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Volume 74 | The Next Wave
From Smart Retail to Sleep Tech — Inside the Future of Performance
Alec Grawe
November 20, 2025
📰 The Pulse
Fabletics Set to Open “Retail of the Future” Flagship in LA
Fabletics is preparing to debut a next-gen flagship store in Los Angeles built around smart fitting rooms, immersive product testing, digital checkout and AI-driven insights. The brand is betting big on blending fitness, tech and lifestyle into one space. (More)
The Playbook Take — Retail isn’t dead. It’s evolving. And Fabletics is building the playground for the modern athlete-consumer.
Eudaimonia Summit Signals a Bright Future for Wellness
The Eudaimonia Summit gathered founders, biohackers, performance coaches and longevity leaders — all exploring how wellness, energy and purpose are now competitive edges. (More)
The Playbook Take — Wellness isn’t a category anymore — it’s an ecosystem of curious and extraordinary humans. Events like this show just how fast it’s evolving.
Ozlo x Calm Launch Co-Branded Sleep Buds
Ozlo and Calm teamed up to release co-branded sleep buds that combine passive noise blocking with active audio programs designed to improve rest quality.
Wattbike Integral to Third Space Performance Lab
Wattbike extended its partnership with Third Space’s Performance Lab in London, focusing not just on performance metrics but on healthspan via VO₂-driven protocols.
The Playbook Take — Performance tools are now lifespan tools. Training just for seconds on the clock isn’t enough—think decades on the clock. (More)
Power Plate® Introduces New pro8™ and my8™ Models
Power Plate released two new models: the pro8™ for commercial use and the my8™ for home use. Both deliver advanced vibration training with wide frequency ranges, touchscreen controls and hundreds of pre-programmed workouts. (More)
The Playbook Take — Vibration training went from boutique to mainstream. Home gyms just got smarter. These machines are sweet.
🧬 The Shop
Kreatures of Habit | Daily Bar
20g plant-based protein, 3g creatine, gluten-free, dairy-free, no seed oils, non-GMO. Crunchy, clean ingredients built for daily fuel.
Stone Island | New Balance Furon V8
Stone Island and New Balance return with their latest collaboration — a redesigned Furon V8, merging Stone Island’s technical fabrics and New Balance’s football engineering.
Satisfy | Winter 2025 Collection
The lifestyle/performance brand drops its seasonal collection built for movement, style and climate.
TRX | Push-It
Progressive push-training tool that delivers advanced upper-body reps with smarter movement built in.
Sunlighten | Red Light Therapy Mask
A high-power recovery mask using red / near-infrared wavelengths to support sleep, skin, muscle recovery.
While On Earth | Hydrokit Move Trainer
New water-repellent + stain-resistant upper built to keep your trainers looking fresh through rain, splash & spills (dropping today).
Crossrope | AMP Vibe Handles — Wider design, textured silicone grip and Bluetooth connection to the Crossrope app for next-level jump rope training.
Beam | Peppermint Bark Dream
Back for a limited time—our popular Peppermint Bark blend, co-created with the Houghtons! Indulge in this delicious, guilt-free flavor that helps you fall asleep, stay asleep, and wake up refreshed.
Ancient Nutrition | Multi-Protein Animal Based
Available in Dark Chocolate & Vanilla Bean; a clean all-in-one formula delivers 26g of complete protein (made from grass-fed whey, bone broth, A2/A2 milk protein, collagen peptides and colostrum), a Protein Digestion† Blend and 5g of creatine monohydrate per serving to support your muscles, joint health, post-workout recovery and cognitive health.
🌱🏃♂️➡️ The Energy Hot Chocolate
Running one marathon. Every day. For over 90 days.
Meet Brooks Bash — the founder behind Earthy, an energy hot chocolate built from real ingredients. He got tired of misleading labels and overdosed energy drinks.
So he built Earthy — and then put it to the ultimate test:
26.2 miles a day until he sells 5,000 bags.
It’s clean, stable, jitter-free energy from ingredients your body actually recognizes:
🍫 Cacao — antioxidant-rich and mood-lifting
🍄 Functional mushrooms — focus, immunity, resilience
❤️ Beets — nitric oxide support for endurance
🌿 Guayusa — clean caffeine without the spikes or crashes
✨ Cinnamon + nutmeg — natural metabolic support and warmth
So whether you’re looking to stay locked in at work, train smarter, or leave caffeine crashes behind. Earthy isn’t just another drink — it’s a smarter energy system for your day.
Your order might be the one to help this man stop running!
👉 Use code PLAYBOOK for 15% OFF
🎙️ On The Podcast
This week on The Playbook, we sat down with Tim Rosa, CEO of Somnee and former CMO at Fitbit, to break down the sleep technology everyone in performance and recovery is suddenly talking about.
Somnee was developed by four neuroscientists out of UC Berkeley — including Dr. Matt Walker, the world’s leading sleep researcher and author of Why We Sleep. After five years of research, they built something that sounds futuristic but is shockingly simple to use: a headband that uses lab-grade EEG to read your brainwaves and a patented neurostimulation signal to guide your brain into its ideal sleep rhythm.
It’s not a tracker. It’s not a hack. It’s neuroscience applied directly to performance.
The results are hard to ignore. In an NBA-backed cohort, Somnee users gained an average of 37 extra minutes of sleep per night and cut their time-to-fall-asleep from 24 minutes down to 8. It’s why the NBA invested in the company. It’s why athletes are already integrating it into their daily routines. And it’s why Somnee is being called one of the most significant breakthroughs in sleep science since the first wearables.
Tim also opened up about his own struggle with adult insomnia — years of nightly THC, CBD, and melatonin — and the moment Somnee finally helped him fall asleep naturally again. Coming from Fitbit, he breaks down why most wearables rely on approximations, why EEG is the gold standard for real sleep data, and what happens when AI is trained on truly accurate signals.
We also explore Somnee’s growing ecosystem: partnerships with Equinox Hotels, data integrations coming in 2026 (Superpower), new work with women in perimenopause and menopause, and the bigger vision of connecting sleep to biomarkers, recovery, and overall health.
To close, Tim runs through his Flow Stack — Rogue AirBike warmups, surfing in Marin, trail running on Mt. Tam, Brooks shoes, Eight Sleep for temperature control, and a stripped-down supplement routine anchored by creatine and Somnee.
The Playbook Take:
We’re entering a new era of sleep-as-performance. And Somnee is one of the first companies proving that improving sleep is far more powerful than just measuring it.
Tune in here — this one’s a masterclass in what the next decade of sleep optimization will look like.
💰 The Boardroom
Vince Carter Joins Huupe
NBA legend Carter comes on as strategic advisor/partner in smart-hoop brand Huupe, helping scale culture + tech.
The Playbook Take — When court meets cloud, the next generation of sport is built.
Functional Health Raises $298M — A major capital raise as the company scales in diagnostics, personalized health and early-stage wellness. (More)
The Playbook Take — Healthtech isn’t optional, it’s foundational. Performance is now built for decades, not just seasons.