Lafufus, fake Labubu dolls, raise safety alarms and spawn raids

NEW YORK - Global demand for

Labubus, the cute-ugly plush elf dolls

embraced by celebrities like Rihanna, Kim Kardashian and David Beckham, has led to a flood of counterfeits that reveal a dark and dangerous side of the toy business.

The dupes are known as Lafufus, presumably because of their fake nature, and they, too, have fans who make up a subculture of the wider craze.

But the fakes have alarmed buyers, consumer protection agencies and customs officials on multiple continents, as well as Pop Mart, the Chinese company that has been making Labubus since 2019.

Not only have they generated consumer complaints, but officials have flagged safety risks and potentially hazardous chemicals linked to Lafufus.

The real collectibles took off after K-pop star Lisa of Blackpink was seen on social media carrying little Labubus on her bag and hugging a big one in 2024. The Labubu craze has caused Pop Mart’s sales to surge, with revenue for the first half of 2025 amounting to more than US$1.9 billion (S$2.4 billion), surpassing revenue for all of 2024, the company said last week.

That success has been fuelled by the way some of the dolls are sold.

They often arrive in “blind boxes”, so that buyers do not know what they will find inside. That generates excitement as unboxing videos amass on social media. But the element of mystery has made it easier for fakes to flood the market.

In Britain, the Chartered Trading Standards Institute, a non-profit organisation that works with the government on consumer protection issues, put out “an urgent warning” in August about the rise in sales of counterfeit Labubus. It said that the fakes were “poorly made in unsafe manufacturing premises” and might contain hazardous chemicals that “can cause lifetime damage to a child’s organs”.

The institute said its teams had seized thousands of dolls from stores in England and Scotland. It added that it was investigating the glut of counterfeits in connection with organised crime groups.

In July, news media in Cyprus reported that customs officials had conducted raids targeting counterfeit Labubus across the island, pulling more than 1,300 fake dolls and products from stores.

Last week, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission said it had ordered the seizure of thousands of units of counterfeit dolls at ports, warning that Lafufus violate a ban on small parts for children under three years old, “break apart easily”, and pose “a serious risk of choking and death”.

The Better Business Bureau also issued a warning about the fakes after grievances piled up on its “scam tracker”. As at Aug 26, a search on the tracker for “Labubu” yielded more than 100 complaints.

Some highlighted the dangers that consumer groups had raised, including a person from Virginia who on Aug 23 wrote about receiving six dolls from a seller purporting to be offering genuine Labubus. They were all defective, with one arriving without one of its hands. A person in California wrote Aug 12 that a scammer had promised real Labubus but sent “broken toys”.

Chinese customs authorities have said they are working to stem the tide of fakes. In June, they confiscated more than 200,000 counterfeit Labubu products. In July, they reported almost daily seizures.

The mania for the monster characters, which were created in 2015 by Kasing Lung, an artist born in Hong Kong and raised in the Netherlands, has prompted Pop Mart to police its intellectual property aggressively.

Pop Mart’s subsidiary in Singapore sued 7-Eleven and some of its stores in federal court in California in July, accusing the chain, which helps franchisees stock their locations, of intellectual property law violations as it allegedly sold counterfeit Labubu toys and products.

The complaint, which 7-Eleven must reply to in September, seeks damages and fees, and demands that the franchise shut down the sales. 7-Eleven did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit.

The rise of the dupes, which are made by multiple companies, highlights the blessing and curse of going viral, experts say.

The success of an imitation can inspire greater interest in the genuine product, Mr Vivek Jayaram, an intellectual property lawyer, said in a phone interview.

That is a newish phenomenon, as some consumers have come to see “dupes” of luxury items as equally desirable to originals, he noted. But he said that letting dupes go for a long time could lead to a company waiving its rights in extreme cases.

Mr Case Collard, a patent lawyer, said in a phone interview: “When someone’s knocking you off, it means you have a very successful product.”

Still, viral success is unpredictable, and it can be difficult to get ahead of a counterfeit wave, he said.

For consumers looking for the real thing, it means that they have to “take an extra step or two to ensure authenticity”, he added.

Pop Mart appears to be fighting to stop the Lafufu onslaught on multiple fronts. According to Sixth Tone, a Chinese state-owned publication, the company applied in July for a trademark for the “Lafufu” name in China.

But some collectors on TikTok saying Labubu mania is already fading, meaning demand could fizzle before the company manages to take control of the tide of fakes. NYTIMES