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This guide is here to help set your brand up for success working with Ulta Beauty. Learn how to design your packaging so your products can be certified and featured in the Sustainable Packaging category of Ulta’s Conscious Beauty Brands.

In this guide, you’ll find an overview of Ulta’s sustainable packaging requirements, overall impact goals, inspiration for updating your packaging, and more.

For individual guidance about creating sustainable packaging that stands out at Ulta Beauty, contact us, and we’ll be happy to help.

Table of Contents

• At a Glance: Ulta Beauty’s Sustainability Goals
• About Ulta Beauty
• Deeper Dive: Ulta Beauty’s ESG Impact Initiatives
• Packaging Requirements for Ulta’s Conscious Beauty Brands
• Other Sustainable Packaging Initiatives
• Frequently Asked Questions About Ulta Beauty
• Customer Spotlight: Sugardoh
• How EcoEnclose Helps Brands Working With Ulta Beauty
• Additional Resources

Ulta Beauty has no general sustainable packaging goals for its brands, but instead, it has established a Conscious Beauty initiative.

This line features over 300 brands whose products meet baseline requirements in one or more of five categories: Clean Ingredients, Cruelty-Free, Vegan Ingredients, Give Back, or Sustainable Packaging. Brands are highlighted in a list showing which of the five pillars their products align with.

For brands to be featured as having Sustainable Packaging within Ulta’s Conscious Beauty line, they must ensure at least 50% of a brand’s total packaging, by weight, sold at Ulta Beauty is (1) made from recycled or bio-sourced materials or (2) recyclable or reusable/refillable.

While Ulta Beauty’s requirements are less specific than other retailers, brands can work to meet and exceed these baseline sustainability goals with their packaging.

EcoEnclose is well-positioned to help brands design packaging in ways that align with Ulta Beauty's Conscious Beauty framework. Reach out to us if you’d like support:

• Converting your brand’s paper-based packaging and thin film packaging to 100% recycled materials

• Converting your brand’s unrecyclable mult-material packaging to mono-material alternatives

• Replacing less readily recyclable materials such as polypropylene with more readily recyclable alternatives such as polyethylene or PET

• Eliminating coatings that can render packaging unrecyclable

Source: Ulta Beauty

Ulta is the largest beauty retailer in the United States, with over 1,400 stores across all 50 states.

They work with over 600 brands to carry more than 25,000 products in categories like:

• Cosmetics
• Personal Care
• Fragrance
• Skin Care
• Hair Care
• Nail Care

Ulta has also established partnerships with major retailers such as Target, creating small storefronts within these big box stores that expose them to an even larger customer base.

Selling through Ulta can be a significant inflection point for small cosmetics and personal care brands, helping you establish your value in the beauty space and reach more customers.

Are you aspiring to work with Ulta Beauty or improve an existing partnership?

Read on for tips on designing packaging that can help you land the deal, elevate your shelf presence, and enhance promotion with the retailer.

Ulta Beauty is committed to its ESG impact through its work across four ESG pillars: People, Product, Environment, and Community. 

They have received multiple awards and other recognitions for their ESG efforts, including Forbes Best Brands for Social Impact and EPA’s Top 30 Green Power Retail Partners. 

Here is a brief summary of Ulta Beauty’s vision for each pillar of their ESG goals:

Within the “product” pillar, Ulta has established a Conscious Beauty line, where they prioritize brands that are working towards improved ethics and sustainability.

Click to enlarge. Concious Beauty at Ulta Beauty. Source: Ulta Beauty

Brands in this line are recognized based on efforts across one or more areas:

• Clean Ingredients: Excludes parabens phthalates, and other ingredients on Ulta Beauty’s Made Without List

• Cruelty-Free: Made without animal testing and certified by Leaping Bunny, PETA, or Choose Cruelty-Free

• Vegan: Made without animal products, including honey, beeswax, lanolin, and gelatin

• Sustainable Packaging: Recyclable, refillable, or made from recycled or bio-sourced materials

• Give Back: Brands with a central commitment to making a positive impact through environmental or social causes

Brands can be highlighted across one or more of the criteria they meet. Ulta Beauty features brands that meet all 5 Conscious Beauty pillars in their “Brands That Do It All” category, which includes companies like Osea, Peach & Lily, and Kopari Beauty.

As of November 2023, over 300 of the 600+ brands carried by Ulta Beauty are certified in at least one or more of their Conscious Beauty pillars. Ulta continues to encourage all brands to strive to meet as many of these requirements as possible as part of their overall climate initiatives.

Ulta’s Conscious Beauty requirements are fairly loose. Unlike Sephora’s Clean + Planet Positive line which requires brands to meet robust criteria across various pillars, Ulta allows brands to be highlighted in just one or two areas.

As such, if your brand is interested in being featured in Ulta Beauty’s Sustainable Packaging category, you must ensure that at least 50% of your brand’s total packaging, by weight, sold at Ulta Beauty is either (1) made from recycled or bio-sourced materials, or (2) recyclable or refillable.

These packaging requirements represent a very minimum standard for sustainability, and we encourage brands to go above and beyond by:

• Maximizing recycled content across all materials, especially post-consumer content

• Choosing responsibly sourced or certified Virgin inputs when required

• Designing for ready recyclability, including curbside and thin film recycling

• Avoiding "compostable" plastic packaging that is rarely environmentally preferable

• Evaluating opportunities for reusable packaging thoughtfully

• Reducing waste through swaps like zero waste label release liners

• Piloting innovative materials like Black Algae Ink or Seaweed Film Windows

The Beauty Drop-Off at Ulta Beauty. Source: Ulta Beauty

Ulta is partnered with Pact Collective, a nonprofit working to help keep packaging waste from landfills by collecting hard-to-recycle (not curbside recyclable) beauty empties.

