Over the last decade there has been a growing realization of how important sleep is, along with exercising and eating right, to overall health and wellness, not to mention performance in work, sports, and daily life. A diverse range of licensors and licensees are creating products meant to help address the need for more and better sleep.
Collaborations centered on sleep take many forms. They can involve content, experiences, and/or merchandise. Categories range from bedding to electronics to edible remedies, and beyond. And the properties involved include dedicated sleep-related brands, characters, celebrities, and many more. A few examples from 2025 and 2026 illustrate the trend:
- The meditation app Calm, which has an offering called Calm Sleep Stories, has been expanding its brand after making its first Licensing Expo appearance in 2025. In November, it paired with Ozlo for a co-branded pair of sleep-optimizing, noise-masking, biometric earbuds that integrate Calm content, along with an offer for a one-year subscription to the full Calm app. Previously, it paired with Paramount for Paw Patrol Sleep Stories with a complementary line of bedding and plush from Hunter Price, among other partnerships. On the content and promotion side, through its existing relationship with Hilton, Calm paired in November with reality star and fashion and lifestyle influencer Paige DeSorbo (who often focuses on “bedtime as self-care” and founded a loungewear line called Daphne) for a new Sleep Story recorded at Hilton’s Waldorf Astoria hotel.
- Pokémon Sleep, a gamified sleep-tracking app introduced globally in 2023, partnered this month with Garmin, in conjunction with World Sleep Day, for a Garmin smartwatch-compatible version that allows users to easily track their sleep amounts and styles, along with free Pokémon Sleep watch faces tied to game play. Most of Pokémon Sleep’s other collaborations to date have taken place in Japan. It partnered with healthcare company Eisai this month for an awareness campaign about the importance of sleep, including a picture book, Snorlax’s Dream, set in the world of Pokémon Sleep and distributed through Japanese medical institutions with sleep disorder patients; leaflets and video content are also planned. In November, Pokémon Sleep paired with sauna search site Sauna-Ikitai for a branded sauna event at Yunoiumi Soka Health Center, a public bath in Saitama, a suburb of Tokyo, with Pokémon décor and scents that recreated the world of Pokémon Sleep. And in October it introduced its second collection of Pokémon Sleep bedding with licensee Showa Nishikawa and its MuAtsu brand. The expanded product range includes oversized pillows, stretchy pillow towels (pillowcases made from terrycloth) in five designs, soft lightweight blankets in three sizes, and two padded blankets. A promotion with Family Mart convenience stores in 2024 offered a Pokémon Sleep mini blanket and towel pouch for purchase, free paper charms, and a raffle for a beanbag, as well as a limited-time flavored beverage in themed cups.
- Licensing agreements involving products that are tied to sleep are standard in the business, but the pairings’ health benefits are increasingly being touted more prominently. Examples of the wide spectrum of ventures in this bucket in the last year have included actress Julia Montes’ partnership with Swiss Proli for Night Gummies specifically formulated with melatonin, ashwagandha, L-Theanine, and reishi mushrooms to improve sleep, enhance mental balance, and ensure non-groggy mornings; CrossFit’s agreement with Saatva to make the latter its official mattress, bedding, and restorative sleep partner; and Sanrio’s pairing in Japan with Hugmotti, a body pillow whose shape and filling are designed to aid in comfort, relaxation, and a good night’s sleep, for versions in the likenesses of Hello Kitty, Kuromi, and Cinnamoroll.
These are just a few of the recent licensing deals and collaborations in a growing and diverse consumer products sector. A previous post from October 2020 offers many more examples to give a sense of the array of sleep-connected products that are possible.
In the U.S. alone, almost a third of U.S. adults do not get the recommended seven or more hours of sleep per night, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And just 32% report “excellent” or “very good” quality of sleep, a Gallup survey found. This creates a need in the marketplace for solutions that effectively address sleep deprivation, licensed products among them.
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