Vol.215 Revisiting 王宁: A Conversation with 王宁 About His 2025 and Pop Mart’s Future
Summary
王宁 gave Pop Mart’s 2025 operating performance a 90 or 95, but cut his score for organizational management from 80 in 2024 to 70. For a 15-year-old company that had already made sustained double-digit growth look easy, suddenly facing roughly 200% growth was like “just learning to drive, then being pulled into an F1 car”; 2025 was the most stressful year, and his sleep and physical condition were also at their worst. Growth did not eliminate risk—it exposed the weak points of a 10,000-person organization all at once.
Globalization was both the core driver of 2025’s high growth and the operating risk most easily concealed by attractive financial statements. 王宁 said he might be spending at least 40% of his time overseas; the target of overseas revenue exceeding 50% will “most likely” be met, but he believes overseas stores may still be operating at the level mainland China reached 2-3 years ago, with gaps in engineering, merchandising, product management and service. “When good news is everywhere, we should be looking for the bad news,” because multiples of growth can coexist with flawed delivery processes.
LABUBU’s breakout rested on preparation across product, design, quality and channels, then benefited from the era’s good fortune: “the democratization of happiness,” emotional demand and social-media distribution. 王宁 said 100M-150M units had already been sold at under RMB100 apiece, but the company sought to keep LABUBU at roughly 35% of the mix so country teams and store managers would not become dependent on the easiest product to sell. At the peak of its popularity, Pop Mart instead “put out the fire”: it paused new releases, offline marketing and a large number of partnerships, and pushed some 2025 products into 2026; he also acknowledged that the supply chain was not fully ready.
Pop Mart defines itself as a “say no company” built around disciplined execution. Competitors have to keep saying yes to partnerships, licensing and store openings to enter the industry, while Pop Mart has insisted on direct operation, building its own parks and content capabilities, and cutting businesses that generated RMB100M-200M in revenue and were sometimes still profitable. “Keep Focus, Keep Real” means returning resources to the leading IPs rather than expanding into every possible opportunity while the heat is on.
王宁 rejects the one-track view that an IP must first have a film story, arguing that LABUBU is more like 梅西 than a movie star. The value of film lies in industrializing the production of music, values and settings, then empowering parks and other content businesses; the goal of games, film and parks is not a one-off IP appearance but to build those capabilities inside the organization. Film and games are “not successful enough” today, but he sees that as tuition an organization must pay to enter highly competitive industries.
After globalization, the harder challenge is becoming a “group”: using IP to enter large industries such as accessories, desserts, small appliances and theme parks. The logic is not to reinvent refrigerators or kettles, but to add design and IP value to mature productive capacity; meanwhile, experiments in games, video and building blocks have fallen short of expectations, and the games team has been replaced. 王宁 acknowledges that the boundaries are broad; the real constraints are whether Pop Mart can find industries large enough and whether the organization can develop capabilities rather than simply graft them on.
王宁 is least worried about any single IP suddenly going cold and most worried that organizational problems hidden by growth will eventually bring down the whole structure. He sees physical IP as different from virtual content: the 100M LABUBU figures already sold will not disappear, but will remain on desks and in homes, steadily compounding recognition and emotion. His brand framework is to use roughly 60% of annual content to keep strengthening the “core” assets and 40% for innovation; as AI creates ever more immersive online experiences, Pop Mart would rather invest in parks and irreplaceable physical companionship.
Deep dive
1. Roughly 200% growth pushed a 15-year-old company into an F1
王宁 looked back on the past 18 months and said the pace had far exceeded internal expectations: “It was like just learning to drive, then being pulled into an F1 car.” The outside world sees only the speed; the driver has to stay fully focused, because any small mistake can be magnified.
His actual experience was not excitement but “only other people think you’re having fun.” 2025 was the most stressful year and also the year when his sleep and physical condition were at their worst; for most colleagues, 李翔 said, last year was also the most painful in recent years.
