Thailand warns shoppers against fake Labubu toys in unverified stores

Thailand warned shoppers away from Labubu toys sold through unverified online stores after several scams were reported, putting the buy-side risk of the craze in sharp focus. The alert landed as demand for the blind-box character kept drawing buyers into glossy listings, fast-moving social ads and storefronts that can look official long before a package ever ships.

The immediate pressure point is the Labubu “macaron” version, which surged after BLACKPINK’s Lisa posted pictures holding a Labubu box. That spike pushed prices higher and stock lower, and it created exactly the kind of gap scammers exploit when collectors are racing to secure a preorder. When supply is tight and the listing is flashy, the safest move is to slow down and verify the seller before any payment leaves your account.

POP MART says purchases made through its official website, official stores, ROBOSHOP vending machines and other authorized online platforms are guaranteed to be authentic and verifiable. Its Thailand store locator also points buyers to official locations in Bangkok and other Thai cities, giving collectors a clear way to bypass sellers whose authenticity cannot be checked. If a preorder cannot be tied back to one of those official channels, treat it as a risk, not a shortcut.

That caution is not just about disappointment at the unboxing table. In August 2025, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission warned that fake Labubu plush dolls, sometimes called Lafufu, can break apart into small pieces and pose a choking hazard for young children. AAP News said the agency tied the fakes to federal toy rules for small parts, which makes counterfeit Labubu a consumer-safety issue as well as a collector scam.

The scale of the fake market has only widened the danger. Kaspersky said it detected hundreds of fraudulent Labubu-related websites in multiple languages in June 2025. Chinese customs said more than 40,000 suspected counterfeit Labubu products were intercepted that same month, and China’s customs agency later said 1.83 million suspected infringing pieces had been intercepted since the start of 2025. In Seattle, U.S. Customs and Border Protection seized 11,134 fake Labubu figures in September 2025, valued at nearly $514,000.

Labubu sits inside THE MONSTERS collection created by Kasing Lung, who built the line in 2015 with Nordic mythology as inspiration. That backstory helps explain why the character moved from niche art toy to mass-market obsession, and why buyers now have to screen sellers as carefully as they screen variants. In a market this hot, the real collectible is still the one that comes from a source you can prove.