Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
SYDNEY — A little over 8,000 miles away from Crumbl Cookies' Utah headquarters, major cookie fans held a pop-up shop for the sugary treats — in Australia.
TikTok account @CrumblSydney posted in late September about a Crumbl Cookies pop-up shop in Sydney. Several videos were posted on the site, advertising the pop-up before it happened.
On Sunday, hundreds of Australians lined up to get a taste of the coveted cookies, which were being sold for $17.50 in Australian dollars, equivalent to about $12 in the U.S. The cookie flavors sold at the pop-up included milk chocolate chip, pink sugar, birthday Oreo, peanut butter Snickers and caramel shortbread Twix.
A video posted Sunday showed the line stretching down the block as people waited for cookies. By Tuesday afternoon, however, all of the videos were deleted.
Some Australians voiced frustration at the pop-up being "fake" because it was not officially affiliated with Utah-based Crumbl. Dozens of videos have been posted to TikTok in the days following, from reviews of the cookies to people claiming the stunt was illegal to others praising the "hustle" of the organizers.
The TikTok account bio states, "Not endorsed by Crumbl, just fans importing!"
The bio links a document to "address the drama surrounding the event" and explains how the devoted Crumbl fans flew thousands of miles to bring the beloved cookies to their country in a pop-up.
"We never claimed to be an official Crumbl store. This was clearly stated in the bio and our comments. Our goal was to bring the authentic Crumbl cookies to Australia by importing the cookies directly from the U.S.A.," the statement said. The page also said the organizers never used the Crumbl trademarks in their videos.
The statement says the pop-up organizers traveled to the U.S. to buy cookies, then imported them in original packaging.
The cookies were several days old by the time they were sold in Australia, as the pop-up was pushed back because of flight delays from the U.S., according to a comment posted online before the videos were taken down.
Screenshots show the group made two purchases at Crumbl totaling more than $3,660 in cookies. According to a cost breakdown from the organizers, they paid around $4,000 in flights, $2,000 in duties, taxes and customs brokering, and $1,000 in staffing for the day of the pop-up.
"This event was never about profit. We aimed to bring the cookies to Crumbl fans. With all these expenses, we set the prices without an intention of making a large profit," the statement said.
CrumblSydney's statement said the act of importing and reselling is called parallel imports and is legal.
"We followed all legal procedures, declaring the cookies as commercial goods and obtaining the necessary approvals from Australian customs," the statement said, with a photo of the customs entry for the cookies that show the goods were cleared by Biosecurity Control.
Australia news network 7News reported Crumbl co-founder Sawyer Hemsley commented on a CrumblSydney video saying that "it appears we need to expedite our visit to Australia. Please note, this pop-up is in no way affiliated with Crumbl Cookies."
Crumbl Cookies said in a statement to KSL.com: "While the pop-up in Australia was not sponsored by Crumbl, we love seeing excitement for Crumbl around the world. Currently, there are Crumbl locations in all 50 states in the U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico. We look forward to expanding to other countries in the future."
CrumblSydney did not respond to KSL.com for comment as of Wednesday afternoon.
