The Current Owner of Yeezy: Kanye’s Ownership
Introduction
In the fashion world today, Yeezy is a fast-growing brand that sets the pace. Kanye West owns this brand, which represents his taste in fashion. It has collaborated with many other reputable brands since its inception in 2006 to create mind-blowing designs. Despite its numerous collaborations, the brand remains distinct. Founded in 2006, Yeezy was initially focused on creating excellent footwear designs, but as the brand grew, its owner ventured into other areas of fashion and launched the Yeezy clothing line in 2015.
Jay Z gave Kanye West the name Kanyeeezy when introducing the Lucifer track, which is the shortened form of the name Kanyeezy. Kanye West decided that when he started collaborating with other fashion brands, he would add “ezy” to their names and name his fashion brand Yeezy.
The brand has always collaborated with other reputable brands such as Nike, Louis Vuitton, and Adidas to release designs that appeal to a broad audience. This has helped the brand remain relevant in the fashion industry. While Yeezy’s collaboration with other brands helped it gain popularity, many people are unaware that it is a different brand and that it is fast gaining popularity as a fashion line. In most cases, when people think of Kanye West’s Yeezy line, they think of his trainers; however, Yeezy is not just about footwear and also designs a mean line of apparel.
- Brand Conception
- Subsidiaries of the branch
- Brand Net Worth
Brand Conception
In 2006, Kanye West designed a pair of shoes for Adidas. However, this design was never released. Later that year, he partnered with Bape, a Japanese fashion brand, and released the Bapesta shoe, also known as the college dropout shoe. Clearly, the collaboration between these two brands didn’t work out very well as Bapesta shoes only lasted a short period of time. They are now scarce and are typically expensive to purchase.
In 2019, Kanye West partnered with Louis Vuitton to create three different pairs of shoes, each named after someone significant to him. The partnership with Louis Vuitton also did not last very long.
His deal with Nike ended in 2013 when Nike refused to pay royalties for Kanye’s designs. Kanye had collaborated with Nike in the same year and released three sneaker designs, the Yeezy I, the Yeezy II, and the Air Yeezy 2. Upon the termination of his partnership with Nike, Kanye entered into an agreement with Adidas, under which he would receive a 15% wholesale royalty. In 2015, the two companies officially launched their collaboration, and since that time, the brand has enjoyed tremendous success.
Subsidiaries Of The Yeezy Brand
Yeezy Clothing
In addition to its footwear designs, Yeezy is also well known for its clothing line, known as Yeezy clothing, which was launched in October 2015. A few months after the clothing line’s launch in 2015, it released ready-to-wear and stripped-down apparel collections. They exclusively produced these styles in flesh-toned colors and military outfits. Yeezy’s outfits are typically monochrome and come in colors such as black, brown, grey, or orange. They also have the reputation of being either very tight or very loose.
There have been a number of collaborations between the Yeezy clothing line and other brands to release new designs. However, some of these designs did not receive as much attention as the shoe line, and most failed to reach the public. With Kanye’s notorious resilience, we were not surprised to hear that his clothing line is partnering with Gap Apparel Line. This partnership is expected to last for ten years. They plan to produce modern, affordable clothing for men, women, and children.
There has been an agreement by Gap to pay royalties and potential equity to Yeezy, and this collaboration is expected to last longer than previous ones.
Yeezy Footwear
Yeezy Boost 750
After the launch of the Yeezy Boost 750 at the first Yeezy season, all 9,000 pairs of shoes had been sold in less than ten minutes of its release. It is a light brown shoe design based on a shoe design from Australia. Once it was released, it was available for seven days through a wide variety of stores.
Yeezy Boost 350
Adidas trademarked material was used to weave exquisite dark blue-to-white patterns into the Yeezy boost 350. Using a unique type of rubber for the sole and heel tab, they created a shoe that had minimal laces, making it very popular. These shoes provide a very comfortable feel and are suitable for running as well.
Yeezy Boost 350 V2
This shoe design has been upgraded from the Yeezy boost 350 design, as evidenced by its name. There are four colors and versions available for this upgrade: beluga, zebra, black and white, and cream white. Another thing that distinguished this upgrade from the previous model was that the SPLY-350 stripe was plastered on the side. It also has a different structure and does not include the rubber heel tap.
Yeezy Boost 950
There are a number of features included in the Yeezy Boost 950 design, including metal eyelets, a mixed canvas and nubuck upper, a large heel tab, matching tonal laces, and unique suede detailing on the eye stay. With all these features, it is easy to assume the Yeezy Boost 950 was designed to be worn by fleeing an apocalypse as it has a waterproof sole.
Yeezy 350 Cleat
In spite of the fact that the Yeezy 350 cleat was intended to be worn while playing football, it did not meet the NFL’s specifications for a football boot.
Yeezy Powerphase Calabasas
Adidas’ Calabasas trainers were designed in 1980, but the Yeezy Powerphase Calabasas update has the following features:
- A quality white leather upper part.
- A red Trefoil emblem.
- Perforated stripes.
- The green Adidas branding.
Yeezy boost 700
As part of a countrywide lemonade stand charity initiative to raise mental health awareness funds, the first pair of the Yeezy boost 700 was released in August 2018 for $300 per pair. The second pair, the Yeezy boost 700 V2, was released in March 2019 for $300 per pair.
Yeezy Foam Runner
The Yeezy foam runner was designed in the United States and manufactured in an Ararat colour scheme. One exciting aspect of the shoe design was that they made that part of it from harvested algae. As well as the sneaker designs, Yeezy has also designed other footwear styles such as heels for women, boots, and the occasional offshoot sneaker.
Yeezy Accessories
There have been a number of accessories released by the Yeezy brand, including Yeezy keychains and Yeezy baseball caps. These baseball caps are made of cotton and are extremely unique and customized in their style. They are still very popular, despite being less popular than the shoe and clothing line.
Brand Net Worth
Private banks have estimated the brand’s worth at between $4 billion and $5 billion. There has been much speculation regarding the actual value of the Yeezy brand.
As a result of a valuation conducted by the United Bank of Switzerland (UBS) in 2021, it is estimated that Yeezy is worth between $3 billion and $4 billion. It has been reported by Bloomberg that Yeezy’s sneakers line generates a large share of the brand’s income. Forbes has refused to speculate about the brand’s collaboration with Gab until after the product has sold. According to the report, Yeezy’s partnership with GAP could potentially raise $970 million for the company.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that Yeezy has been collaborating with other brands since its inception. However, one collaboration that stands out was its collaboration with Adidas in 2015. Several sneaker designs were created and manufactured by the duo that were extremely popular and were fast-selling. These designs saturated the sneakers market at that time and became the talk of the town. All shoe designs released under this collaboration featured both the Adidas logo and the Yeezy logo. There has been a misconception that Yeezy is part of Adidas and not an independent brand.
In 2006, Kanye West launched Yeezy as a fashion brand. The brand was named after him and is well known for its collaborations and sneakers. However, it also features apparel for women, men, and children.
Having grown tremendously over the years, the brand recently signed a deal with GAP clothing. The brand has a value of approximately $3.2 billion to $4.7 billion.