All Ulta Stores now feature The Beauty Dropoff collection bins. Customers can drop off clean, empty packages in this list:

• Plastic bottles + jars smaller than a fist
• Plastic + aluminum squeezable tubes
• Ceramic + porcelain containers
• Colored glass bottles and jars
• Caps + closures
• Pumps + dispensers
• Droppers + applicators
• Compacts + palettes
• Lipstick/lip gloss tubes + applicators
• Mascara tubes + wand
• Plastic pencil components for eye/lip liner + brow pencils
• Toothpaste tubes + dental floss containers
• Silicone containers
• Pouches

Through Pact, these items are mechanically recycled, chemically recycled, or converted into energy - recognizing that waste-to-energy is the least preferred alternative and is not a true form of recycling.

It is important to note that packaging that can be recycled through the Pact partnership - but is not “readily recyclable” through curbside or thin-film recycling - does not qualify for certification through the Conscious Beauty Sustainable Packaging category.

Ulta Beauty does not have robust packaging requirements for general brands. To be included in Conscious Beauty’s Sustainable Packaging category, brands must ensure that at least 50% of the packaging sold into Ulta Beauty is either (1) recycled or made from bio-sourced materials, or (2) recyclable or reusable/refillable.

Ulta partners with Pact to take back and recycle hard-to-recycle beauty empties. They now have “The Beauty Dropoff” collection bins at all storefronts. These empties are then sent to Pact for either chemical, mechanical, or waste-to-energy recycling.

Ulta Beauty has not banned any specific packaging materials at this time. They do have a list of ingredients that they have prohibited in products, including PFAS. Under their Sustainable Packaging category, Ulta Beauty states that they prefer recycled, recyclable, or bio-sourced packaging materials.

Ulta Beauty does not require third-party certifications to sell on their shelves. However, they require third-party certifications for some of the pillars of the Conscious Beauty program. For example, to receive the “Cruelty-Free” designation, brands must be certified by either PETA, Leaping Bunny, or Choose Cruelty-Free.

Brands must meet the requirements of at least one pillar of the Conscious Beauty program to be featured. Brands meeting all five pillars are highlighted under the “Brands That Do It All” category. The five categories are Clean Ingredients, Cruelty-Free, Vegan, Sustainable Packaging, and Give Back.

Ulta Beauty uses RangeMe to source new products, so interested brands must create an account and submit products through this platform. Creating a profile is free. Once you submit a product, Ulta Beauty reviews it, connects you with a buyer in the right category, and evaluates your product for selling through their storefronts.

Sugardoh sustainable packaging. Source: EcoEnclose

Sugardoh partnered with EcoEnclose to create a suite of custom packaging solutions for their sugaring beauty products. We helped Sugardoh manage their packaging project against an aggressive launch at Ulta Beauty and successfully brought their custom packaging strategy to life.

Is your brand currently working with Ulta Beauty or actively looking to be carried by Ulta Beauty?

EcoEnclose can help you develop retail packaging solutions that meet their sustainability guidelines and help you put your best foot forward - so you can stand out to conscious beauty customers on-shelf and online.

Here are specific ways we’ve helped supplier brands for Ulta Beauty:

Move to recycled paperboard packaging

We help brands convert paperboard packaging and retail folding cartons to 100% recycled materials.

Move to recycled product labels

We help brands convert all product labels to recycled facestock. Our paper facestock can be 100% recycled, and our poly face stocks can be up to 90% recycled.

Evaluate reusable or refillable options

Reusable and refillable packaging can be an eco-friendlier choice in some cases, but may not always be the best path forward. We help brands analyze to determine if these types of packaging make sense for their brand, product line, and budget.

Maximize recyclability of rigid packaging

Maximize recyclability of rigid packaging by eliminating or reducing the use of two or more different materials, such as plastic and paper or foil and paper. When two materials are required, such as a retail folding carton with a plastic window, we help brands design this packaging in a recycle-compatible way or make it easy for consumers to separate the two materials.

Move to recycled thin-film packaging

We help brands make their thin film packaging with 100% recycled materials. Where relevant, we bring in third-party verification of these claims.

Move to recycle-ready pouches

We help brands convert multi-layered pouches that are not recyclable to mono-material pouches that are curbside or thin-film recyclable.

Design beautiful custom branding

We help brands refresh or rebrand their designs to appeal to conscious beauty customers, from font choice to color matching and beyond.

Develop clear and transparent labeling

We help brands ensure all sustainability claims are clear and accurate and can help pursue necessary third-party certifications. We can also help brands develop clear ingredient labeling that meets Ulta Beauty’s standards for transparency.

Our unique Sustainable Packaging Framework helps streamline decision-making, and our rigorous standards for all products ensure your packaging goes well beyond the minimum sustainability requirements set by Ulta Beauty. We leverage our experience working with hundreds of brands, from the smallest startups to the most robust enterprise brands, to help you create a packaging strategy that works.

To get started, you can request free samples, explore our extensive resource library, or get in touch for a free consultation.

• Conscious Beauty at Ulta Beauty
• Ulta’s Supply Chain Transparency
• Ulta Beauty Vendor Standards
• Ulta’s Product Submissions
• Ulta Beauty and Pact: Beauty Packaging Collection Program

EcoEnclose is the leading sustainable packaging company that provides eco-packaging solutions to the world’s most forward-thinking brands.

We develop diverse, sustainable packaging solutions that meet our rigorous research-based standards and customers’ goals. We drive innovative packaging materials to market and consistently improve the circularity of existing solutions.