Serena Zhu, 27, was carrying eight minifigurines in a tote bag, each slotted lovingly into its own little sleeve. To the uninitiated, these Sonny Angels look like the kind of thing a kid would get in a Happy Meal. But in fact, Zhu’s rarities are worth nearly $1,000. At a recent meetup of collectors in Berkeley’s Willard Park, other enthusiasts oohed and ahhed over her collection.
“The sun’s out, and my seasonal depression is melting away,” said Aleya Samaniego, an organizer of the toy-and-trinket meetup, which takes place around the Bay Area a few times a year. “The collectors are defrosting.”
Yet a cloud of worry hung over the crowd — a cloud in the shape of Donald Trump.
These earnest, toy-loving young adults — collectors of Sonny Angels and little green creatures called Smiskis, among other figurines made by Dreams Inc. — are the last people who expected to have politics intrude on their lifestyle. And yet, in the year 2025, even a harmless toy-collecting hobby is at the whim of chaotic national affairs.
The hobbyists first began panicking in February, when the U.S. Postal Service briefly suspended accepting packages from China, according to Lala Tadios, 27, founder of Gachapon Pals, a Bay Area artist collective that co-organized the meetup. Alarmed collectors flooded Reddit and Discord, wondering if their precious “blind boxes” — the mystery packages containing one of a variety of figurines — would make the journey home.
Then, on March 1, Dreams, the Japanese brand that manufactures its ultra-popular figurines in China, increased prices by $1.25, to $11.25. This was in anticipation of the Trump administration’s increased tariffs on Chinese imports to 20%, which went into effect a few days later.
That might not seem like a lot, but collectors buy the figurines in bulk, then trade and resell them. Almost 80% of toys sold in the U.S. are manufactured in China, and trade group The Toy Association expects prices to increase by 15% to 20%.
In the past few years, it’s become common to see groups of friends huddled around a Japantown shop, shaking mystery packages in an attempt to predict which figurine they’re going to pull. Many retailers limit customers to one or two blind boxes. Stonestown Galleria’s Pop Mart store is often packed, and its Robo Shop vending machines are rarely without a line. In other local toy shops — some authorized retailers, others not — Pop Mart and Dreams figurines are frequently sold out.
At the meetup, friends who had hoped to bond over their favorite naked baby figurine or Smiski found themselves worrying about what the tariffs will reap for their cute plastic obsessions. “It definitely makes me think twice,” Zhu said about continuing to amass Dreams goods.
The anxiety ties into greater economic trends and concerns as the Trump administration’s policies rock the economy. Electronics, including computers and phones, could see an 11% price jump, according to a Joint Economic Committee report. An Intuit Credit Karma report found that 51% of Americans, especially Gen Z and millennials, have changed their spending habits in anticipation of tariffs.
To these collectors, it can feel like a tax on joy. They are stressed about how the tariffs will affect their other coping mechanisms, too, from collecting trading cards and vinyl albums to the price of baking.
“We’re seeing the effects happening right in front of us,” said Samaniego, who is something of a trinket celebrity to her 74,000 Instagram followers. “I kind of don’t want to buy a blind box for $1.50 more than it was last month.” But blind boxes that contain mystery figurines are a huge part of the hobby, incentivizing people to buy more in search of specific toys. If tariffs continue to hike up prices, Samaniego said, collectors will prefer to buy and trade at meetups rather than test their luck with blind boxes online.
For a hobby that offers an escape from the real world — a 3-inch Sonny Angel cherub is meant to “make you smile” — the intrusion of geopolitics is a total bummer.
“Sonny Angel is anything but political,” said Alan Buff, vice president of Dreams USA. “He is the most apolitical thing that you can ever imagine. … We would be really disappointed if politics entered the world of Sonny Angel. That’s not what we’re about.”
But, he said, “the tariffs absolutely impact our cost structure.”
Under the first Trump administration, the toy industry was mostly exempt from tariffs. This time around, everyone is feeling the hit.
“The recent tariffs [are] a really direct and stinging increase, because it’s a flat rate,” said Buff. “We raised prices on March 1 with the understanding that there was going to be a 10% tariff. By the time we implemented the price increase, the tariff was doubled to 20%, and we have no idea where tariffs on Chinese product are going.”
Anthony Ramos, 26, said the price increases are making him think twice about purchasing blind boxes directly from the Dreams website. He plans to buy a highly anticipated new series of figurines secondhand.
However, resellers who buy up figurines in bulk have been known to list them at higher prices, a subject that makes collectors audibly aggravated. “It works hand in hand,” said Ramos. “If the tariffs increase the base price, then the reseller prices can also go up.”
As the young collectors, dressed with ribbons in their hair and pastel dresses meant to match their caricatures, stressed over international trade policies, the meetup in the park was a stark reminder that these days, nowhere, and no one, is free from the reach of politics. Not even Sonny Angel.
