When you haven’t met Labubu but, you’re lacking the blueprint for the subsequent wave of client model virality.
Born from Hong Kong’s Pop Mart, Labubu is an oddly lovable toy that’s greater than merch. It’s a cultural phenomenon.
Labubu is triggering international sellouts, fuelling resale frenzies and constructing a fanbase with near-religious devotion. Followers camp out for brand spanking new releases. TikTok is flooded with unboxings and trades. Resellers flip uncommon items for 1000’s of {dollars}. This isn’t simply fandom. It’s cult commerce at its best, catapulting founder and CEO Wang Ning’s web price $1.6 billion in a single day.
However this isn’t about toys.
It’s about technique. An intentional, repeatable approach to construct a model that doesn’t simply seize consideration – it creates a world folks need to come again to, time and again.
When you’re constructing a commerce model, that is the playbook for turning merchandise into moments, clients right into a neighborhood and a model right into a motion.
As a result of essentially the most highly effective manufacturers don’t promote. They invite folks into one thing larger.
Right here’s how Labubu did it:
1. Creating model moments by using current waves
Labubu didn’t invent the wave, it joined the pendants and bag‑allure development and turned it into its personal emotional ecosystem. When celebrities like Blackpink’s Lisa and Rihanna showcase a blind‑field determine dangling from their luggage, the impression explodes driving on the spot sell-outs.
That’s the lesson: You don’t should invent the wave. You simply should journey it in another way.
Take the present micro-trend of mini pendants on purses, telephones, and keychains. Now think about a founder launching a tiny, collectible wellness mascot, a allure that doubles as a lip balm, a mantra, or a each day affirmation. Cute, collectible, emotionally sticky and layered with Labubu’s mystery-drop mannequin you’ve gotten a viral formulation:
Steal what’s already working. Add narrative. Make it private.
2. Constructing a model world – not only a model
Labubu’s magic isn’t the figurine – it’s the universe round it. From blind‑field drops to character evolution, neighborhood trades and TikTok unboxings (#Labubu has thousands and thousands of views), it capabilities as a portal right into a shared cultural area.
What makes it work:
- Storytelling: Characters, tales, and evolution over time.
- It has neighborhood rituals: Trades, fandom, TikTok reveals.
- It has texture: Emotional resonance, bodily shortage, digital spectacle.
Life-style model founders can do the identical whether or not it’s a skincare line, a wellness product, or a trend drop – any vertical can replicate this:
- Launch product traces as chapters in a much bigger narrative.
- Introduce characters, which means, recurring rituals.
- Construct interactive boards, occasions, or collectives the place followers stay the model.
- Give clients causes to return again not only for the product, however for the sensation.
3. Realizing the formulation: Shortage + story = model momentum
Labubu isn’t merely bought – it’s pursued. It’s not about clicking “purchase now”; it’s about incomes entry, being a part of a second and proudly owning one thing that not everybody can.
Assume thriller containers. Restricted drops. Randomised unboxings.
These aren’t simply gimmicks, they’re emotional accelerants. And when paired with compelling storytelling, they unlock $7,000+ resale costs, app-topping launches, international queues and a type of model devotion cash can’t purchase.
Why it really works:
- FOMO turns into neighborhood gas: Individuals don’t simply need the product – they need to be in on the second.
- Shortage turns into standing: Who obtained the uncommon drop? Who shared it first? All of a sudden your model turns into a badge.
- The hunt turns into the advertising: Anticipation, hypothesis, unboxings – your clients generate the excitement.
Apply this:
You don’t want huge stock. You want intention.
- Drop a limited-run capsule solely to your prime clients or neighborhood first.
- Embed a shock factor – a golden ticket, a uncommon variant, a co-created design.
- Wrap it in which means: Inform the story of why this second issues and why they need to care. As a result of in right this moment’s world, essentially the most highly effective manufacturers don’t simply promote. They stage experiences folks need to be a part of.
4. Not simply constructing hype, however properties
Virality is seductive. Nevertheless it’s additionally harmful.
One-hit wonders burn quick and fade sooner and in right this moment’s consideration economic system, hype with out depth is a short-lived recreation. Right here’s the place 99 per cent of viral manufacturers fail, they chase a second however don’t construct endurance.
Labubu dodged this. It might have been simply one other TikTok development – a flash of dopamine and finished.
As a substitute, it’s constructing: increasing into jewelry, boards, artist collaborations, practical merchandise and storytelling arcs that maintain followers emotionally invested.
5. Realizing the hazard of one-hit fame
Tendencies fade quick. Manufacturers that survive construct ecosystems: narrative arcs, model alliances, owned communities, cross-category evolution.
That’s the true lesson: Cult manufacturers don’t chase moments – they create ecosystems.
That is the way you flip virality into longevity:
- Narrative enlargement: Don’t simply drop merchandise, construct chapters. Create storylines, character arcs.
- Cultural partnerships: Align with artists, streetwear designers, area of interest communities that reinforce your values and aesthetic.
- Owned neighborhood: Don’t let your viewers stay on borrowed land. Construct areas digital or bodily the place your clients really feel like they belong.
- Product evolution: Lengthen your model past its core assume crossovers, limited-run merch, and adjoining classes that deepen the expertise.
As a founder, you’re not simply launching a product – you’re architecting a model world.
Ask your self:
- What spin-offs would my clients struggle to personal?
- Who can be the dream collab that feels surprising however excellent?
- What would my most loyal buyer need to see subsequent, not as a result of they want it, however as a result of they love the world I’ve created?
As a result of hype can get you observed. However properties, manufacturers that really feel like inventive, linked areas maintain folks coming again. Construct a model your clients by no means need to depart.
What you must steal?
Right here’s the Labubu playbook damaged down into actual, repeatable ways for girls constructing manufacturers right this moment:
- Design for emotional which means, not simply performance. Your product ought to clear up a sense – not only a downside.
- Layer your launch technique with storytelling. Make each drop really feel like a second in a bigger story. Give folks a motive to return again.
- Use shortage to amplify narrative – not change it. Hype alone burns out. That means retains folks coming again.
- Don’t easy the perimeters. Embrace what makes you distinctive. Labubu’s weirdness is what created its magic. Be boldly area of interest.
- Make your buyer the content material engine. Labubu followers are the model’s finest entrepreneurs. Give your viewers instruments, rituals, and causes to co-create with you.
Proof: Actual numbers, actual returns
The success of manufacturers which have had the same technique within the toy market is eye boggling:
- Pop Mart’s “The Monsters” franchise (Labubu’s umbrella line) pulled in ¥3.04 billion (US$419m) in 2024, up 726% YoY.
- The worldwide collectibles market hit $294 bn in 2023 and is anticipated to develop to $422 bn by 2030 .
- The toy collectibles phase alone is forecast to leap from $12.5bn (2021) to $35.3bn by 2032 .
- Squishmallows bought 400 million items as of mid‑2024, with TikTok engagement surpassing 13 billion views .
- Sonny Angel figures -$10 originals, $250 resale hit $5m income in late 2024 .
These usually are not anomalies – they’re proof. Manufacturers that mix shortage, emotion, neighborhood, and technique create actual capital.
Create worlds. Spark actions
Labubu isn’t quirky fluff – it’s strategic mastery. It exhibits how trend-savvy model builders can domesticate emotional resonance, convert shortage into connection and construct universes folks select to inhabit.
For founders prepared to interrupt the mould: don’t ask “What ought to I launch?”
Ask: What universe am I inviting my buyer to stay in?
