Posted on 02/28/2023 4:37:46 PM PST by algore
Adidas could be forced to burn Yeezy sneakers worth around half-a-billion dollars after rapper and fashion designer Kanye West's anti-Semitic outbursts.
The sportswear brand is struggling over what to do with its massive stockpile of the shoes, which retail for between $200 and $600
Analysts now say Adidas, which has already said the debacle hit revenues by $1.3bn, could be forced to burn the stock - because it risks a PR nightmare if they are still sold at a discount.
The company's decision to drop West capped the rapper's fall from grace after a pattern of increasingly erratic behavior and anti-Semitic outbursts.
In October, he said in a social media post that he would go 'death con 3 on Jewish people', then doubled down in media interviews with comments that included vile remarks about Jewish people.
the Yeezy line was worth about $2 billion per year in revenue for Adidas, adding: 'What makes this so dramatic is how big it is.' He said the commercial dilemma was confounded by the 'abruptness' of West's downfall.
stripping the trainers of the Yeezy label and selling them at a discount as 'zombie Yeezys' was a risk because the brand could still be seen as 'profiting off of a collaboration with someone who made blatant anti-Semitic statements'.
Burning or otherwise destroying the shoes would be the most extreme option - but it is something other fashion brands have done previously, albeit under different circumstances. Luxury brands like Louis Vuitton and Burberry have previously faced criticism for burning unsold sold to preserve brand value.
Elizabeth Napier, an assistant professor at the University of Toledo, told the Post Adidas should offer the stock to charities to help with disaster relief, including those supplying aid following the earthquakes which recently hit Syria and Turkey.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
They could give the inventory away to needy people either here or in some other country. But, I guess they care too much about social justice to do anything like that.
Can’t they sell them to the tens of millions of white supremacists that the Biden administration claims there are in the U.S.?
Geez heaven forbid if they donate them to kids in Africa that would love to have shoes like that.
They would go perfectly with those “Philadelphia Eagles Super Bowl LVII Champions” T-Shirts.
Sell them on the West Bank and Iran.
Funny. I just read yesterday that Adidas was started by and named for a Nazi sympathizer.
So it’s about $10 million in costs for Chinese labor.
Is Adidas a woke company?
Asking for a friend.....
Probably not an issue for them if sold in the middle east. Seriously, we all know it.
Its not that people don’t want them.
they don’t want to buy them from adidas.
send them to West Africa with all the Buffalo Bills Super Bowl Champion T-shirts.
Considering the last time they made a Super Bowl was about 30 years ago, those would be some real old shirts.
“Geez heaven forbid if they donate them to kids in Africa that would love to have shoes like that”
What happens to African shoe makers when you dump thousands of “free” shoes into their market?
L
The Daily Mail posted two pictures of this nutjob, in both he’s wearing a Trump hat.
Yeezy made them queasy!
Give them away for free to people who need shoes instead of burning them.
The only PR nightmare is in their own minds.
Go woke and get stuck with thousands of dollars worth of merchandise you can’t sell.
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