At Ulta Beauty World, a ‘marketer’s dream come true’

When attendees eagerly entered Ulta Beauty World at 9 a.m., phones in hand and empty branded roller bags in tow, they were transported to a pink-and-orange-tinted universe where everything revolved around beauty.

In Orlando, Florida’s Orange County Convention Center, the Ulta Beauty store was essentially supersized across an entire expo hall, with branded gondolas now immersive experiences—like Too Faced’s chocolate-scented bakery, Maybelline’s New York City hot dog cart, and NYX’s sailor-filled yacht. At the more than 200 booths, there were beauty-themed games to be played, photos to be taken, foundation shades to be expertly matched, perfumes to be spritzed, and new and unreleased products to be sampled.

But unlike at its stores, there’s no checkout at Ulta Beauty World. Each booth experience simply ends with a stamp of a consumer’s “passport,” with free, often full-sized, products, plus a $2,000 swag bag for each of its 3,000 attendees. That’s the main reason they—much to the chagrin of the 3 million beauty lovers who attempted to get tickets—sold out the second iteration of the event, held earlier this month, in just 71 minutes, even though Ulta Beauty sold double the number of tickets it offered at the event’s viral debut in San Antonio, Texas, last year.

“[Last year], I learned just how much people want to be a part of this. It’s coveted,” Ulta Beauty CMO Kelly Mahoney told Retail Brew. “We created the best, buzziest beauty experience in real life that anybody has been able to do.”

The beauty of it: Ulta Beauty World was born out of the retailer’s long-running Field Leadership Conference (FLC), where positions like GMs and regional VPs learn about the year’s strategies and receive leadership development, Chief Retail Officer Amiee Bayer-Thomas told Retail Brew. FLC’s third day is a brand expo, where Ulta Beauty brand partners exhibit their products and, of course, hand out free ones.

Last year, the retailer decided to tack on a brand expo day for consumers, selling $160 tickets for the one-day event. The event went viral as consumers’ vlogs and dramatically large hauls of mass, prestige, and luxury products drew millions of TikTok views.

The event has become a component of Ulta Beauty’s brand-building ethos, core to the retailer’s Ulta Beauty Unleashed turnaround plan unveiled last year.

“​​We need to make sure that we’re showing up as a place you can truly build your brand for the very first time, and you can continue to be with us to build it, and then you can continue to be with us to scale it, and even now globalize your brand,” Mahoney said. “That’s very much something that has changed in the last year.”

At the booth for Noyz, an Ulta Beauty-exclusive fragrance brand that launched at the retailer in 2024, CEO Malena Higuera created a “thank-you station” to chat with consumers (and even, at one point, Ulta Beauty CEO Kecia Steelman). Higuera said the event has allowed Noyz to build new connections with consumers, giving the emerging brand “a chance to tell the story of why we’re a modern fine fragrance brand, what we are about.”

“[Attendees are] saying they’re not coming just for free product,” she said. “They want to hear about us.”

Stila Cosmetics, meanwhile, is a longtime Ulta Beauty partner in the middle of a “resurgence,” CMO Mary Rodrigues told Retail Brew at its lip-centric booth.

“[Ulta Beauty] really believed in our brand, year after year,” she said. “They’re so supportive that we want to be supportive back.”

For the long haul: Beyond growing its brand relationships, the event builds “deeper loyalty” with customers that’ll drive them to shop more and attend the 140,000 in-store events it has planned this year—up from last year’s 110,000—Bayer-Thomas said.

The event and the “massive hysteria of joy” it creates, Mahoney said, is ultimately a “marketer’s dream come true.”

“A lot of marketers’ job is to show up inside culture,” she said. “That’s where beauty is happening—music, sports, entertainment—show up inside and then tell stories about how beauty can make that experience even better…To be able to actually create culture like we created Ulta Beauty World is something I’m massively proud of.”

Consumers’ dedication was evident at the show: Two friends and toddler moms said they’d driven 12 hours from Nashville for the event. Another woman drove eight hours from South Carolina.

They were among the many that trickled out of the convention center’s doors at 5 p.m., their orange roller bags now filled to the brim and shoulders weighed down by product-filled branded totes, taking one last picture with the giant Ulta sign, most likely thinking about presenting their enormous beauty haul—to friends, family, or the internet—when they made it home.