Not everyone is out to collect them for keeps, though. Kelly, 32, from Macao, has been reselling Labubus since the start of this year. Inspiration struck after she waited in a long queue for them at a pop-up store with friends. “I realised that I need to queue for that stuff! So I guess, if I already queued for my friend, why don’t I get more and sell to others who didn’t come and queue? One of my friends was doing this already, so we established a ‘partnership’. She is the one to get customers online, and I’m the one who queues and gets the Labubus.” The duo resell them on Rednote, Xianyu (a secondhand platform in China) and Carousel (in Hong Kong). For the latest Labubu series, people are willing to pay more than double their cost, she says, and because she sells them in a boxset, people have a chance at getting a “secret” one, which is more expensive. This means she can up the price on her boxsets. In terms of pounds, she can often make as much as £100 in profit from one sale, especially if it’s a rare edition. It’s getting hard for her to continue selling so much because of how difficult it is now, compared with the start of the year, to buy them. “It’s time-consuming, and most of the time when I get to the store, there is already a long queue or products are sold out.” Kelly has resorted to Pop Mart’s “online lucky draw”. She has 10 accounts to maximize her chances of winning.
