When PostNL loses your package, where does it go? It might be at a pop up store in Amsterdam  Alkmaar Heerhugowaard.

It’s quiet on a Tuesday morning at the Middenwaard Winkelcentrum in Heerhugowaard.

The press release for the King Colis pop up event said Amsterdam. The West-Friesland town of Heerhugowaard is only mentioned in the fine print.

The French company sells lost packages at pop up events around Europe. Ever had a Bol package disappear or an Amazon return get lost en route? It might be one of the hundreds of packages stacked in wooden crates in the middle of a mall somewhere north of Amsterdam.

The concept is simple. You have ten minutes to dig through stacks and stacks of packages, pick out what you want, and pay €1.99 per 100 grams for “standard” parcels and  €2.79 per 100 grams for “premium” parcels.

Everything is in packaging so you don’t know what is inside, though the external labels someones provide clues.

Manager Paul Munos tells Dutch News the most expensive thing he’s ever seen someone pull out of one of the mystery boxes is a Rolex. He’s also seen someone find a gold bar. Mostly, though, it’s accessories and clothing. “You see a lot of phone cases and cables,” he says.

In the Netherlands alone, nearly one million packages go missing every year. Some are stolen, some delivered to neighbours. Some are simply stuck in transit, like a book from New Zealand that took two years to arrive at its destined address in The Hague.

Many of these packages end up as unclaimed parcels and can be sold on to resellers, like King Colis. A survey by eCommerce platform Metapack estimates around a million items go missing every month across Europe.

Teenagers Ellen and Nikkie are two of the customers browsing through some of those missing items. Neither had been to a pop-up like the King Colis event before, but they had both seen unboxing videos on TikTok.

“I’m hoping for a new phone,” Ellen told Dutch News. Nikkie was a little more realistic. “Maybe make up?” she answered, when asked what she would like to find.

In 2021, unboxing videos of lost packages took social media by storm, with influencers showing off unwrapping entire pallets of packages, shopping in unclaimed pack warehouse and opening iPhones, name-brand sneakers and designer purses.

In Heerhugowaard, some customers took their chances with a stack of packages. A man who did not want to give his name said he liked the “surprise” aspect of the concept but wasn’t convinced he would find anything valuable.

Dutch News took home one mystery package. The attached customs form indicated it contained a book that the Austrian postal service had been unable to deliver.

Fittingly, the parcel contained one book. Inside was $100M Money Models: How To Make Money, which holds the Guiness World Record for fastest-selling non-fiction book. Written by influencer Alex Hormozi, it sold 2,917,443 copies when it launched in August.

It promises to “accelerate cash flow in a business.” The hardcover version retails for €32.09 on Amazon. At 648 grams, we bought it for €12.90. (If any Dutch News reader wants to accelerate our cash flow and take the book off of our hands, send an email to editor@dutchnews.nl)

The pop up in Heerhugowaard runs until January 25 and King Colis will be back with more events in the Netherlands later in the year.