Ulta Beauty says its bet on K-beauty is paying off

• Ulta Beauty has been making a strong push into K-Beauty, and it appears to be paying off.
• CEO Kecia Steelman said that K-beauty is driving sales and bringing in new customers.
• The company inked exclusive sales partnerships with K-beauty brands like Medicube and Peach & Lily.

Ulta Beauty's bet to expand its South Korean beauty collection is paying off, driving sales and bringing in new customers.

In a Thursday earnings call, Ulta Beauty CEO Kecia Steelman said the company's K-beauty assortment "continues to resonate and drive skincare sales."

She said that aside from its long-standing exclusive sales partnership with skincare and beauty brand Peach & Lily, it expanded its K-beauty brand portfolio in 2025.

"We saw space for growing K-beauty trends in both skincare and makeup," Steelman said to investors. "We moved with agility to build a complementary and largely exclusive pipeline, including a portfolio of new and many exclusive brands throughout 2025, like a new Medicube, TIRTIR, Fwee, and Unleashia."

Ulta Beauty is the only US retailer selling products from beauty-tech company Medicube, which has been promoted by celebrities such as Kylie Jenner and Hailey Bieber.

Steelman added that some K-beauty brands, like pimple-patch brand Starface, "benefited from newness and social media virality." The brand sells cute, colorful pimple patches, shaped like stars and cartoon characters.

She said the brands are attracting "the next generation" of customers.

Ulta Beauty posted third-quarter results on Thursday, reporting net sales of $2.9 billion, a 12.9% increase from the same period a year ago. Its same-store sales increased 6.3% year-on-year.

The company's stock price rose by almost 6% in after-hours trading on Thursday. It's up about 33% in the past year.

This comes as K-beauty is establishing a strong fan base in the US. Data from marketing research firm NielsenIQ showed that K-beauty was a $2 billion industry in the US in the year leading up to July 2025, a 37% from the same period the year before.

Beauty retail experts told Business Insider in October that the draw of K-beauty was their affordable price point.

Anna Keller, a principal analyst from London-based market research firm Mintel, told Business Insider, "They're super affordable, so you're getting high-quality, effective products without breaking the bank."

Ulta Beauty and Sephora are attempting to secure exclusive sales partnerships with K-beauty brands before the mega South Korean beauty retailer, Olive Young, makes its highly anticipated debut in the US next year.