Ivy Park: is the love affair between Adidas and Beyoncé drawing to a close?

By

Olivier Guyot

Translated by
Nicola Mira

Published
Mar 27, 2023

When Adidas signed an agreement with Beyoncé in 2018 to develop her existing Ivy Park athleisure label, the partnership seemed to have all the means to become a global success. The collaboration's huge potential was to enable Adidas to spark a craze equal to that generated by Puma with Rihanna, creating a successful new venture with a star of US pop music on a scale comparable to that of Yeezy.

More than four years after that, it is clear that Ivy Park’s magic ingredients did not work, despite Beyoncé's international reputation. On the contrary, the setback appears to be so major the Wall Street Journal reported in February that, in 2022, Ivy Park generated less than half the sales it did in 2021, barely reaching revenue of $40 million. The newspaper wrote that the German group's road map for Ivy Park had forecast revenue of approximately $250 million for last year.

In the following days, Adidas's US spokespersons refuted these figures to Forbes, claiming that “a strong partnership” exists with Ivy Park, which is owned by Parkwood Entertainment, Beyoncé Knowles-Carter's production company.

Ads

However, two US media outlets reported in the last few days that the relationship between Beyoncé's label and Adidas has reached an impasse. Both TMZ and The Hollywood Reporter, two sources well-acquainted with US celebrity news, have announced that the partners will terminate Ivy Park.

Contacted by FashionNetwork.com, Adidas declined to comment on the subject for the time being. According to TMZ and The Hollywood Reporter, Ivy Park has not generated the financial results Adidas sought, while Beyoncé is not satisfied with what the label has achieved. She is said to be keen to “take back control of the brand, charting her own path and retaining design freedom.” This is a position that seems to echo the criticism made a few seasons ago by Kanye West, then still revered, about the impossibility of imposing his own brand of creativity at Yeezy.

Ivy Park’s latest collection, Park Trail, was launched on the market in February. It is listed as out of stock on Adidas’s US e-shop, and none of its products are currently available on the brand’s European site. The agreement between the two parties runs until the end of 2023.