Employees For Adidas Suggests Internal Racism Against Its Employees From The Brand

A week after #Adidas Originals Assistant Apparel Director Julia Bond sent a letter to Adidas’ North American leadership, describing the company as a “racist work environment,” which stemmed a week of protests by over 200 employees, new accusations of the brand being racist are being reported.

Bond not only described the work environment as racist but also called out the corporation for it’s response to the death of #GeorgeFloyd amid the national protests that have taken place worldwide.

Over the last week, we have seen employees gather at Adidas Portland headquarters to protest.

On Friday, marking a full week since protests began, employees are continuing to make their voices heard against racism claims against the company.

Now, more claims of racism have surfaced about racist inferential occurring behind the scenes within the company.

In an interview with Highsnobiety, Bond reveals two incidents taking place behind closed doors at the Three Stripes following an article from the New York Times on the brand’s racial disparities in 2019.

One of the experiences Bond described consisted of an interaction with Adidas Senior Vice President of Global Design Nic Galway. Bond states that Galway used an image that promotes a white skateboarder wearing the confederate flag, Sole Collector reports.

Bond also described an uncomfortable situation, which included white employees for Adidas describing their black co-workers as “moving at a coon’s pace,” if they were late to a meeting.

Adidas US Sports Footwear Designer Aric Armon is also speaking out on the unfair treatment against black employees internally at Adidas.

“There are not a lot of minorities in this company…It allows certain people to think they’re able to make racist comments, or feel like they’re entitled to be able to call people the N-word and whatnot,” Armon told Highsnobiety in a statement.

Employees have been demanding that the company donate a larger to black communities as well as sincerely apologizing to its employees. So far, the company has upgraded its donation to black communities to $120 million from $20 million, however, they haven’t generated an apology.

Bond confirms that until the company creates an apology to its employees, they will continue to protest.

“Money is a very empty thing, and these are all symptomatic promises, but they are not addressing the systemic changes that need to happen within the brand,” Bond continued. “For the racism and discrimination that [the sportswear manufacturer] has openly enabled and perpetuated.”