The Nue Co. Targets $50M at Ulta as Fragrance Surges to 65% of Revenue

Quick Facts

Fragrance now represents 65% of The Nue Co.’s revenue, up from 20%, following a 2024 rebrand that drove 303% year-over-year category growth.
The brand surpassed its first-half Ulta sales forecast by 17% after rolling out to 1,100 stores in April 2026, and has doubled its second-half projections.
New scent Good Spirits launches exclusively at Ulta on July 19 online and July 26 in stores, backed by the brand’s largest marketing campaign to date.

The Nue Co. started as a supplements company in 2017. By mid-2026, fragrance drives nearly two-thirds of its revenue and the brand expects that share to reach 85%. The shift is reshaping how founder Jules Miller thinks about the business, retail partnerships, and what wellness means on a store shelf.

Miller launched The Nue Co. after experiencing severe IBS in her mid-twenties. The brand raised approximately $36 million over its history from investors including Unilever Ventures and REDO Ventures, the family office tied to the controlling shareholders of L’Occitane Group. Majority ownership sits with Coterie L.P.

The fragrance category grew from 20% of revenue to 45%, then to 65% following a rebrand and relaunch in 2024. That growth came with a 400% increase in new customer acquisition. The cost to acquire a fragrance customer is less than half the cost of acquiring a supplement customer, while lifetime values are comparable across both groups.

The Nue Co. entered Ulta Beauty in January 2026, with products reaching all 1,100 U.S. stores by April. The brand developed three discovery kits exclusive to Ulta, priced between $45 and $110, along with 10-milliliter travel sizes of its eight scents at $38 each. Launch events ran across six doors, with a focus on California, Texas, and Florida. The brand also seeded product to 150,000 Ulta consumers and partnered with social media creators to reach 18-to-24-year-olds, now its fastest-growing demographic.

Performance at Ulta exceeded expectations. The brand’s pheromone-based scent Us now accounts for 37% of its Ulta revenue. After beating its first-half forecast by 17%, The Nue Co. doubled its second-half sales projections for the retailer. Miller has set a long-term target of $50 million in annual Ulta sales.

Miller is direct about the challenge of selling wellness in traditional beauty retail. “Retailers have always been very excited about wellness, but wellness is really hard to crack in retail, particularly in beauty retail,” she said. “Traditional beauty retailers are really dependent on sampling and education on the shop floor.” Her solution has been placement within Ulta’s wellness-oriented shop-in-shop concept. “If you put these products in just a normal fragrance aisle, you’re going to lose the point of them,” Miller said. “These are tools for well-being.”

The brand’s newest product, Good Spirits, launches exclusively at Ulta on July 19 online before hitting stores July 26. The scent is built on MoodScentz, a neuro-fragrance technology from Givaudan that draws on 35 years of neuroscience research and more than 200 million neural data points collected through brain imaging combining MRI, EEG, and physiological monitoring. The fragrance opens with passionfruit, blood orange, and coconut water and settles into smoky mezcal, vetiver, and sandalwood, reflecting Miller’s Colombian heritage.

The Good Spirits launch includes localized pop-ups with shaved-ice raspados scented with the fragrance’s notes, alongside a content series spotlighting Latin American voices in art, movement, and wellness. Miller describes it as the brand’s most ambitious marketing campaign to date.

Despite the fragrance focus, Miller is clear about the brand’s identity. “We want to be known as a wellness brand more so than a fragrance brand,” she said. The Nue Co. also sells through Erewhon and has expanded its fragrance line from three stress-focused scents to eight across six mood states.