Labubu craze makes Pop Mart founder Henan’s richest person
Wang Ning’s $21 billion fortune rides Labubu scarcity, Lisa’s Instagram boost, and a resale market where a first-gen figure hit RMB1.08 million.
A $21 billion fortune now sits at the center of the Labubu boom, and it has made Pop Mart founder Wang Ning the richest person in Henan Province. The rise says as much about the toy as it does about the man behind it: Wang, born in 1987 in Huojia County, built Pop Mart in 2010 after graduating from university, and the company he founded has turned one grinning character into a global money engine.
Labubu was created in 2015 by Hong Kong illustrator Kasing Lung as part of The Monsters, a fairy world inspired by Nordic mythology. Pop Mart sells it as a blind-box collectible, a format that keeps buyers guessing and encourages repeat purchases. That scarcity mechanic helped turn Labubu from a niche character into a social-media object, then into a status symbol. The surge accelerated in April 2024 after Blackpink member Lisa posted Labubu merchandise on Instagram, giving the toy a cross-border lift that stretched far beyond core collector circles.
The numbers show how quickly that demand moved through Pop Mart’s business. The company said 2024 revenue reached RMB13.037749 billion, up 106.9% from the previous year. Plush products alone brought in RMB2.8321 billion and accounted for 21.7% of total revenue, a sign that the softer, huggable side of the brand had become a serious growth driver, not just a side category. Wang later said Pop Mart was on track for RMB20 billion in 2025 revenue and that RMB30 billion would be “quite easy.” Pop Mart ultimately reported 2025 revenue of RMB37.12 billion, or $5.38 billion, even as its shares fell on concerns about how long the frenzy could last.
The secondary market has been just as revealing. On June 10, 2025, a first-generation Labubu sold at auction in Beijing for RMB1.08 million, a headline-grabbing price that showed how far collectors were willing to push the premium tier. That kind of result does not happen without a market that believes rarity still matters, and that belief is now part of the Labubu economy itself.
Wang’s ascent past Qin Yinglin of Muyuan Foods to become Henan’s richest person in June 2025 captured the scale of the moment. The fortune, estimated in real time by Forbes at roughly $20.3 billion to $22.7 billion depending on the day, reflected more than one hot product. It reflected a market where blind-box anticipation, celebrity validation, and resale fever had fused into something bigger than a trend, and possibly strong enough to reshape how collectors buy, chase, and price access to the next drop.
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