Football Gets A WIN

PRESENTED BY RAREBIRD

Happy Tuesday, TFP. Despite travel costs hitting record highs, this Memorial Day weekend is expected to be busier than ever. According to AAA, 44 million people are expected to travel for the long weekend — a 20–year high. It just goes to show that nothing can stop summer from kicking off with a bang.

Patrick Whitesell, the co-founder of WME and Endeavor, who recently left after going private again, is launching a boutique football-representation shingle called WIN Sports Group.

The Big Play: Football is by far the most popular sport in America, with players and coaches reaching the heights of influence usually reserved for global movie stars. WIN hopes to leverage that appeal beyond the relatively short sports career into successful businesses that give players a lifelong winning streak.

Behind the Signings: WIN Sports is born out of WME’s former football division, which Whitesell took on his way out the door.

Last Down: Pro football is only growing in popularity, with games representing 45 of the top 100 TV broadcasts last year (including the entire top 10). Revenue is also up 9%, and games are now accessible in over 20 international markets. On top of that, college football is heating up just as much — collegiate programs are even turning their players into content creators to attract media attention and endorsement deals. In this ecosystem, WIN could have plenty of popular talents to build 360 degrees around.

Prediction: Considering that WME can still represent retired football players and coaches (just not current ones, due to Silver Lake co-CEO Egon Durban’s stake in the Las Vegas Raiders), WME and WIN could soon become fierce competitors down the road — pitting Whitesell against WME CEO Ari Emanuel.

Ever have coffee without the jitters? If you’re like 50% of Americans genetically sensitive to caffeine, you probably didn’t even think that was possible.

Well, there’s now a better way to fill your cup.

A UC Berkeley PhD realized that regular coffee was wrecking his productivity and sleep, so he created Rarebird: the only coffee that replaces caffeine with paraxanthine — the long name for the thing our bodies naturally turn caffeine into. Same energy and focus boost, just gentler on your body during the day and night.

The problem with ANY caffeinated coffee is that it takes all day (or more) and a list of side effects for your body to process the caffeine. The problem with ANY decaffeinated coffee? No energy. So, Rarebird simply kicked out the middleman and combined the best of both worlds, making theirs the first (and only) Px Coffee on the market.

The results are:

That’s not all! Switching out caffeine for Px also boosts your metabolism, helps burn fat, and increases focus.

Rarebird is for everyone from the five-espresso warrior to the decaf faithful. Same ritual, better results.

Use code “FUTURE15” to get going with Rarebird today.

As more people start using chatbots for answers instead of search engines, marketers are turning their attention from search engine optimization (SEO) to answer engine optimization (AEO).

Why It Hits: Using chatbots instead of search engines like Google to answer questions like “Which airline has the cheapest fares?” or “Is this mole on my back normal?” is a fundamentally different technology — but still pulls from the same dataset: the internet. Optimizing websites or online content so that chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini consistently surface them in queries requires a new approach to building them.

Between the Lines: Goodbye, SEO… hello, AEO.

The Future: There are a lot of facets to consider now that chatbots pull from the internet in real time, so dozens of AEO-focused companies have popped up in recent months, attracting serious VC attention and already leading to more chatbot-driven results. David Slater, a former CMO of blue-chip firms like Mozilla and Salesforce, told Insider that AEO is “absolutely going to be a hot space.” And considering chatbots give slightly different answers every time you ask the same question, that could be a benefit to upstart companies that know how to work the system.

Prediction: Since effective AEO requires developers to focus more on the overall substance of a piece of content rather than just keywords, it could maybe… hopefully… signal a decline in clickbait.

🚨 ICYMI: We’re giving away Apple AirPods Pro 2, and all you have to do is refer your friends to TheFutureParty!

Each successful referral earns you one entry to win, so the more you share, the better your odds. This giveaway closes on May 23rd — don’t miss out!

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64.8% of you voted Yes in yesterday’s poll: Do you ever shop at Walmart?

“I grew up in a middle-class family in the South. We got all of our groceries from Walmart. Now that I’m an adult with a comfortable white-collar job, I do most of my shopping elsewhere, but Walmart is still the most convenient place for urgent and miscellaneous purchases like diaper cream or pet food.”

“I enjoy Walmart+ and the free delivery often saves the day!”

“I live in a strong union town that has kept them out.”

Let’s keep the conversation going. Join our Poll Of The Day newsletter, so your opinions can shine. Discover how your views line up with your peers’, check out cool insights, and have some fun. It’s data with personality.

🍿 AMC, the largest theater chain in America, is slashing ticket prices by 50% on Wednesdays to supercharge weekly moviegoing.

🎧 Spotify is adding a “plays” metric to its long-form podcasts to help with discovery and to compete with YouTube.

🏀 NBC announced that basketball legend Michael Jordan is joining as a commentator for its NBA coverage.

🤖 AI firm Perplexity is raising $500 million in a funding round led by Accel and is planning to launch a browser called Comet.

📱 Apple is planning to release an almost all-glass, curved iPhone in 2027.

👀 Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski announced that the transition to all AI agents went too far for customers, so the company is rehiring humans.

🎫 Ticketmaster will start showing customers an all-in price for tickets upfront.

📺 Amazon is introducing “contextually relevant” pause ads and shoppable ads on Prime Video.

🤝 The US and China are significantly reducing tariffs on each other for 90 days.