At this point, G.O.O.D. Music's Cruel Winter is nothing more than a rumor. And now it appears Nike won't be delivering a Nice Winter for some very special Kanye fans this year, either.
After speaking with five winners of the Willy Wonka-esque giveaway Kanye West held in June for a pair of the uber-limited Air Yeezy Red Octobers, Complex has learned that they likely won't be getting their kicks until...long after October.
In order to be certified as a winner, those who win need to be in contact with the contest's administrator, a company called Ventura Associates. Most of the winners we spoke with already knew—by virtue of obsessively looking at the contest terms and conditions—that there's a clause in there that reads: "Prize award notices will be sent to each winner approximately thirty (30) days after winner verification detailing when winner should receive prize, which is expected to ship by February 2014."
Most contests have clauses like that, legalese that simply covers the company in the event the product can't move quickly enough (note the operative term "by," as in "no later than"). Generally, contest winners get their winnings long before that last possible due date on their prize. But after they spoke with reps at Ventura, the five contest winners we spoke to claim they were told in no uncertain terms they'd be receiving their prize in 2014, and some were told specifically either in January or February. In other words, either
(A)TheRed October contest winners won't be getting their prizes until long after the shoes actually hit streets,
or
(B)TheRed Octobers ain't coming out in October.
But that's not the only part of the giveaway that might surprise winners. While going through the rules, we stumbled upon this:
If a potential winner is a Canadian resident, he/she will be required to correctly answer, without assistance of any kind, a time-limited mathematical skill testing question administered at a mutually agreeable time by telephone.
Yeah, little did we know that the Yeezy Contest Deities won't bless you if you're Canadian unless you can deal with some numbers. But one of the Canadian winners—Jeff Vilette of Toronto—explained to us what the deal was:
None
Commence the Talmudic scholars of Yeezus around the world obsessively re-examining the "even when I blow doja" line. Either way, know this: The Lord Yeezus giveth, and the Lord Yeezus maketh delay.
