Pop Mart’s New ‘Starry’ IP Sparks Market Frenzy in Bid to Replicate Labubu Success
Pop Mart International Group is aggressively promoting its new character IP, "Starry," attempting to replicate the massive commercial success of its flagship Labubu character by leveraging a similar playbook of emotional marketing and calculated scarcity.
The toymaker’s latest “Starry Delicious Moment Series” blind box collection, released in late September, sold out instantly on official platforms and triggered a speculative frenzy in the secondary market. A rare "Little Bear Biscuit" charm from the series, with a retail price of 59 yuan ($8.15), saw its price soar to 929 yuan—a nearly 16-fold premium—temporarily surpassing the resale hype for comparable Labubu launches.
Pop Mart is capitalizing on the momentum with a nationwide marketing blitz, launching pop-up stores and themed exhibitions in major cities like Shanghai and Beijing during the recent National Day holiday. The concerted push underscores the company's strategy to cultivate a new pillar of growth as it reported record-breaking financial performance in the first half of 2025.
The rapid ascent of Starry highlights Pop Mart's reliance on a formula that combines emotionally resonant characters with the addictive mechanics of blind-box collecting. For investors, the key question is whether this model can build sustainable, long-term IP value or if it primarily fuels short-term speculative bubbles.
A Rapid Ascent Fueled by an Emotional Connection
Described by Pop Mart as its "fastest-growing emerging IP," Starry's rise has been carefully orchestrated. The character, a child with a transparent, star-filled head, debuted in a 2020 picture book with the healing-focused theme "Stars can't shine without darkness." After gaining initial traction as a toy at a 2023 Shanghai trade show, Pop Mart signed its creators in 2024.
The first blind box series, "We Are All Starry People," generated over 100 million yuan in revenue in 2024. The character's "dazed but trying hard" persona has resonated deeply with consumers, a trend supported by an iResearch report stating that 78% of Gen Z consumers are willing to pay a premium of over 20% for products that offer an "emotional connection." By the first half of 2025, the Starry IP had already generated 390 million yuan in revenue.
Following the Labubu Playbook
To accelerate Starry’s growth, Pop Mart is employing the same multi-pronged strategy that elevated Labubu to a cultural phenomenon. Beyond frequent blind box releases, the company has expanded the IP into over 10 categories of derivative products, including phone cases, scented candles, and keychains. In June 2025, it introduced a lower-priced 39-yuan "Mix & Match" series to broaden its consumer base.
The marketing efforts also mirror the Labubu model. Pop Mart created a dedicated theme song for Starry, making it only the second IP in its portfolio to receive such treatment. Furthermore, it is leveraging its existing IP ecosystem by including Starry alongside established stars like MOLLY and DIMOO in a recent Halloween-themed collection, allowing the new character to tap into mature fan bases.
A Long Way From Labubu's Shadow
Despite the initial frenzy, Starry has a long journey to match the commercial weight of its predecessor. In the first half of 2025, Pop Mart's The Monsters series, which includes Labubu, recorded 4.81 billion yuan in revenue, accounting for 34.7% of the company's total and representing a figure 12 times larger than Starry's. For the same period, Pop Mart's total revenue grew 204.4% year-over-year to 13.88 billion yuan, with adjusted net profit surging 362.8% to 4.71 billion yuan.
Signs of market volatility are already apparent. The price of the coveted "Little Bear Biscuit" charm has fallen to 459 yuan on the GetU platform, halving from its peak. Resellers have noted that Starry's trajectory mirrors that of Labubu, which saw secondary market prices cool as the company increased supply.
This familiar pattern has raised concerns among early fans about the potential for over-commercialization to dilute the IP's appeal. For Pop Mart, the challenge remains what CEO Wang Ning has described as the core mission of an IP company: "to continuously operate, cultivate, and manage IPs for the long term." As the initial hype subsides, the true test will be whether Starry can be nurtured from a viral sensation into an enduring asset.