Pop Mart (泡泡玛特): No One to Take Over "LABUBU"

A flagship’s shadow grows long

Pop Mart (泡泡玛特), the Beijing-based collectible toy company that built its brand on a string of viral characters, is confronting a hard truth: spectacular past hits do not guarantee future ones. After creating household names such as MOLLY, SKULLPANDA and the recent global sensation LABUBU, the company’s two early-2026 launches — “After School Merodi” and “KeyA” — have cooled noticeably. Who can replace LABUBU’s emotional gravity and market pull? That question is now central to investor and management debates.

New IPs fizzle, controversies flare

“After School Merodi,” priced at RMB 69 and intended to broaden Pop Mart’s IP matrix, reportedly sold only about 3,800 units on Douyin by March 12 and showed weak secondary-market prices — with some regular pieces trading below the RMB 69 retail and lows in the low-RMB 40s on resale platforms. KeyA, a cyber-mechanic girl created with designer Chen Yanran, has not yet shipped but has already attracted online accusations of aesthetic overlap with other creators and resemblance to its designer; it has been reported that social platforms are awash with negative reactions such as “I don’t get it” and “not fit for Pop Mart.” Together these cases highlight that the company’s formula — fast-paced new releases plus designer partnerships — may not automatically produce the emotional blank slate that turns a figure into a mass-market phenomenon.

Strategy under strain as frequency rises

Pop Mart has accelerated output: public reports show annual new-IP releases rose from 29 in 2024 to 57 in 2025. But higher volume risks both homogenization and insufficient time for cultural resonance. Historically, hits like MOLLY and LABUBU left “emotional room” for consumers to project themselves into the character; many recent launches, critics say, are either too generic or too narrowly personal to do the same. The company’s 2025 first-half results underscore the stakes: consolidated revenue of about RMB 138.76 billion and explosive growth driven largely by THE MONSTERS series, which reportedly contributed roughly RMB 48.14 billion (34.7% of revenue). In short, Pop Mart’s income remains highly concentrated in a few top IPs.

Markets punish uncertainty

The capital markets have responded. After peaking at HKD 339.8 on August 26, 2025, the share price has retracted to HKD 204.8 as of March 11, 2026 — a roughly 39.7% decline and an estimated HKD 180 billion fall in market value on the company’s ~1.341 billion shares. Analysts are divided: HSBC research has warned of growth normalization even as platform capabilities persist, while Bernstein has issued short reports. Amid broader U.S.–China geopolitical friction that has made investors more sensitive to growth sustainability in Chinese consumer and tech names, Pop Mart’s next earnings release will be scrutinized not only for numbers but for proof that it can systematically incubate the next LABUBU — or whether the era of phenomenon-driven, outsized returns in the collectibles market has shifted to a tougher, more incremental phase.