The beauty industry has struggled with its balance between retail stores and digital sales. It’s a market in which brick-and-mortar locations are essential to the original sale.

If I, for example, want to know the right shade of makeup to wear to look less shiny or red-faced on camera, I would go into a beauty supply store or a department store with a beauty counter to find the right answer.

Once I knew what to buy, however, the physical store become less needed, or really completely not needed.

The $450 billion global beauty industry has been growing, but changing, according to McKinsey’s State of Beauty 2025: Solving a shifting growth puzzle report.

“For years, a seemingly insatiable appetite for newness in beauty fueled robust volume and even greater pricing growth, with the sector growing 7% annually from 2022 to 2024. Now, geopolitical and economic uncertainty, market saturation, and evolving consumer preferences threaten that progress, requiring industry leaders to develop a new growth strategy,” the data shows.

Digital retailers, however, are making their mark.

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“The channel landscape is also in flux. By 2030, we expect online channels to account for nearly one-third of global beauty sales (up from 26% in 2024), the highest share of any channel. Specialty retailers and mono-brand stores are likely to maintain their share of sales, while department stores and drugstores could see their share of sales decline,” McKinsey reported.

This changing market has contributed to the ongoing struggles of Beauty Brands, which survived a 2019 Chapter 11 bankruptcy, but has been closing stores in 2025.

Brick-and-mortar chains have suffered

While selected local chains and stores from national retailers have closed, the biggest blow to the brick-and-mortar beauty industry is Ulta Beauty and Target ending their partnership by August 2026.

“Staffing needs, loyalty program synergies, shrink, and [return on invested capital] were likely key considerations,” TD Cowen analysts said in a note shared with Retail Dive, which alsoreferenced “conscious uncoupling.”

Ulta Beauty is closing all of its Target locations by August 2026.

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Ulta Beauty at Target: Partnership ending (stores to close)

• On August 14, 2025, Ulta Beauty and Target jointly announced they will not renew their “Ulta Beauty at Target” partnership; the current agreement will sunset in August 2026, according to an Ulta Beauty press release.
• Until the expiration date, Ulta’s mini-stores inside Target and the integrated Target-Ulta online/omnichannel offering will remain in operation, the companies shared in a joint Business Wire press release.
• The partnership began in 2021, and at its peak included more than 600 Ulta shop-in-shop locations inside Target stores nationwide, according to CNBC data.
• According to company statements, the decision was mutual. Target said it will “continue to offer a differentiated beauty assortment” after the partnership ends; Ulta indicated it will focus on its core omnichannel business, including a planned standalone “Ulta Beauty Marketplace,” Ulta Beauty shared.

Some points to theft prevention measures and inventory problems as leading to the breakup.

“Target has been tackling out of stock issues more generally since the Ulta partnership debuted in 2021. Similar to other mass retailers dealing with theft, Target also increased its use of locked merchandise, including beauty products, since the partnership began,” Retail Dive reported.

Beauty Brands is closing stores in 2025

While the end of the Ulta Beauty and Target partnership might be the headline brick-and-mortar beauty industry story this year, Beauty Brands has also been closing stores selectively.

• The closures in 2025 are part of a broader contraction for Beauty Brands after previous financial troubles (including bankruptcy history), reported Bloomberg Law.
• Beauty Brands will close two stores in the Kansas City metro, locations at Shawnee (15320 Shawnee Mission Parkway) and Country Club Plaza (438 Ward Parkway), with final closure on December 28, 2025, Yahoo reported.
• Another location, in Lawrence, Kansas, is also scheduled to permanently close on December 28, 2025, shared Acast.
• Beauty Brands’ leadership stated that while these locations will close, many of the “salon professionals and managers” from those stores were offered transfers to other Beauty Brands locations. The Kansas City Star reported on Yahoo.
• Chapter 11 filing date: Beauty Brands filed for Chapter 11 in early January 2019, according to PacerMonitor.
• Size of business pre‑filing: At the time, Beauty Brands operated around 58 retail locations across 12 states, added Cole Schotz.
• Store closures & liquidation plan: Prior to the filing, Beauty Brands had already closed 25 underperforming stores, Retail Dive reported.

Beauty Brands has not shared a timeline for all its store closure, but it now operates 15 stores across three states, down dramatically from its peak of 58 locations in 12 states.

“If you’d like to visit Beauty Brands, we operate 15 corporate-owned locations in Illinois, Kansas and Missouri. We employ more than 600 specially trained, knowledgeable customer service associates and salon professionals across these locations,” the company shared on its website.

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