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There aren’t many trends that are hotter in the streets right now than Labubu dolls. Unfortunately, the hype for those viral accessories may have attracted thieves who targeted a store in Los Angeles before making off with a sizeable haul.
There are countless fads that have ensured the wheel of consumerism never stops turning, and while there will always be A Next Big Thing that comes along to replace the previous one, it can be very difficult to predict the products that have the potential to turn into an overnight sensation.
Younger generations tend to lead the vanguard of those movements, and we can thank those Cool Kids for ushering in one international sensation that’s currently all the rage: Labubu Dolls.
Kasing Lung, an artist who was born in Hong Kong and raised in the Netherlands, dreamed up the cuddly monster that is Labubu for a story before it was adapted into a line of figurines in 2015.
They were initially produced by the company How2Work but got a boost from a partnership with Pop Mart in 2019 that ultimately led to the collectibles taking the world by storm close to a decade after they were first produced.
Labubu really exploded in popularity in 2024, and the trend is still going strong as some people happily shell out hundreds of dollars to secure some of the rarer offerings—a reality that has also made them a lucrative target for some bad actors.
Thieves stole $7,000 worth of Labubu dolls while clearing out a store near Los Angeles
Pop Mart made a name for itself with the “blind box” approach to selling toys that essentially follows the baseball card model: customers have an idea of what they’re getting when they make a purchase, but they don’t know exactly what’s inside until they open it up (although the brand and other retailers do also sell plenty of Labubus that are absent of that air of mystery).
According to NBC News, a group of robbers who targeted One Stop Sales in La Puente, California around 1:30 A.M. on Wednesday were also not exactly sure what they were making off with when they cleaned out the store, but the Los Angeles County Sheriff released a statement saying the haul included “several boxes of Labubu dolls ” that were valued at approximately seven thousand dollars.
The shop shared footage that was captured on a security camera while noting the burglars “took all of our inventory,” with co-owner Joanna Avendano saying the pilfered goods likely amounted to a minimum value of $30,000.