What's the Deal with Kanye West and Adidas?
image: Axel Antas-Bergkvist via Unsplash
UPDATE: This article was originally published on October 11, 2022. On October 25, 2022, adidas chose to cut business ties with Kanye West, citing his antisemitic remarks as the reason for their severance. This severance effectively ends the adidas x Yeezy partnership.
Kanye has undoubtedly been riding a slippery slope since the start of the year and honestly, things just keep getting worse. We’ve all known (due to Ye’ not shying away from shouting his business from the mountaintops) that Kanye has been having issues with Adidas for some time now. But, Adidas finally managed to put a nail of their own in the coffin last week by announcing that their relationship with the outspoken rapper has been put on pause.
“After repeated efforts to privately resolve the situation, we have taken the decision to place the partnership under review. We will continue to co-manage the current product during this period,” said Adidas. Kanye has been apart of the Adidas family since 2013 and it’s a relationship that has made both parties a substantial amount of money. But, Kanye has been very vocal recently in regards to the company and it’s CEO claiming that Adidas has been stealing his ideas and they aren’t giving him enough creative control. Sound familiar?
It’s also been revealed that Yeezy LLC made the decision to terminate its partnership with Gap. Kanye cited the same reasons above as to why he decided to end the deal. According to a private document reviewed by Bloomberg, Yeezy’s LLC sneaker and apparel business with Adidas AG and Gap was recently valued at between $3.2 billion and $4.7 billion dollars. While this was probably a tough decision for Adidas to make, they had nothing but positive things to say about Kanye stating that, “Kanye is our most important partner worldwide. We have a very, very good relationship with him. We communicate with him on a very ongoing basis and we’re very proud of that relationship.” They also stated that their partnership with Yeezy is one of the most successful collaborations in the history of the industry.
We can imagine completely nixing the relationship altogether would leave a lot of money on the table. As well as it would leave a whole lot of fans and consumers upset. We hope both parties are able to come to a resolution soon that’ll satisfy them both.