Yahoo Finance Adidas profits surge as Sunak fails to derail demand for Samba trainers
Rishi Sunak failed to dampen demand for Adidas’s Samba trainers despite claims that he ruined their fashion credibility, with sales of the shoes helping to drive a profit surge at the German sportswear company.
Adidas said appetite for its shoes including the Samba and Gazelle was “very strong and growing”, contributing to better-than-expected sales since the start of the year.
It comes weeks after Mr Sunak was accused of “ruining” Sambas for the public after being pictured wearing them in Downing Street. Sir Keir Starmer, the Labour leader, was later pictured sporting a pair of Adidas Gazelle trainers.
Adidas said demand was strong across its “terrace” shoe designs, which get their name from football fans in the 1970s and 1980s who stood on the terraces to watch games. While the Samba and Gazelle styles are its best known terrace shoes, its Spezial line, the vintage-inspired Campus and its newer SL72 range are all also proving popular.
Adidas’s sales were up 8pc in the first three months of the year, stripping out currency movements, while operating profits surged to €336m (£287m), from €60m the same period a year earlier.
Chief executive Bjørn Gulden said the company was “not as good as we should be, but I feel that we are making the progress that we had hoped for”.
The German company suffered a heavy financial hit after cutting ties with rapper Kanye West following a series of anti-Semitic comments by the rapper.
The discontinuation of the Yeezy brand, co-created by Mr West, contributed to a €500m decline in sales during 2023, and last year Adidas made its first annual loss in more than 30 years.
Adidas has been slowly selling off its remaining Yeezy stock and donating part of the sales to anti-hate charities. Yeezy sales generated revenues of around €150m in the first three months of the year, Adidas said. It expects to net around €200m from sales of the remaining Yeezy trainers throughout the remainder of the year.
