S Poddar
Adidas had already put an end to the dispute with Kanye West over his antisemitic comments back in 2022 when it had suspended its collaboration on the very popular “Yeezy” line.
But by yesterday afternoon, after the whole scandal broke, Adidas stopped taking orders for Yeezy and started selling from its remaining stock to wholesalers. On Tuesday, the company announced it had made a settlement with West but didn’t detail what such a settlement might entail or the terms. It reportedly ends all open legal disputes against him.
“There are no more open issues and no. money going either way,” Adidas CEO Bjorn Gulden said on an earnings conference call.
Gulden admits the tensions that have already appeared between the two parties. “There were tensions on many issues [but]. both parties said we don’t need to fight any more.” As according to Gulden, this matter is now in the past: “When you have conflicts like this, you take provisions and you have legal opinions and there are negotiations and there are settlements being done, and this is the end to it.”. Nobody owns anything to anyone else anymore. Everything that was is history.
The break-up of their partnership has seen Adidas with a stock of Yeezy products that should amount to €1.2 billion, or £840 million. The company is, however selling the remaining products in batches, sending money to charities, including its new anti-discrimination foundation, Adidas fears all the last Yeezy products will be sold off by the end of the year 2024.
This is a significant shift from what the company published in 2022 after Adidas stated that it “condemns antisemitism and all forms of hate speech.” Adidas also alleged that West’s comments were “unacceptable, hateful, and dangerous” and also ran against its values of diversity, inclusion, mutual respect, and fairness.
Adidas partnered with Kanye West in 2014, and the partnership developed one of the house’s most profitable lines. Though the scandal, consumers remain demanding for Yeezy products; many shoes resold for hundreds or even thousands of pounds.
A spate of antisemitic comments from West in October 2022 led to him having his accounts suspended on Instagram and X, the rebranded Twitter. He continued to make such comments in interviews and podcasts during the next few months, though not all were broadcast. In December, he appeared on InfoWars, the program of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, making statements there that he had admiration for Adolf Hitler.
The musician, who has been open about his battle with bipolar disorder, was also dealing with personal issues due to his separation from celebrity Kim Kardashian.
