After a decade of cupcakes, the University Bookstore’s vending machine will now sell blind boxes. On Wednesday night, a Pop Mart Robo Shop machine, an automated retail store, was installed in the space where the now-defunct Sprinkles Cupcakes ATM once stood. 

Sales began Thursday, with a line forming outside the machine shortly after it opened.

The Pop Mart vending machine is the first of its kind, with USC being the only college campus in the world to host a Pop Mart Robo Shop. 

The Robo Shop will have slots for about 50 different Pop Mart products, ranging in price from $16.99 to $36.99.

Ivy Ng, a senior majoring in public relations and advertising, showed up at the Robo Shop shortly after it opened. She said it was a “smart collab” and that she plans to stop by regularly to reward herself after a long night of studying, or to grab a last-minute gift for a friend.

“[Pop Mart] is unleashing the inner child of everyone, just like Disney and other [similar] companies,” she said. “Pop Mart basically touches into the softest parts of our hearts, and it’s really nice that we have something that can release all the kindness of everyone.”

The USC Sprinkles Cupcakes ATM stopped working in December 2024 after Sprinkles abruptly closed all of its retail locations and vending machines nationwide. Since then, the machine has been nonoperational. Now, only two independently owned locations of the cupcake shop remain, both located in California. 

The University had been talking to Pop Mart before Sprinkles closed and was considering other locations on campus to retail its products, according to Darren James, director of retail for USC Bookstores. Pop Mart had been working with the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism and a group of students to put together a collaborative plan.

“When Sprinkles suddenly closed down, it just made sense to replace that space with the Pop Mart location,” James said.

James said the Bookstore is constantly watching trends to determine their next retailers. They look for brands that aren’t “collegiate,” such as Aviator Nation and Cactus Jack. 

“All of that is to build cultural excitement around really exciting brands that are really special when you compare them to other college campuses,” James said. “Being in downtown Los Angeles, we feel like it uniquely positions us to engage with brands like this, so we do the [brand deal] drops to kind of test them out.”

Freddy Tran Nager, associate director of digital social media at Annenberg, said the collaboration highlights the global community at USC and did a good job of integrating different cultures present on campus.

“This Bookstore has so much USC culture tied into it, and this is the real Asian presence here for the first time, so it’s pretty exciting,” Nager said. “I know my students are excited — this morning I started posting on LinkedIn and Xiaohongshu, and there was an immediate response.”

The Pop Mart machine will be at the Bookstore until the trends change, James said. For now, he doesn’t expect that to happen. James said the Bookstore is considering a permanent installation inside if Pop Mart does well.