Kanye West and Adidas have officially split up after a two-month standoff that got ugly, very fast. Ye had originally wanted to split from Adidas in September when he revealed that the brand was dropping silhouettes and colorways without his permission. It was an interesting admission, and Ye was trying to build a sympathetic case online.
In recent weeks, Ye has transitioned into full-blown antisemitism and white supremacist rhetoric. It has been jarring to watch, and there is no doubt that he has effectively lost the support of all the important people around him. He is being dropped from pretty well every partnership he has, and just a few days ago, he was officially dropped by Adidas.
The interesting part of this news is that Adidas owns the Yeezy designs, and they are allowed to sell them without the Yeezy name. This will obviously enrage Kanye, but if it was built into his contract, then there is simply nothing he can do about it. At the end of the day, this is what he wanted, and now he is facing the consequences.
According to the Daily Mail, this latest news is actually having a huge effect on the resale market. As it stands, Yeezy shoes are making up nine of the 25 most popular shoes on reseller sites. Not to mention, google searches for "sell Yeezy" have gone up by a whopping 500 percent. The average price of a Yeezy has also gone up to about $400 USD.
Resellers have always capitalized on news like this. It makes sense that prices would go up, as now, old Yeezy shoes will become even rarer. Finding old Adidas Yeezy shoes with the Yeezy branding will become a novelty, and holding on to these for a long time could yield quite dividends. Sneaker reselling is a dog-eat-dog world, and that is what we are seeing right now.
It remains to be seen what Kanye will do, moving forward, but there is no doubt that he has a lot of work to do. Rebuilding a brand is not easy, and he is about to learn just that.
Stay tuned to HNHH as we will be sure to bring you more news from this developing story.
[Via]
