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In recent years, the blind box economy continues to heat up. Consumers open the blind box packaging, inside is a random doll, want to open the preferred style all depends on luck. However, in the online shopping platform, offline shops, there are many merchants selling imitation blind boxes, their appearance is no different from the original, only some details are different from the original, the price is much lower than the original blind boxes.

Accordingly, Zhao Zhanling, a special researcher at the Intellectual Property Research Centre of China University of Political Science and Law and a partner of JIA LAWYER law firm, was interviewed by Rule of Law Weekend Newspaper and gave an in-depth explanation of such incidents.

01 imitation blind box low price poor quality

Bubble Mate ‘court in front of the ink plum’ series of blind box hand puppet recently quietly popular, dolls, including 12 basic models and a low chance of extraction of hidden models, the official website is priced at 69 yuan. The reporter searched in the online shopping platform found that ‘the court before the ink plum’ series of blind box selling price from a dozen yuan to the original price varies. However, the merchants are using the official publicity map or real picture to advertise. Most claimed that ‘official authentic’, fake can pay.

Reporter to 22 yuan price, in an e-commerce platform, a shop called ‘buy good 08’ to buy a ‘Tingqian Mo Mei’ series of blind box, even opened a rare hidden models, but the handpiece is very rough, lack of colour, degumming, emitting an unpleasant smell of plastic! However, the doll is very rough, lack of colour and glue, smells of plastic, and falls off when the doll's head moves a little.

In the bubble Mart official website to see, the head of the hidden model handpiece is filled with oil-like liquid containing luminous sequins, slightly shaking, sequins like snowflakes slowly fall. However, the reporter bought this handpiece, the head is solid, and can not achieve the same effect of ‘snow crystal ball’.

Bubble Mart staff told reporters that the reporter purchased a blind box on the line for imitation. The official genuine packaging material is thick, often with brand sealing stickers at the seal or one-time opening design, and complete, clear brand logo and anti-counterfeiting labels.

02 Customised blind boxes can be made to order from

So how are these low-priced blind boxes made and sold?

Imitation blind box sales chain throughout the country, the source of the factory can not only directly copy the big brand toy blind box, but also according to the sample drawing provided by the customer to produce blind boxes, and will be slightly altered style, in order to avoid copyright disputes.

In the platform released a ‘there is no source’ post, three days, there are four strangers to find a reporter, said the hands of the source, can also be customised.

The reporter in the capacity of a customer to a merchant consulting, said he would like to order Bubble Mart ‘court in front of the ink plum’ series of the same blind box. Merchant customer service said that if the bulk of custom 10,000 pieces, each piece of blind box factory price of about 28 yuan, another 40,000 yuan mould fee, the finished product is about 8 cm high, almost the same as the genuine article.

In addition to the source factory, the reporter after investigation, learned that some offline toy shops are also selling imitation blind boxes.

In a toy shop in a department store in Beijing, not only sells finished blind boxes, but also sells bulk blind box dolls. Merchants told reporters that buyers only need to buy the box can be made into a blind box.

Some of these bulk blind box dolls uneven colouring, some parts are missing, there is no product information on the bag. When the reporter asked whether these blind box dolls are officially authorised, the toy shop staff said that most of the products sold for the production of individual studios, there is no copyright, there is no official authorisation.

03 Imitation Blind Boxes Suspected of Infringement

Currently, the sale of imitation blind boxes by merchants has been included in the scope of combating and rectifying by the public security authorities.2025 In January, the Beijing police received a report from the public that a certain online shop was suspected of selling counterfeit branded artefacts. After identification, the shop sold hand puppet and blind boxes, all of which were products of counterfeit brands. The operator of the online shop, Min Moumou, purchased the goods from a provincial manufacturer and sold them on the online platform at a price increase. The police took criminal detention measures against Min Moumou according to the law.

Not only that, Beijing police, after further tracking, locked up six criminal gangs producing and selling counterfeit hipster handbags and blind boxes. In February this year, the police carried out a unified netting operation in six cities in five provinces, criminally detained 34 suspects, seized a large number of counterfeit brand registered trademarks, and shut down two factories involved in the case.

What subjects' legitimate rights and interests have been violated by the imitation blind boxes flooding the blind box market, and what laws have been violated by the businessmen's production and sales behaviours?

Zhao Zhanling said that in recent years, the big brand toy blind box has been imitation of the ‘disaster area’. Merchants produce imitation blind box, not in the packaging on the specific origin information, product number, but claimed to be ‘big’ blind box behaviour, may be suspected of violating the product quality law and other relevant provisions of the law.

In Zhao Zhanling lawyers, the genuine big brand blind box with originality, art, reproducibility, according to the law enjoys the copyright of works of art, protected by law. Imitation merchants are also suspected of violating the copyright of the right holder. In addition to the toy itself, the genuine big brand blind box outer packaging may also be protected by copyright law, anti-unfair competition law and other laws and regulations, if the direct copy of other people's outer packaging design, may constitute copyright infringement.

‘Merchants who produce, warehouse and sell copyright-infringing blind box handbags without authorisation in order to gain illegal benefits may be held criminally liable if they constitute the crime of copyright infringement. In addition, because the blind box to consumers caused personal damage, but also bear the corresponding legal responsibility.’ Zhao Zhanling lawyer said.

In addition, Zhao Zhanling pointed out that a large number of infringing products contain ‘hidden model’ blind box figures, after entering the market to reduce the scarcity of the ‘hidden model’ attribute, but also reduce the willingness of consumers to buy, expanding the loss of the right holder.