For a 15-year-old company, sustaining double-digit growth every year is already an achievement; 20% could even be called excellent. A sudden roughly 200% growth rate was an extreme stress test of the driver, the components and the entire operating system.
2. After 10,000 employees, team issues became organizational issues
王宁 said the word used most often internally in 2025 shifted from “team” to “organization.” In the early startup phase, the company was a group of friends and “the heroes of Liangshan”; it later evolved from a loose crew into a team. Once headcount passed 10,000, the company became as complex as a capillary network.
At the team stage, a few core executives could sit down and solve a problem. At the organizational stage, collaboration takes place between one group of people and another, involving management layers, incentive systems, business-line boundaries and the “walls” that departments can inexplicably build between themselves.
Global operations add another layer of complexity: each country has its own culture, regulations and ways of working, and individual will can no longer cut directly through the organization. 王宁 said he might spend at least 40% of his time overseas, visiting major markets including Europe, the US and Southeast Asia every year.
3. Overseas moved from “worth applauding if it happened” to a domestic-style push for performance
In the early overseas phase, the business was going from zero to one: when a store or sales counter appeared on a street corner somewhere in Europe, the team would say, “It actually happened.” Overseas colleagues received far more applause than demands.
By 2025, as the brand rapidly gained global recognition, the bar rose with it. Using 李翔’s analogy, 王宁 said that in the past, a child taking his first steps was worth celebrating; now the company has realized the child might be “a 刘翔-level prospect” and has begun demanding a much higher level of performance.
The gaps show up across engineering quality, finishing details, merchandising, product management and service operations. Ordinary customers may not feel them strongly, but in 王宁’s eyes, overseas stores may still be operating at the level mainland China reached 2-3 years ago.
More dangerous, the data can look excellent: “When good news is everywhere, we should be looking for the bad news.” A market’s sales may grow severalfold, masking problems in delivery processes and operating fundamentals; headquarters will struggle to see them by looking only at reports.
4. The outside world sees the hit product, not the system that produces it
李翔 observed that public discussion in different countries has become polarized every year: some people think Pop Mart appeared like 孙悟空 springing from a rock, while debate centers on whether LABUBU will still be hot next year and rarely reaches its world-building, artists, design or systems-based operations. 王宁 summarized the pattern this way: people are using appearances to take either a bullish or bearish view.
Even when bullish observers call Pop Mart “Moutai for young people,” 王宁 does not think that means they truly understand it. The market sees the visible result; what gets overlooked is whether the team can keep developing, identify problems and move from A to B, C and D.
In response to the criticism that its IP has no story, 王宁 offered a new analogy: if a film IP is a movie star, Pop Mart’s IPs can also be sports stars. LABUBU can be 梅西; it does not need to make a film first to prove itself.
5. Film, games and parks are meant to leave capabilities inside the organization
王宁 still believes in film, but not as a way to add a conventional story to an IP. The film industry can industrialize the production of better music, values and settings, then feed those elements into parks, offline experiences and other content businesses.
The films and games Pop Mart has tried have been “not successful enough.” He sees that as tuition newcomers must pay to enter highly competitive industries. More than an externally produced finished product, he cares about capability—whether the organization itself can master the methods of creation and operation.
His “land, sea and air” framework is this: offline capabilities such as stores are the relatively strong army; new businesses such as desserts and appliances are the navy exploring the open seas; games and film are the air force, capable of reaching farther but still needing to be built out.
Parks follow the same logic. Pop Mart could simply license its IP to existing parks, but the goal is not “a park for the sake of having a park”; it is to build the ability to operate parks. Hiring 1 or 2 people from outside cannot substitute for the systematic collaboration of an entire team.
6. Pop Mart uses “say no” and business pruning to fight the fat that accumulates during growth
王宁 distinguishes between 2 types of companies: new entrants have to keep saying yes, looking for partnerships, licenses and store openings; Pop Mart says no far more often than yes and insists on direct operation, completing many parts of the chain itself. “At its core, this is a business about restraint.”
