Kanye West and adidas’ partnership may have officially come to an end but the Three Stripes will continue to sell Yeezy designs in 2023. After publicly bashing adidas’ board of directors, wearing ‘White Lives Matter’ apparel, and claiming that George Floyd died from a fentanyl overdose, adidas terminated the partnership on October 25.
On an earnings call, current adidas CFO Harm Ohlmeyer stated they have all the rights to the Yeezy line and “we intend to make use of these rights as early as 2023.”
Image via Brendan Dunne
The adidas Yeezy brand is one of adidas’ most profitable collections and without paying royalties and marketing fees, adidas will save an additional 300 million per Bloomberg. The brand is planning to leverage the existing Yeezy inventory in the following year and could undergo a name change much like the former Kobe now “Crazy” series.
The brand has already asked retailers to pull the product from the shelves which could be a sign of its retooling. Throughout their collaborations, adidas and Yeezy cobranding has been relatively light on the models essentially only existing on the insole of the sneakers.