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| - Snopes readers asked our newsroom to look into online posts, like the one below, that suggest Adidas is the only major athletic shoe company at the time of this publication to use kangaroo leather in shoe production.
Our newsroom contacted the shoe company, which confirmed that Adidas does use kangaroo leather in some of its shoes as of August 2024. This claim is "True."
An Adidas spokesperson sent the following company statement:
No kangaroo is killed for the creation of a soccer shoe. Kangaroo hunting in Australia is necessary for population control, and the leather Adidas uses is a by-product of this. We source the leather exclusively from suppliers that are monitored and certified by the Australian government, ensuring both animal welfare and the conservation of species. The share of kangaroo leather is less than 0.1 percent of our footwear upper materials usage.
Kangaroos are protected native species in Australia, but commercial harvesting is allowed under certain situations in states like Western Australia, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, for example. Culling of the marsupials is illegal without the proper licensure. Suppose a kangaroo is damaging property, posing risks to safety or causing economic harm. In these cases, the marsupials can be culled by local commercial harvesters or through a landholder's license to harm kangaroos after other nonlethal measures have failed.
Adidas wrote on its website that its largest animal-derived material is leather, comprising 4% of the total materials used. The company added that a majority of the leather used for Adidas products comes from cattle.
Jennifer Skiff, director of international programs at the animal welfare group Center for a Humane Economy, told Snopes that in 2023 Nike, Puma, Diadora, and Sokito (all leading sportswear companies) announced they would cease using kangaroo leather. Nike, Puma, and Sokito officially stopped using the leather in 2024, according to Skiff.
"While Adidas has suggested at its annual general meeting in Germany in May that it may stop using kangaroo leather "sooner than you think," the company is still using it," wrote Skiff in an email.
The Center for a Human Economy hosts the "Kangaroos Are Not Shoes" campaign, an international protest against athletic shoe companies for using kangaroo skins in their products.
In a news release published Oct. 9, 2023, the Center for a Humane Economy also reported that the German-based Adidas shoe company was the only one of five major athletic shoe brands to continue using kangaroo leather in shoe production.
Skiff also referred Snopes to a May 20, 2024, news release that reported Adidas CEO Björn Gulden "acknowledged that the commercial industry of killing kangaroos to make shoes is 'terrible'" and that he added, "We will certainly, maybe, switch faster than you think."
Kangaroos Are Not Shoes stated that kangaroo leather was used in soccer cleats. Although Adidas notes on its website that the company uses "premium leather" in its shoes, it did not specify which animal the leather was sourced from.
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