He gave the company’s 2025 operating performance a 90 or 95, but scored organizational management at just 70, down from 80 in 2024. The team may not have deteriorated; the pace of growth it could previously absorb simply changed overnight, concentrating and exposing capability gaps.
He used a hospital to explain the mismatch: a hospital that used to see 10 patients a day suddenly receives 1,000, including more patients with complex conditions. Revenue and traffic look great, but doctors are exhausted and patient experience deteriorates; the hospital must also replicate its diagnostic capabilities and bring in stronger specialties.
The company therefore cut a group of businesses generating RMB100M-200M in revenue, some of which were still profitable, and shifted attention back to its leading IPs. “Keep Focus, Keep Real” means first figuring out LABUBU, Hirono, MOLLY, CRYBABY, SKULLPANDA and the other leading IPs and making them better, rather than expanding into every possible opportunity at this point.
7. Global channels absorbed demand, turning luck into revenue
王宁 attributes 2025’s growth first to globalization: when consumers in Thailand, Japan and the US began liking the products, the company already had enough offline channels and online capabilities to absorb the demand. “Once prepared, you can catch the demand.”
LABUBU’s global breakout also benefited from luck and the era, including emotional demand, “the democratization of happiness” and the information explosion on social media. But before luck can work, the conditions still have to be in place: product, design, broadly accessible aesthetics, consistent quality, supply chain and consumer reach.
He sees no value in fixating on the secondary-market price swings of “LABUBU 3.0,” because the LABUBU products planned for 2026 are “much better than last year’s products,” and he expects them to open a new round of global affection. Continued product iteration is the prerequisite for generating further demand.
The supply chain was not fully prepared. Counterfeits appeared in large numbers across Europe, the US and Southeast Asia, while public opinion questioned whether the company was using hunger marketing. Pop Mart had to resolve those problems immediately; the emergency effort to fix old issues could itself create new management problems.
8. At LABUBU’s peak, the company chose to put out the fire rather than accelerate
王宁 acknowledged that excessively rapid growth can make an organization grow “fat”; teams begin relying on the easiest wins. The company has sought to keep LABUBU’s share at roughly 35%, and he believes it would be healthier if that share fell further over time.
Store managers and regional managers naturally want to order more LABUBU because the sales numbers look better; headquarters, however, wants them to spend more time promoting other IPs. That creates a direct incentive conflict between the hit product and the long-term health of the portfolio.
At the height of LABUBU’s popularity, the company “put out the fire”: it paused many new releases, pushed some 2025 products into 2026, and suspended virtually all offline marketing and a large number of external partnerships to avoid blanketing the market with licenses like an ordinary breakout IP.
王宁 explained that Pop Mart actually serves only tens of millions of users each year. If 2B people suddenly knew the brand, it could not serve most of the resulting demand, and many of those people would only be watching the spectacle. Protecting real users’ chances to buy mattered more than continuing to amplify short-term heat.
9. One-off breakouts are hard to replicate, but the framework for building and iterating stars is reusable
王宁 did not claim that another LABUBU is certain to appear, but believes the platform and operating framework are now in place. He compared it with Douyin: one video or person may be hot today and someone else will replace them next year. What matters is that after users experience a different kind of happiness once, they may keep buying that experience.
LABUBU becoming a global phenomenon has also created pressure and motivation for other contracted artists. Their past ambition may have been to move from a niche stage to domestic stardom; now everyone can see the possibility of becoming a world-class IP. The company must determine the route that best suits each artist.
He used MOLLY’s product wall since 2016 to show that the products have in fact improved year after year. He also cited Pucky, once dormant, whose “knocking a wooden fish” product reawakened demand in a way young people liked.
王宁 also previewed a new LABUBU product for the summer: Pop Mart previously brought artists and partners into its production platform, and the next step is to let users participate as well. He sees this as another upgrade in the organization of production, but did not elaborate on the mechanism.
