The secret recipe behind Pop Mart, Mixue, Din Tai Fung’s success

Soooo, do you Labubu? The furry creature went viral this year thanks to Dua Lipa, Blackpink’s Lisa, and Kim Kardashian all buying into the adorably bizarre, plushy monsters. The results were millions in sales, long lines, and frantic scrambles as people tried to get their hands on this latest trendy phenom.

Labubu’s Chinese parent company, Pop Mart, reported global revenue for Q3 (July through September) jumped by about 250% compared to a year earlier, and sales in America were up by more than 1,200%. But it goes beyond Pop Mart, as brands from South Korea, Japan, and other Asian countries are finding more inroads into American culture. Just as American cultural influence has spread around the world via Levi’s, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Apple, and more, now Asian brands are making it two-way traffic. 

Mixue, a Chinese ice cream and tea chain that recently overtook McDonald’s as the largest fast-food chain in the world, opened its first U.S. store in New York City in September. Luckin, a Chinese coffee chain, is coming for Starbucks after opening a shop in NYC, too. Chinese automaker BYD surpassed Tesla in EV sales globally last year and is eyeing American expansion. Korean skincare brand CosRX drives 90% of its revenue from international sales, with major traction among Gen Z Americans. Taiwanese restaurant chain Din Tai Fung—with 21 U.S. locations—now has the highest average per-location revenue of any American restaurant chain—$27.4 million per store.

A new report from global ad agency network TBWA looks at some of the qualities that drove these companies’ overseas success. The report takes a deep dive into how exports like K-pop, matcha, anime, and Labubus have rebranded Asia for a new generation of consumers—and explores what U.S. brands can learn from it.

“With the rise of K-beauty, J-beauty, and now in a world of Miniso and Pop Mart, we’re seeing brands from Asia really building emotional connection with consumers,” says Jen Costello, TBWA’s global chief strategy officer. “It’s not cheap, fast, low-cost, plastic crap, but it’s actually being supported by increasingly breakthrough products that have a real role in culture.” 

Found in translation

The report outlines four underlying cultural values—deep mastery, unapologetic emotion, thoughtful friction, and social etiquette—that the new wave of Asian brands are particularly strong in. These obviously aren’t exclusive to Asian brands, just common threads among them. 

Deep Mastery

Deep mastery revolves around the idea that as culture is increasingly saturated by AI-generated content and digital art, consumers are craving skill-based learning, time-honored craft, and enduring expertise. One brand example is Toku Saké and its focus solely on doing “one thing exceptionally well,” which is creating slow-brewed, small-batch sake. The idea is that specialization, rather than expansion, can be the new growth strategy for brands.

Unapologetic Emotion

Unapologetic emotion signifies a cultural pivot away from irony, sarcasm, and emotional detachment, where sincerity was often dismissed as “cringe.” The report says audiences are growing bored of performative nihilism, and find freedom in honest emotional expression. Here, Pop Mart’s Labubus are the brand example, rooted in the Japanese culture of kawaii (cuteness).

Thoughtful Friction

Thoughtful friction challenges the idea that speed and seamlessness equal freedom. Instead, the report contends, the promise of “effortless everything” leads to digital addiction, burnout, and waste. The report uses South Korea’s pay-as-you-throw food-waste system that requires residents to purchase special, volume-based bags, creating a daily constraint that incentivizes people to think twice before discarding waste and to buy only what they need.

Costello says the concept of thoughtful friction surprised her the most. It’s unusual for brands to reject effortless experience in favor of creating intentional friction. “It’s counterintuitive to the way that a lot of brands think,” she says. “Especially for Western brands, it’s always about making it seamless. It is always about reducing friction. It is always about making it easy. But there is value in making people think for just a moment and having that be rewarding.”

Social Etiquette

The report defines social etiquette as an outlook that counters the hyper-individualism encouraged by the “main-character energy” cultural narrative, which has led to widespread incivility. It functions as “soft infrastructure” to preserve social harmony. The report says marketers should recognize that after years of “casual everything,” clear codes of conduct feel “refreshingly helpful.” One example is how Singapore Airlines has built its relationship between crew and passengers with high mutual respect, and has even considered rewarding passengers who demonstrate good behavior on flights through its loyalty program.

New export confidence

Pop culture and our ability to share it has made the world a much smaller place. The report posits that these core values have played a significant role in Asian brands making inroads with Western audiences. It’s also supported by a boom in tourism. (Visits to Japan soared by 16% last year, and Japan, Thailand, and South Korea are among the top 10 destinations for Gen Z travelers, according to travel visa service Ztartvisa.)

Emmanuel Sabbagh, TBWA\Asia’s chief strategy officer, says this overall cultural boost has given brands from Asia more confidence in talking to international audiences. “For many, this is the very first time they’re seeing appeal from the West,” says Sabbagh. “They feel way more confident to be who they are and to express who they are to the rest of the world. It’s a big shift. They say that this is their way to go bigger, stronger, not changed for the West. They want to be more themselves.”

Traditionally, Asian companies have been stronger on product than building brands, particularly ones that translate to the West. That challenge remains for many of them. Sabbagh says the brand culture in America is very mature, in terms of how the logo, experience, and story are all tied together.

“That’s where brands from the East are not as strong as they should be,” Sabbagh says. “Even a brand as big as Uniqlo, think about how they can go bigger into what is the promise, what is the real brand platform, what people will look for in that specific brand.” Sabbagh adds that many Asian brands hyper focus on process and manufacturing, but that leaves incredible white space for them to grow on the brand side of things. “The brand is what they are missing as the vehicle to go to the other side of the world and to be stronger in their own market,” he says.

The aim of the report isn’t to get Western brands to mimic their Eastern counterparts, but rather to use their success to identify insights that work for their own audiences. “The whole point is to make sure that you’re not just trying to hold up a mirror to these values, but find your version of it, find your truth in it, find what makes it real for you,” says Costello. “This isn’t about going out and trying to replicate exactly what Pop Mart or Miniso have done.”

View the full article