Pop Mart has become synonymous with the designer toys that have found their way onto desks, shelves, and into group chats around the world. Yet it is not a single product line, and seeing it that way is perhaps the first mistake a new collector can make. At its heart, Pop Mart is a house of distinct characters, each with its own visual language, release cadence, and place in the resale market.
This guide looks beyond individual products to the characters that define the world of Pop Mart. Once that landscape comes into focus, collecting becomes less about keeping pace with every new release and more about knowing what speaks to your own sense of taste.
Why Pop Mart Is Several Brands Rather Than One
Each series in the range is a separate intellectual property with its own designer or license holder. They share a manufacturing standard and a blind-box format, and beyond that, they behave like different brands with different audiences.
The Series Structure
Two kinds of series exist side by side. The first consists of in-house characters, developed by Pop Mart with an artist and owned outright. The second consists of licensed series, where the company applies its format to a property owned by somebody else, such as a film studio or a comic publisher.
The distinction decides how long a series lasts. An in-house character can run for a decade across dozens of releases. A licensed series runs for as long as the license does, and it is not usually repeated once it has sold through.
Why the Release Calendars Diverge
Because the series are independent, the release calendars are independent too. One character can go quiet for a season while another gets three series in a row, and the secondhand market for each moves on its own.
That counts at the point of buying rather than at the point of browsing. A series that sold out last month is only available secondhand, while a series released this month is sitting on the shelf at retail.
The blind-box format itself is covered in the guide on why people love blind boxes, which explains the mechanism through which these series are sold.
The Monsters, Where Labubu Sits
Labubu belongs to The Monsters, a series created by the Hong Kong artist Kasing Lung. The character has a wide grin and pointed ears, and it is the figure most people picture when they say Pop Mart.
What Changed for Labubu
What changed was visibility rather than supply. A character with a steady following for years reached a much wider audience through celebrity wear and social media in 2024 and 2025, and demand rose faster than the production schedule could follow.
That gap is what produced the resale prices people talk about. It also means The Monsters is now the hardest line to begin collecting at retail because series sell through quickly and the secondary market carries most of what is available.
The Monsters Releases Currently Listed
Three releases from this series appear in the current range, and they differ in format as well as in design. The differences are worth reading before choosing because a plush pendant and a seated vinyl figure serve different purposes.
The pendant format is the one that travels, and the seated format is the one that sits on a shelf. The Macaron release is the smallest of the three and the easiest to display in numbers.
Buying The Monsters at Retail
A retail purchase gives a sealed box at a fixed price with no choice of figure. That is the whole point of the format, and it is also why collectors end up with duplicates they did not choose.
Where the specific figure counts, the sealed box is the wrong purchase and the secondary market is the right one. Where the mechanism is the appeal, the sealed box is the only purchase that delivers it.
The Licensed Series, and How They Differ
The licensed releases are the part of the range that most New Zealand buyers do not expect. They take the same blind-box format and apply it to properties that already have an audience, and they behave differently from the in-house characters.
Marvel
Two Marvel series appear in the current range, and both are built on armor designs rather than on characters in action. The Iron Man armor series works through the different suits, which suits a collector who is following a single character across versions.
The Marvel Across the Infinite series takes a wider sweep across the roster instead. Where one series rewards a focused collector, the other rewards somebody who wants variety within one purchase.
Naruto Shippuden
The Naruto Shippuden childhood series depicts characters as children rather than in their adult designs. That choice makes the set appeal to people who followed the series rather than to people collecting figures on design alone.
Anime-licensed series tend to sell through faster than film-licensed series because the audience is already used to buying merchandise in this format. That makes them a reasonable starting point for somebody new to blind boxes.
Minion, Stitch, and Ted Two
Three further licensed releases sit at the lighter end of the range. The Minion Bello World series and the Stitch Adventure series both come from animated properties with a wide and younger audience.
The Ted Two baby Ted action plush pendant is the outlier, aimed at an adult audience from a comedy film rather than at a family audience.
These releases are the ones most likely to be bought as gifts rather than as collecting projects because the property is recognized by somebody who does not collect blind boxes at all.
How a Series Is Built
The structure of a series decides what collecting one actually involves. It is the same structure across every release in the range, and knowing it removes most of the guesswork.
Twelve Designs and a Secret
A standard series holds twelve designs, usually with one hidden figure replacing a regular one at a published probability. A single box gives a random figure from the set, and a full case gives the set with an unknown chance of a secret figure.
The probability is why a case does not guarantee the secret. It is also why a collector can buy twelve boxes and still be missing the one figure they wanted, which is a likelier outcome than most people expect.
Why the Secondary Market Exists
Duplicates and gaps are the two guaranteed outcomes of blind-box buying, and the secondary market exists to resolve both. Common figures sell for less than a box costs, and secret figures sell for several times that price.
The economics of the format, including why the average cost per wanted figure is higher than the sticker price suggests, are set out in the guide on the real cost of blind boxes.
Buying in New Zealand
Two routes exist locally, and they suit different purchases. Choosing between them is a decision about whether the specific figure counts more than the mechanism.
Buying at Retail
Retail gives a sealed box at a published price with no control over the contents. The advantage is certainty about authenticity and condition, which is not a small thing on a range that is copied.
Where the purchase is a gift, retail is the safer route for the same reason. The recipient gets the mechanism as well as the object, and the mechanism is a large part of why the format works.
The Secondary Market and Counterfeits
The secondary market gives a specific figure at a price that reflects how hard it is to find. The risk is counterfeits, which are a real issue on this range rather than a theoretical one.
The checks that separate a genuine figure from a copy are set out in the guide on spotting fake collectibles.
The full range currently listed is under Pop Mart collectibles for anyone wanting to compare what is available.
Keeping What You Collect
These are painted objects, and the paint is the part that ages. Where a collection is being kept rather than played with, two habits preserve almost all of its value.
Light, Dust, and the Box
Sunlight fades paint and dust settles into the recesses, and both effects are permanent rather than reversible. A shelf away from a window is enough to prevent the first, and a cabinet or cover prevents the second.
Boxes are worth keeping for anything that might be sold later. A complete box and card are a documented part of the value, and they are the first things thrown away and the last things replaced.
Displaying in Numbers
A collection large enough to fill a shelf stops being a set of objects and becomes a display problem. Grouping by series rather than by size makes the arrangement legible and makes gaps visible.
The wider question of arranging and protecting a collection is covered in the guide on displaying and protecting a blind box collection.
Where to Start
The first purchase settles more than any amount of reading. The format is either enjoyable or it is not, and that is discovered by opening a box rather than by research.
If You Have Never Bought One
Pick one series, buy one box, and decide afterward whether the mechanism suits you. A licensed series is a gentler start than The Monsters because it is available at retail rather than only secondhand.
If You Already Collect Designer Toys
Collectors who own other designer figures in this scale, such as the ones covered in the guide on Sonny Angel collectibles, will find the format familiar.
The display logic transfers directly, and the main adjustment is the price per figure rather than the way a collection is stored.
Final Notes
Pop Mart is a house of separate series rather than a single brand, and the release calendars prove it. Labubu sits inside The Monsters and is the hardest line to begin collecting at retail because demand outran supply, while the licensed releases are the ones sitting on shelves. Choose one series and follow it through releases rather than jumping between them, and keep the packaging of anything you might sell. The collection that grows well is the one that was aimed rather than accumulated.