10. Overseas revenue above 50% is not the finish line; becoming a group is the next test
Pop Mart had previously set a target for overseas revenue to exceed 50% in 2025, and 王宁 believes it will most likely be achieved. Domestic growth also exceeded expectations, however, so the company does not plan to suppress China or inflate overseas numbers simply to hit the ratio.
His long-term vision comes with a clear condition: “Perhaps one day,” if Pop Mart truly becomes a world-class consumer brand, each country’s share of revenue should approximate that country’s share of global GDP, rather than having headquarters impose the mix.
Of the 2 strategic priorities laid out at the IPO, globalization means replicating a validated business model across more countries; becoming a group means using IP as the core for industrialization and finding more possibilities that have not yet been validated. Globalization succeeded in the first 5 years; building new capabilities makes the group strategy harder.
11. New businesses enter through mature productive capacity—and accept failure and team changes
王宁 explains new businesses through the framework of productive forces, the means of production and relations of production. Products such as refrigerators and kettles already have mature technology; Pop Mart does not need to reinvent the basics, but can try to add value to existing categories through IP, aesthetics and design.
Accessories are similar to collectibles and driven mainly by design; desserts support the parks by completing the extreme offline experience. The company has also tried jewelry stores, 小野 independent-IP stores, SKP’s MEGA store and small appliances.
The logic has theoretically blurry boundaries, because many mature categories can be empowered by IP. 王宁’s practical constraint is scale: as the company gets larger, a new business still needs to enter an industry large enough to matter, rather than remaining a collection of scattered niche categories.
The results of experimentation have not been uniform: games fell short of expectations, and the entire team has been replaced as Pop Mart searches for a new approach; video and building blocks also did not fully meet expectations. 王宁 places these attempts alongside LABUBU’s early failures and argues that mature products are built through multiple rounds of trial and error.
12. 王宁 is not afraid of a single IP cooling off; he is more afraid of organizational problems slowly surfacing
When 李翔 asked where the next major challenge would come from, 王宁 did not choose demand or LABUBU’s popularity but again answered “the organization.” Rapid growth can make one strength mask a hundred weaknesses; if the company becomes absorbed in sales and applause from public opinion, small problems will eventually bring down the whole structure.
He is not worried that LABUBU will suddenly become unpopular because Pop Mart is not entirely analogous to Moutai, games or other existing industries. The outside world reaches for old-category comparisons because it has not yet seen this new industry.
The key difference is physicality: the 100M LABUBU figures already sold are not virtual content that disappears, but objects that remain on desks and in homes, reinforcing recognition, companionship and emotion every day. Ultimately, he still places the company’s value in people and the team’s ability to solve problems.
13. Classic assets and extreme offline experiences form 王宁’s long-term operating framework
王宁 said Pop Mart should not be understood through its price points or from a luxury-goods perspective. The discussion over why 吴越 was invited onto the board, as well as the debate over various strategies, ultimately comes back to how consumption provides satisfaction and a sense of existence.
His brand framework is to devote roughly 60% of annual content to continuously improving the “core” assets and 40% to innovation. Core assets can be classic IPs, classic products or key categories. Luxury brands use the share of handbags to measure the health of the business; this focus on a stable base is worth borrowing.
Pop Mart will learn from Disney’s respect for and operation of IP, and from LVMH’s approach to building brands, but 王宁 does not want to follow anyone else’s entire path: “If you follow someone else’s road, you can never surpass them.” Short films, social-media content and character interactions in parks can all become content for a new era.
Facing AI, he expects people to pursue ever more immersive online and offline experiences at the same time: online may approach the immersion of Ready Player One, while offline must be strong enough to persuade people to put down their screens. That is why the company is investing more in offline parks; sofas, cushions and plush toys represent forms of companionship that the physical world can provide and the virtual world cannot replace.