Ahmaud Arbery Inspires Meaningful Collaboration With Adidas

Before 2020, Wanda Cooper-Jones was a mother of three from coastal Georgia, living a quiet life shaped by faith, family, and community. Then, on February 23 of that year, 25-year-old Ahmaud “Maud” Arbery went out for a jog and never returned home.

The world came to learn the story: Ahmaud was pursued, cornered, and murdered on a quiet street in a racially motivated attack that echoed the darkest chapters of American history. Before his name became synonymous with a national uprising against racist violence, he was simply Wanda’s son—a vibrant, athletic, loving young man who ran because it made him feel free.

The violence that took Ahmaud’s life could’ve broken his mother, but Wanda refused to let the truth be buried along with her child.

The day that she laid him to rest is when she promised she would find out what happened.

Wanda remembers that day with striking clarity. The world had no idea what happened in Satilla Shores; the case had not yet gone viral. For months, officials stalled, deflected, and attempted to distort the truth. Wanda’s response was simple: she fought. She kept asking questions. She refused to be dismissed. She refused silence.

“When we lost Ahmad back in 2020,” she told MadameNoire in a recent interview, “immediately after we lost him, the state of Georgia [made] some incredible changes in legislation. Georgia did not have a hate crime law, and also, they repealed the citizens’ arrest law here in Georgia, which was a law they used back in slavery forever ago.”

Those changes, she said, were the start. Yet, they weren’t enough.

“After those changes came, I wanted to create something involving Ahmad’s legacy as far as change. And I wanted the change to be in my community, your community, and for little boys who may have some challenges when it comes to mental health.”

With that commitment, The Ahmaud Arbery Foundation was born.

The Birth of a Movement Rooted in Love

The Foundation didn’t begin as a polished nonprofit with corporate backing, but as a mother’s calling. Wanda wanted to create something that honored who Ahmaud was: a young Black man whose joy lived in movement, community, and care.

In its earliest days, people came together simply because they believed in Ahmaud. Runners gathered from across Atlanta and coastal Georgia. Mothers who had also lost sons reached out. Community organizers, faith leaders, youth advocates, and everyday people stepped in to help. Wanda, still grieving, stepped forward.

Since launching in Atlanta, the Foundation has created safe spaces for young Black boys to run freely, learn wellness practices, build leadership skills, and heal collectively. “We’ve partnered with several high schools,” she said. “We do a summit four times in the quarter where we get young Black men together. The last one we did was leadership. The one that we’re going to do in December is on social justice. The one in February is going to be in community service.”

Each gathering starts with strangers and ends with brothers.

“The guys come in as strangers because we pull them from all the communities here in Atlanta,” she explained. “But they leave as brothers and friends. So that’s really a good time.”

This work—rooted in emotional wellness and cultural connection—is what Wanda believes keeps her son’s spirit alive.

Healing in Community

Every year since 2021, Wanda has attended the Circle of Mothers, a healing retreat hosted by the Trayvon Martin Foundation for mothers who have lost their sons to violence. It’s a powerful, heartbreaking, beautiful gathering: a room full of women who never wanted to meet under these circumstances, yet find strength in each other’s presence.

“I remember the first time that I was there,” she said. “I was new, and I needed support. And what other way to gain support other than mothers who actually are going through the same thing that I’m going through?”

Her grief, though deeply personal, became a bridge. The more Wanda carried her son’s story outward, the more she realized other families were walking the same impossible road.

“I promised Ahmaud,” she said, “the day that I laid him to rest…I was going to find out what happened, and, also, I will continue to say his name. In any space, any environment where I’m given an opportunity to say Ahmaud Arbery, that’s the only thing that I want to do.”

The adidas Partnership

If Wanda’s foundation is a story of purpose, the relationship with adidas is a story of alignment.

It began quietly in 2020, when Wanda reached out to the brand after Ahmaud’s passing. What followed was not a sponsorship—but a partnership rooted in shared values and a shared belief: every young person deserves to run without fear.

“When Ahmad was killed, it was in 2021, and they never walked away,” Wanda shared. “As you know, the era of the pandemic and everybody was actually home and paying attention. A lot of the people who were walking with me during those times, they walked away. But the brand adidas, they started, and they’re still walking with me in the organization today.”

That loyalty carried through some of the Foundation’s most critical moments:

2021 – adidas supported the early launch of the Foundation in Atlanta.
2022 – Wanda was selected for adidas’ inaugural social enterprise accelerator (now Community LAB), giving her mentorship, funding, and storytelling support.
2023 – The “Run With Maud” 5K expanded youth engagement in Atlanta.
2022–2025 – adidas continued supporting Ahmaud Arbery Day activations and youth running initiatives, never centering themselves—always elevating the community.
2024 – Wanda became an Honoree in adidas’ Honoring Black Excellence initiative and received a grant for the Foundation.

Being recognized by adidas, she said, she felt “honored” and humbled. “That they would even think of a little organization like the Ahmaud Arbery Foundation to give us the space to tell the story and also put me in a position where other families [who are] going through the same thing…[we] hear their voices as well. So, it’s really an honor.”

Community Archives: A Legacy Preserved

This #GivingTuesday, adidas is releasing Community Archives, a new zine created to uplift the untold stories of the people who have shaped sport, culture, and community. It’s part retrospective, part cultural record, and part invitation: to build futures that honor the people who got us here.

Over the past five years, adidas has shifted from traditional marketing toward community-driven, legacy-focused work rooted in its Purpose pillars. Community Archives is the brand’s way of documenting that journey—from movements sparked to impact sustained. In the inaugural issue, Wanda receives a six-page spread. It’s an amalgam of the walk, the grief, the triumphs, the youth she’s reached, the mothers she’s embraced, the laws changed, the communities healed, and the promise to her son that she refuses to break.

The Road Ahead

“Where I’m from,” she said. “I’m from a small town outside of Augusta, Georgia, and we’re really having a lot of gun violence in the community. I would tell any parent to get involved. Know what your kids are doing. Be there for them because we’re losing a lot of young men due to gun violence in our community and it really breaks my heart.”

Her plea was direct, maternal, and rooted in lived experience.

Wanda Cooper-Jones didn’t choose this path. It chose her—through heartbreak, through injustice, through the kind of loss that shifts the earth beneath you. However, her response has shown what resilience, accountability, and purpose look like when fueled by love.

This Giving Tuesday, her story enters the Community Archives as a living record and reminder that legacy is built in motion, and justice requires endurance. Wanda keeps her promise every day—saying Ahmaud Arbery’s name wherever she goes and fighting to make sure Black boys can run with the freedom and safety her son was denied.

Ahmaud Arbery Inspires Meaningful Collaboration With Adidas