Exited = ranked on a haircare board at that retailer, then on none, and confirmed gone from the retailer’s site.
Not counted: brands that dropped off the haircare boards but still sell at the door.
Products = ranked SKUs across every haircare board at that retailer when last seen.
Reasons come from trade press or live brand and retailer pages. Where nothing exists, we say so.
Ulta: the 5 biggest haircare exits
The read:
Scünci is the outlier. It ranked 6 products for two quarters, 232 in Q1’26, then none. Ulta’s brand page now shows zero products. The accessory line still sells through other channels.
Big names are not safe. Pantene and Klorane left. Scale did not hold the slot.
Textured hair thinned out. CurlMix ranked six products four quarters running, then went. Lola From Rio was growing when it left.
Late arrivals left fast. Forte Series arrived in Q4’25 with 17 ranked products and was gone by Q3’26.
Men’s grooming lost ground. Beast and three other men’s brands exited.
20 more Ulta exits are in the report.
Sephora: the 5 biggest haircare exits
The read:
One retailer decision, several exits. Sephora sunset its supplement category in late 2025. Nutrafol and The Nue Co. were named among the brands removed (Beauty Independent, Dec 2025).
Nutrafol was growing when it went: 13, 16, 16 ranked products, then none. That is a cut, not a decline.
Function of Beauty PRO bled out: 25 ranked products, then 7, then gone.
4 more Sephora exits are in the report.
Exited at both retailers
BeautyBio: gone from Ulta by Q4’25 and from Sephora by Q2’26. Owner Nu Skin wound the brand down in September 2026 (Beauty Independent, Sep 2026).
The two shapes of an exit
1. The cut. The brand is ranking, sometimes growing, and then it is gone in one quarter.
Nutrafol at Sephora. CurlMix and Lola From Rio at Ulta.
Cause: usually a retailer decision or a brand decision. The board gives no warning.
2. The bleed. The shelf shrinks for quarters first.
FEKKAI at Ulta: 27, 25, 25, then 2, then gone.
Andrew Fitzsimons at Ulta: 23, 23, 18, then 3, then gone.
Function of Beauty PRO at Sephora: 25, then 7, then gone.
Cause: SKUs fall out one at a time. The exit is visible a year early to anyone tracking the path.
For founders: if your ranked SKU count halves in a quarter, you are in a bleed. That is the quarter to act, not the one after.
Who climbed while they left
At Ulta, mass and masstige brands under $25 gained the most places. At Sephora, curl and density claims climbed. See the climbing blog.
What this means for your brand
Track your ranked SKU count every quarter. A falling count is the earliest exit signal on the board.
Know which shape you are in. A cut is rarely the brand’s call: get notice terms in writing. A bleed is a shopper marketing funnel problem: diagnose where shoppers drop, then show the buyer incremental profit versus the status quo.
Don’t rely on one door. BeautyBio lost both. If you are exclusive, have a second retailer ready to list you at least 12 months before you need it.
Scale is not protection. Pantene and Klorane exited Ulta. What holds a slot is incremental profit per square foot against the brand the buyer could put there instead.
Get the full picture
The Haircare Q3 2026 Ulta + Sephora report covers:
every exit, left-category and off-board brand, with its five-quarter path
brand ranks at both retailers, with the 2-year trajectory