Ulta Beauty and Black Beauty Roster Launch An All Textures Certification

For years the industry has talked about the texture gap. Too many stylists come out of school confident on straight and wavy hair and shaky the second a curly or coily client sits in the chair. Clients feel it, they book around it, and a whole segment of the population ends up feeling like an afterthought behind the chair. Now two big names are doing something concrete about it. Ulta Beauty and Black Beauty Roster have teamed up to launch the All Textures Certification, or ATC, a standardized credential built to prove a stylist can actually work across every texture from straight to coily.

This is the kind of news we love to see. Not another product drop, but a real education standard that raises the floor for the whole industry.

What The Certification Actually Is

The All Textures Certification is a formal credential that combines a written exam with a hands on assessment. It covers straight, wavy, curly, and coily hair, and the whole point is to give the industry a clear professional standard instead of everyone guessing at who can and cannot handle texture. Black Beauty Roster founder Maude Okrah Hunter put it simply, saying ATC is designed to establish a clear professional standard for hairstylists who work across all hair textures, from straight to coily.

It made its public debut at the Black Beauty Roster Beauty Show on July 27 in New York City, and select Salon at Ulta Beauty educators are the first group going through it during the initial rollout.

Two Parts, One Real Standard

The certification comes in two pieces, and neither one is a rubber stamp. The first part is a written knowledge exam you take online. It covers hair texture knowledge, product selection, tool usage, and styling principles. You have to score at least 80 percent to move on, so you cannot just click through it and call yourself certified.

The second part is where it gets real. The practical assessment has you complete three to four styles on mannequins that represent multiple textures, and qualified educators and stylists grade you in person. There is a remote evaluation option planned down the road, but for now this is hands on, which is exactly how it should be. You cannot fake your way through texture work on paper. Either you can section, product, and style a coily head correctly or you cannot, and this puts that to the test.

Why Ulta Is Leading The Rollout

The Salon at Ulta Beauty is the first organization to launch the certification, starting with Services District Educators in the Northeast region before it expands more broadly. Dani Darmanin, Ulta Beauty Director of Category, Brand and Services Education, framed it around the guest experience, saying their mission is to keep honoring inclusive beauty services behind the chair and to keep upskilling their service providers with education that welcomes every guest.

What stands out is that Ulta went looking for a partner that was brand agnostic. Darmanin said they wanted an organization with a clear connection to the needs of the guest and the salon pro, not a program built to sell one company's products. Ulta Academy has already worked with Black Beauty Roster in recent years, including updating its three day Textured Immersion education program, so this is a partnership with real history behind it rather than a one off announcement.

What It Means For The Rest Of Us

Right now the certification is limited to select Salon at Ulta Beauty educators in the Northeast, with Black Beauty Roster planning to open it up to more stylists across the industry in 2027. So most of us cannot go sign up tomorrow. But the direction matters. When a retailer the size of Ulta puts its weight behind a texture standard, it tells clients they can expect competence on their hair no matter where they book, and it tells stylists that texture skill is not optional anymore, it is a baseline part of the job.

If you have been meaning to sharpen your work on curly and coily hair, do not wait for a certificate to make you do it. Chase the education now. The stylists who can confidently take any texture that walks in are the ones who are going to own the next decade behind the chair. You can keep an eye on the program at alltexturespro.com as it expands.