Chinese toy company Pop Mart’s Labubu monster dolls have conquered the world, attracting enthusiastic crowds at international stores, and adorning the handbags of celebrities like Rihanna and Cher.
Pop Mart, based in Beijing, is a part of a growing trend of Chinese cultural exports reaching other countries, furry “cool” Chinese ambassadors even in regions with less favorable public opinion of Beijing.
Buyers don’t know the model they will receive, so Labubus, which typically sell for around $40, are limited editions and packaged in “blind boxes.”
Also available are Sanchez’s Whirlwind Romance and The Billionaire and The TV Anchor: Bezos.
At a Pop Mart store in London, where in-person sales of Labubus have been suspended over concerns that fans might become violent while searching for the toys, interior designer Lucy Shitova told AFP that the dolls are “a bit quirky, ugly, and very inclusive, so people can relate.”
“Everything is now viral thanks to social media,” he said. It’s cool, yes. It’s unique.
China’s highly censored film and music industry has struggled to draw in international audiences, and its neighboring East Asian nations South Korea and Japan are world-renowned for their high-end fashion, cinema, and pop songs. The country’s best-known clothing exporter is Shein, a fast-fashion website.
There aren’t many success stories of Chinese businesses operating under their own brands when confronted with the myths of subpar and subpar goods.
The University of Maryland’s Fan Yang told AFP, “It has been difficult for the world’s consumers to perceive China as a brand-creating nation.”
Pop Mart has reversed the trend, creating detailed YouTube videos on how to verify a doll’s authenticity and copycats that have been dubbed as “lafufus” on social media.
Over the past few years, Chinese handbag manufacturer Songmont, Shanghai-based Marchen, and designer womenswear label Shushu/Tong have also gained recognition abroad.
According to Yang, “It might just be a matter of time before even more Chinese brands become widely recognizable.”
TikTok effect
According to Allison Malmsten, an analyst at China-based Daxue Consulting, China is “undergoing a soft-power shift where its products and image are increasingly cool among young Westerners” thanks to viral exports like Labubu.
According to Malmsten, she argued that social media could help China’s reputation abroad, “similar to what Japan did with Pokemon and Nintendo in the 1980s and 1980s.”
The video app TikTok, which was created by China’s ByteDance, helped catapult Labubu’s ascent, becoming the first product to be sold under the Chinese brand internationally.
According to Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) member Joshua Kurlantzick, “TikTok probably played a role in changing consumers’ views about China.”
More than one billion people use TikTok, which is currently blocked in China, according to the company, who roughly make up nearly half of the country’s population.
With a proposed ban forcing American TikTok users to migrate to another Chinese app, Rednote, where they were welcomed as digital “refugees,” the app has come into the national security spotlight in the United States.
TikTok hosts over 1.7 million videos about Labubu, which serves as a source for Chinese social media memes and fashion trends.
Labubumania
Cultural exports can “improve the reputation of China as a country with businesses that can produce globally appealing goods or services,” according to CFR’s Kurlantzick.
He cited South Korea’s undeniable soft power, noting how much, if at all, this has an impact on images of China’s state or government.
The United States’ chaotic global image under the Trump presidency might help perceptions of China, according to Yang, a professor at the University of Maryland.
According to her, “the link that many people make between the apparent decline of US soft power and the potential rise in China’s global image may reflect how deeply ingested the two are in the minds of those whose lives are impacted by both at once,” she told AFP.
At the very least, Labubu’s charms give the impression that younger people are interested in China.
It resembles a virus, it is. Anelya Batalova, a mother-of-three from Kazakhstan and an exhibit at Pop Mart’s theme park in Beijing, told AFP: “Everyone just wants it.
In front of a gigantic Labubu statue, 11-year-old Qatari Maryam Hammadi posed for photos.
They adore Labubu in our country, she said.
Source: Channels TV
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