Adidas probably did not worry about the tens of thousands of remnants when they announced they would sell every pair in the warehouse. The shoe maker just revealed that they got rid of some €508 million worth of the Yeezys that were initially thought to be written off. Is Kanye West enjoying the last laugh?

The popular Adidas Yeezy Boost 350 V2 ‘Zebra’ from 2017

Adidas struck gold with Yeezy inventory they initially thought they would not sell, or that few wanted. Following the Kanye West rants of last year, starting with the Yeezy Season show in Paris, later the berating of the Three Stripes, and the exposé of the rapper-designer’s unseemly behaviour in the design studio, Adidas terminated ties with Mr West, which, at first, meant the end of Yeezy shoes, even when there were vast amounts in their warehouses. But give it time, and the sneakers will not be affected by the scandals that had plagued the suspiciously unhinged founder. Adidas finesse a potentially bad outcome by waiting six months (long enough for most people to forget celebrity indiscretions) and then announced last May that they would sell their hoard of Yeezys. And they did a month later, to much shopper frenzy. According to a recent Financial Times report that quoted “people familiar with the matter”, the German brand “received more than €508mn (or about S$750 million) for 4mn pairs of trainers”.

Staggering. Who would have thought that sneakerheads are not jelak of those shoes, yet? Or that the Yeezy brand isn’t at the end of its inexplicable popularity, especially after its creator behaved so questionably, and without a smidgen of remorse even after being called out. The unattractiveness of his demeanour was perhaps reflected in the output of his kicks. One of them, the Boost 350 V2, is a pair that we have never found to be aesthetically advantageous on any feet with any leg of pants, or ankles exposed (we’re not even talking about some styles in puke-inducing colours, such as the ‘Semi Frozen Yellow’, which isn’t so much a yellow as bleached Slime green). There is something about the form factor of the Boost 350 V2 that is akin to badly risen bread, yet the sneaker captivated many, and is frequently the Yeezy seen on the street, even six years after its birth.

Another popular colour of the Yeezy Boost 350 V2, the ‘Carbon Beluga’, as seen on a seller of the YZY Slide

For some of us, Yeezy sneakers do not communicate the sleekness or edginess that footwear must these days. What Adidas has released this time may have again aroused the ardour in the shoes, but it is hard not to think that they still come with baggage, however they look. It isn’t just what Mr West said in the month-long denunciation last year against Jews, there was also the toxic top-down culture in which the shoes were conceived, not to mention the undesirable culture of re-selling the sneakers that is characterised by greed. The global sneaker resale market was, according to the investment bank Cowen & Co that pronounced sneakers as “an emerging alternative asset class” in 2020, valued at US$2 billion (or about S$2.7 billion) in 2019. It is projected to triple to US$6 billion by 2025. Yeezys have a large part to play in those staggering numbers. As one Yeezy fan at last year’s Culture Cartel told us: “the shoes are innocent. Don’t deprive us of them.”

Adidas had said that they would donate a “significant amount” of the Yeezy comeback sale to non-profits (such as the Anti-Defamation League). How that significance—even when they had said they would “sell it [the stock] with a small margin”—will impact the gains they hoped to make or trim the losses isn’t yet clear. The Three Stripes confirmed that Mr West would continue to receive royalties—reported to be an impressive 15% of wholesale revenue—when the shoes were sold. The rapper, however, did not say what he’ll do with the money earned. Or if he would, after a good laugh, use it to reinvest in the Yeezy fashion line (not produced by Adidas) that has become tedious and, frankly, pointless, such as the latest, Season 10. It seems that Adidas’s recent staggered drop was not the final. In a statement quoted by the media, the German sporting goods giant said, “…potential future Yeezy drops would further improve the company’s results.” How many more pairs of Yeezys does Adidas really have in their cache?

File photo: Zhao Xiangji for SOTD