 billion. Ulta had 1,534 U.S. stores at the end of that quarter. About 1,000 stores is about 65% of Ulta’s fleet, a calculation from the two figures. Adding 1,000 doors grows Glow Recipe’s footprint by about a third.
Lauren Brindley, Ulta’s chief merchandising and digital officer, pitched the retailer’s data. “As the #1 specialty beauty retailer in skincare, we’re able to leverage insights from more than 46 million loyalty members to identify opportunities to reach new guests and drive meaningful growth for our brand partners,” she said.
What Glow Recipe Gets from Ulta
The fair case for the brand is reach. Ulta’s 46 million loyalty members are a ready audience, and the launch roughly matches a third of the brand’s existing doors in a single day. The move also tells shoppers that Sephora no longer has an exclusive hold on one of the K-beauty brands most associated with it. The eye mask’s results are the brand’s own claims, from its clinical test of 33 people. The Fresh Slices Eye Mask goes on sale on Ulta’s TikTok Shop on Nov. 17, and the full line reaches stores Dec. 6.
