NEW YORK — Consumers and trend-watchers across TikTok feeds and mall aisles are drawing a line under 2025’s loudest fads — from “6-7” chants and Dubai chocolate to Labubu charms and barrel jeans, Dec. 20, 2025.
What started as harmless fun often ended as overload (too much, too fast) or, in the case of viral food and collectibles, real-world safety alerts that made “buyer beware” literal.
In a year-end cultural cleanup, The Associated Press’ rundown of trends to leave behind captured the familiar arc: the internet coronates a must-have, brands race to clone it, and the backlash arrives right on schedule.
Dubai chocolate: from flex snack to recall headline
Dubai chocolate was the snack equivalent of a status symbol — thick milk chocolate split open for the camera, revealing a pistachio-green center and a crackle of shredded pastry. By 2024, Food & Wine traced the original Dubai chocolate bar to Fix Dessert Chocolatier and flagged how quickly counterfeits and sketchy sellers followed the viral buzz.
The copying only accelerated. In Northern California, SFGate reported bakeries making their own Dubai chocolate-style bars for customers who couldn’t easily buy the Dubai original — a sign the craze had moved from influencer content to everyday retail.
Then came the part no one films in an ASMR unboxing: labels. The U.K.’s Food Standards Agency issued an allergy alert for Brookie Bakes’ Dubai Bar Pistachio & Knafeh in December after it said the product may contain undeclared peanuts. In the U.S., a separate Costco pullback put Dubai chocolate back in headlines when Rolling Pin Dubai Style Chocolate was recalled over allergen mislabeling tied to wheat.
The lesson isn’t that Dubai chocolate is inherently risky. It’s that when a niche treat becomes mass-market overnight, “check the ingredients” becomes part of the trend.
Labubu: when a toy turns into a supply-chain problem
Labubu — the pointy-eared, sharp-toothed monster charm — became a universal tell: someone in your orbit suddenly had one clipped to a bag. Early U.S. mania was already visible in 2024, when the Los Angeles Times chronicled long lines and scuffles around Pop Mart launches, a familiar sign that scarcity had become part of the product.
By late summer 2025, the hype had a darker edge. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission warned consumers to avoid counterfeit Labubu dolls, saying knockoffs can pose choking hazards — especially for small children — and urging buyers to stick with reputable sellers.
“6-7”: the meme that ate the classroom
Unlike the fads you can return, “6-7” is a sound: shouted, repeated, and intentionally meaningless. It was everywhere in 2025 — in hallways, comment sections and parents’ group chats — and its ubiquity was enough for Dictionary.com to name “67” (pronounced “six seven”) its 2025 Word of the Year, citing its rise from a Skrilla lyric to viral TikTok clips and a full-blown in-joke.
Barrel jeans: the silhouette that divides the room
Barrel jeans didn’t get recalled — they just got reconsidered. Fashion’s love affair with the curved, ballooning leg has been simmering for years; Vogue wrote about barrel jeans as a polarizing trend back in 2023. In 2025, the look went mainstream enough that the backlash arrived: shoppers who tried the “editor-approved” shape decided they didn’t want to dress like an optical illusion.
As 2026 approaches, the common thread is less about aesthetics and more about agency. Treat the next viral drop like Dubai chocolate: enjoy it in small doses, read the label, and don’t let the algorithm decide what belongs in your cart — or your closet.
