Talk about a well-Krafted plan.
Billionaire Patriots owner Robert Kraft helped craft a charitable way for Adidas to unload $1.3 billion of its Yeezy apparel made by disgraced anti-Semitic rapper Kanye West.
Adidas has said a significant portion of the profits from its remaining Yeezy items will be donated to five organizations.
We hear they’ll include Kraft’s Foundation to Combat Antisemitism, as well as the Anti-Defamation League and the Philonise & Keeta Floyd Institute for Social Change.
The company has not revealed how much it’ll donate — but a source told Pvnew it will be a “substantial financial seven-figure payment.” The brand has also said it doesn’t expect to make a profit on the sales.
Adidas released its first batch of leftover Yeezy wares in June, and reports said the sale racked up $565 million in online orders.
Now a second batch of the shoes is up.
As part of the new wave, shoes sold directly via Adidas in North America will include blue square pins, a symbol created by Kraft’s foundation as part of a $25 million awareness-building campaign. Sources said the pins, and a special card, will be in a million pairs of the Yeezy sneakers.
The blue squares have been publicly worn by celebs including Tom Brady, Mike Tyson, Jon Bon Jovi and Dave Matthews.
Adidas cut West’s deal as a result of his antisemitic rants late last year, which included praise for Hitler, leaving the manufacturer with millions in unsold footwear.
A sports insider told Pvnew, “Four or five weeks ago, Adidas CEO Bjørn Gulden flew over to see Robert Kraft” and they hatched the plan to include the blue square pins in the shoes for American and Canadian customers.
Said the insider, “Adidas was brave to do what they did. They had the inventory, and they cut Kanye off. They had 15 million pairs, over a billion in value. They were courageous, and you’ve got to give credit to their CEO.”
Yesterday, Kraft appeared on a panel called Hate Has No Home Here, as part of the NAACP’s 114th National Convention, with rapper Meek Mill, Fox Sports’ Joy Taylor and Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Meek and Kraft also traveled to Poland together recently to participate in the 35th International March of the Living, and to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
