Ulta Beauty Inc. is expanding its digital toolkit with a new generative, AI-powered hair try-on tool designed to make online beauty shopping more interactive and personalized.

The GLAMlab Hair Try-On is now live on Ulta’s website and mobile app. This allows buyers to virtually experiment with different hair colors and styles before deciding to purchase.

Using Nvidia’s advanced AI technology, this feature allows users to upload a photo, take a quick selfie, or use a model’s image to see what different hair transformations might look like. Ulta reports strong early engagement, with thousands of users trying the tool daily. The company has not disclosed exact conversion numbers. However, it is noted that customers who use the virtual try-on tool are more likely to purchase a product than those who do not.

Ulta Beauty is ranked No. 91 in the Top 1000. The database is Digital Commerce 360’s ranking of North America’s top online retailers by annual web sales.

Ulta’s digital innovation strategy

Ulta Beauty has been combining technology with beauty retail for years, setting the standard for omnichannel shopping experiences with its virtual and augmented reality tools. GLAMlab first launched in 2016 with the ability to try on makeup virtually, offering an alternative to physical testers in stores.

The new GLAMlab Hair Try-On builds on this foundation and is based on Nvidia’s StyleGAN2 technology – a neural network architecture known for producing hyper-realistic images.

“Shoppers need to try hair and makeup styles before purchasing,” said Juan Cardelino, head of computer vision and digital innovation at Ulta Beauty, in a blog post about the new tool. “As one of the first beauty companies to integrate makeup testers in-store, try-on fittings are part of Ulta Beauty’s DNA – be it in physical or digital retail.”

For the new application, Cardelino said, Ulta licensed the model for commercial use, retrained it and implemented guardrails to ensure the AI ​​only changes hair-related pixels and leaves facial features untouched.

“StyleGAN2 is one of the most respected models in the tech community and with the source code available for experimentation, it was the right choice for our application,” said Cardelino.

Ulta generative AI hair try-on tool

Specifically, the tool relies on Nvidia Tensor Core GPUs in the cloud to process each hair transformation using AI inference. In simpler terms, inference is how AI takes the information from a user’s uploaded photo and quickly applies the selected hair color or style to create a realistic preview.

The first transform takes about five seconds to generate, while subsequent styles load almost instantly, in about a second each. Once users find a color they like, they can find links to Ulta Beauty products to achieve the look in real life.

Ulta doesn’t stop there. The company said it plans to expand GLAMlab’s capabilities into categories such as wigs and explore how hairstyle try-ons could be linked to in-store styling services.

“Stylists could use the tool to show our guests how certain hairstyles would look on them, giving them more confidence to try new looks,” Cardelino said.

Strong digital performance drives growth

Ulta Beauty’s continued investments in digital tools appear to be paying off. During the retailer’s recent earnings call, CEO Dave Kimbell emphasized that Ulta is focused on improving its digital experiences to increase discovery, traffic and sales.

For its fiscal third quarter ended Nov. 2, Ulta reported net sales of $2.53 billion. That’s up 1.7% from $2.49 billion in the same period last year. Comparable sales, which include e-commerce, rose 0.6%. Customer transactions on the website and in stores increased 0.5%. Average spend per visit increased 0.1% year-over-year.

Ulta also saw double-digit growth in member engagement with its mobile app. The mobile app also accounted for around two-thirds of e-commerce sales in the third quarter. That’s an increase of 600 basis points from last year, Kimbell said.

The quarter also marked the launch of GLAMlab 2.0. Kimbell said it introduced improvements such as a new 3D engine for:

• Increased precision
• Shopable Makeup Looks
• An updated interface with sharing features

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