Kanye West is not leaving Adidas. The rapper — who now goes by Ye — took to Instagram on Thursday night (February 29) to share a photo of a purported corporate document instructing employees at the clothing giant how to talk to consumers about the company that sells the Yeezy line for one more time.
Dated February 26, the alleged internal document explains: “Adidas is the sole owner of the product, including design rights for existing products as well as previous colorways. The products are existing Yeezy designs that launched in 2022. Adidas honored contractual obligations and discussed product releases prior to the announcement with the former partner.”
The document also appears to ask employees not to pursue extensive conversations with customers surrounding the Yeezy line and instead directs them to a general email to voice their concerns.
“This is the document they give adidas employees when they ask them questions about Yeezy,” the rapper claimed in caption of his post. “There's an overlap in adidas and Kim ignoring my opinion… or people ignoring my name change or the whole celebrity culture ostracizing me for my political opinion. It's all about the human rights you sacrifice when you're stigmatized with mental health problems. The situations are actually a lot crazier than I've been made out to be.”
Advertising sign has reached out to Adidas representatives for comment and has not yet been able to verify the document's accuracy. Advertising sign has also reached out to representatives for Ye and Kim Kardashian, who was married to the rapper from 2014 to 2022.
Adidas announced on Monday that she would sell some of her remaining Yeezy inventory after splitting with Ye in 2022 following his spate of hate speech and anti-Semitic comments. After ending the partnership, Adidas says it has donated some proceeds from such sales to teams that “combating discrimination and hatred, including racism and anti-Semitism”.
After Adidas announced this week that Yeezys were making a comeback, Ye blasted the brand for selling “fake Yeezys” and called on his fans to boycott the company entirely.
“Anyone who loves Ye would not buy these fake Yeezys. I never made these colorways, I don't get paid for them, and adidas sued me,” he wrote at the time. “All the new unlicensed 350s are flawless and everyone knows the 350s were bad.”
He also claimed that Adidas is suing him for $250 million, but as of earlier this week, there is no evidence that Adidas has filed any kind of new lawsuit against West or his companies.
However, Adidas revealed that it had filed a private arbitration case against West's Yeezy LLC in December 2022 on the grounds that the rapper's “racist, anti-Semitic and other offensive public statements and conduct” had breached their partnership agreement and had caused “significant damage to his brand.”
West may refer to the arbitration case by claiming that the sportswear brand “sued” him. It is unclear if $250 million is at stake in this case or if this case is still ongoing as the arbitration proceedings are being heard behind closed doors.
The company began selling Yeezy products again in May 2023 after cutting ties with West the previous year.
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/music/rb-hip-hop/kanye-west-calls-out-adidas-shares-alleged-internal-document-1235619666/
