Adidas Originals was one of the first fashion brands to take an early step into Web3. With what started as the purchase of a Bored Ape and a plot of land in The Sandbox, Adidas has dedicated itself to the Metaverse with its aim at digital wearables.
What is Adidas: Into the Metaverse?
Into the Metaverse is an Adidas Originals Collaborative NFT Drop with Bored Ape Yacht Club, GMoney, and Punks Comic, featuring exclusive physical merchandise and ongoing digital utility.
Phase 1
Phase 1 began in December 2021 with the minting of 30,000 NFTs in the Into the Metaverse Collection. 20,000 were reserved for early access, 9,620 were minted during the public sale, and 380 were retained by Adidas and allocated towards future events.
The collection sold out in a matter of hours and Adidas was able to generate over $23 Million USD through NFT sales.
Phase 2
The Phase 2 NFT is one that has been redeemed for physical products and cannot be redeemed again.
Holders were able to claim physical merchandise with their Phase 2 NFT on April 28 2022. The merch was free, only requiring the user to pay a gas fee. Apparel in the drop included a gm gm beanie, the hash hoodie, and the Indigo Herz tracksuit. Adidas covered the cost of shipping and customs fees associated with each order. The claim period for physical merch closed on May 18 2022 along with a snapshot of holders’ wallets.
Adidas experienced unexpected delays in the distribution of their merchandise. The items were originally supposed to ship around mid-June 2022, however, supply chain logistics delayed the shipments by several weeks.
Meta Capsules
On June 3 2022, holders of the Phase 2 NFT were airdropped an Adidas Originals Meta Capsule NFT. This was a mysterious airdrop that gave a clue towards Adidas' recently released Virtual Gear collection. On November 16 2022, holders of the Capsules could burn their NFTs to receive a new token.
The Impossible Box
On November 5 2022, The Meta Capsules evolved into the Impossible Box where holders were able to “unbox” their capsule. Through this process, Adidas revealed the next phase of their project, the Virtual Gear Collection.
Adidas Virtual Gear
The Virtual Gear is a 16-piece Adidas Originals collection of wearables that is meant to be worn by virtual avatars and is accessible via a PFP dressing tool. The wearables are interoperable with other identity-based projects which allows them to connect with other metaverse environments.
Steps Challenge
In September 2022, Adidas collaborated with the virtual sneaker mobile application Aglet, to create a month-long steps challenge. Users could compete for prizes by wearing their digital NMD S1 sneakers via the Aglet app.
The prizes were as follows:
- Top 10 Winners
- Two upcoming NMD S1s (one pair each)
- Next two Aglet One IRL releases (one pair each)
- Exclusive, guided tour of the adidas digital Archive
- Top 50 Winners
- One upcoming Aglet One (next release)
- Random draw entry for one upcoming adidas Original NMD S1 (five will be chosen)
- Random draw entry for exclusive, guided tour of the adidas digital Archive (two will be chosen)
Kanye West Controversy
In October 2022, Yuga Labs co-founder Wylie Aronow stated that he didn’t want his company involved with Ye, formerly known as Kanye West. At that time, Adidas had been producing and distributing Ye's Yeezy line of shoes and clothing for the past nine years. Yuga Labs, the creators of the Bored Ape Yacht Club, partnered with Adidas in a metaverse fashion project in December 2021. The development started amidst the controversy surrounding Ye’s antisemitic tweets.
After putting its nine-year partnership “under review” Adidas decided to terminate its relationship with Ye in October 2022. The termination was expected to cost the company more than $240 Million in profits.
New Management
In a January 23 2023 tweet from Indigo Hertz, Adidas’ Bored Ape, it was announced that Three Stripes Studio will manage Adidas’ Web3 presence. Three Stripes said they will take responsibility for the development and delivery of all Web3 activities.
