Technical characteristics of padel courts

Before embarking on this entrepreneurial activity, it is good practice to consult a trusted advisor to assess the feasibility of the project in the chosen location and, if you have identified the right area, also a local professional (engineer, architect, surveyor) who can evaluate in advance whether there are any bureaucratic constraints to the realization of your project.

Do not risk signing rental contracts for unsuitable premises; it would be a serious waste of both money and time. Once the professional has prepared all the necessary documentation to be submitted to the various competent public authorities and you have received the green light, then you can start the process of choosing a trusted supplier for the courts (and the covering if needed).

Always keep in mind this simple and ancient rule: WHO SPENDS LESS, SPENDS TWICE.

And if it is true in life, it is even more so in padel. Clients will choose the center that suits them best, and if you have done everything only in your own interest (low-quality courts, unattractive area, non-insulated covering, poor services, changing rooms like those of a 1970s sports field) rather than in theirs, you will deeply regret your choice.

When you see padel clubs full every day of the week and others so empty that the only court being used is yours (and you feel like you are in a “sad” environment), now you know the reason why this happens. Choose the best, choose quality. It doesn’t matter whether your choice is Padel Corporation or another company (that may work as well or even better than us), what matters is that you choose courts as you would have wanted them as a customer. Everything will go well!!! Good luck!

The Third Sector Reform has recently come into force, and although managing a sports club may seem simple, it is actually anything but. Our clients often ask us for advice on how to best manage their organization, and whether it is better to opt for an ASD or an SSD.

We have become skilled at building sports facilities, but honestly we do not have the expertise to advise on such an important and delicate matter. However, thanks to the synergies developed through our work and through the President of CNA Jesi, Francesco Barchiesi, we now have the opportunity to introduce a new and important partner of ours, specialized in the management of sports organizations, with over twenty years of experience and, above all, extensive knowledge of the 2023 reform.

Have you decided to invest in padel and would like to finance the operation without touching your liquidity? From today it’s possible. One of the most advantageous solutions is to finance a good part of the initial costs by spreading them over the first 2, 3, or 5 years.

Small installments that will be easily repaid with revenues and will allow the entrepreneur to keep liquidity available for other purposes. In fact, for amounts not too high, Padel Corporation offers the possibility, through a special agreement with a leading brokerage company, to finance up to 50% of the amount in 10 months at zero interest (subject to approval by the financial company).

More and more often, since both the courts and the covering must be taken into account, the investment goes beyond initial expectations. Instead of giving up on covering (a choice that we believe is not forward-looking), the best solution is to finance part of the investment with small monthly installments.

Do you want to know how much your installment could be based on your planned investment?

More and more clients ask us for not only padel courts but also concrete support in finding high-level services, such as schools and coaches to include in their facilities—professionals who can grow the community of newcomers to this sport and build loyalty through individual and group lessons, clinics, family days, and corporate events; because, as they teach in Argentina, padel is and must be about inclusion and fun.

The Fusion Padel Team led by Manu Moreira (WPT player with 32 years of experience in padel) is today one of the most professional padel schools in Italy.

Fusion is a company dedicated to consulting and developing padel clubs and relies on the collaboration of Argentine 1st and 2nd category coaches with WPT points, experts not only in teaching but also in the overall sporting development of the club itself.

Together with PTR Italy, one of the most prestigious schools in the world, we offer clubs that request it advice on the proper management of their center and valuable support in launching the technical and sporting management.

How to identify the location that we consider suitable for developing our business? It can be indoor, such as a warehouse or tensile structure, or outdoor, such as a sports club, land, open space, garden, or beach.

It is important to keep in mind that a padel center is a very significant investment and the choice of location is crucial to the success of the project.

The first evaluation is: indoor or outdoor?

Without a doubt, building inside a warehouse with a minimum height of 7 meters (9/10 meters is even better) is the wisest choice for many reasons:

• the existing floor is often drivable, avoiding the need to build a reinforced slab costing €10–15,000 per court
• the center can be used every day of the year, making it much more profitable
• if you can invest in an air-conditioning system for the summer, success is almost guaranteed
• there will be no wind or sun making lobs and bandejas difficult
• often there is an internal, fenced parking lot, preventing customers from having their car broken into in a dark and crowded street at night
• you can provide charging stations for electric vehicles, which will be increasingly in demand in the future
• it will be easier to build comfortable, insulated changing rooms

If instead we cannot find any suitable building (which is quite likely, since warehouses at acceptable prices with heights and sizes adaptable to padel are very hard to find), we must opt for an outdoor solution. In that case, either we find a sports club to renovate or, if we are lucky or able to have land in an industrial or commercial area, by far the best investment is the construction of a HAN-GAR, the most innovative covering in the world of sport. It is essentially a prefabricated warehouse in wood and sandwich panels, fully eco-sustainable, with photovoltaic panels on the roof that not only offset construction costs in less than 10 years but also allow year-round play in a climate-controlled environment, which is still very rare in the padel world and beyond.

Equally important is that after about ten years, the value of a tensile structure costing hundreds of thousands of euros approaches zero, whereas a warehouse, specifically a HAN-GAR, gains value over time and can easily be converted into industrial, craft, or commercial use. For more details, we invite you to visit our website WWW.HAN-GAR.COM
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The last option is outdoor courts, which are the right solution in cases such as resorts, seaside businesses, or parks with landscape restrictions where covering is impossible, and these are “seasonal” activities. In such cases, the outdoor solution, besides being the only possible one, is also positive because it integrates well with the surrounding environment.

It is therefore clear that an indoor court is the best choice, if feasible, but the focus must then shift to the location. Certainly, opening a center in a big city will bring higher revenues than in a small town, a center near a major road exit is more accessible than one hidden in the countryside, a neighborhood with universities or factories with many workers will be more advantageous than a remote and sparsely populated area, and opening near an already successful padel center with 10–12 courts is probably not the wisest choice because, no matter how good you are, customers will still be split between two important facilities, and so on.

In short, the right location is a decisive factor in the success of the investment. If you are interested in learning how to maximize it, we invite you to read the blog HOW MUCH DOES A PADEL COURT EARN, where you will find more useful advice. Enjoy your reading.

Padel is today considered one of the best investments for those who have savings and wish to start an entrepreneurial activity, and especially for sports centers with multiple tennis courts that are no longer as profitable as they once were.

The investment is often recovered within the first year, and at most by the second.

A well-known tennis racket manufacturer has just published its 2022 sales data in Spain (the most advanced European country in this sport), and sales of padel rackets accounted for 60% of the total compared to tennis, beach tennis, etc.

We could even say it is almost essential for all resorts and hospitality facilities that want to offer a sporting alternative within their centers. Nowadays, many customers ask at the very moment of booking whether the facility has padel courts, and the answer influences their choice.

Asking how much a padel court costs is like asking how much a car costs; there are cars for €15,000 as well as for €100,000 and beyond. They all have 4 wheels, an engine, and a steering wheel—the difference lies in quality, performance, and safety.

The same goes for padel courts: some cost €15,000 and others €35,000, yet they are made of the same components—tubular frames, nets, glass, synthetic turf.

Where’s the difference?
In the quality of the synthetic turf, in the safety of the glass used, and in the long-term durability of the metal structure. These elements will also determine the success or failure of your center. What really matters is not how much a court costs, but rather how much that same court yields! As everyone knows, there are often several clubs in the same area, and clients have learned to choose: at the same game price, they pick the best-performing, most attractive courts with the best services.

If you already have a warehouse, where the flooring is often sufficient to support a padel court, the average cost is around €25,000 + VAT, installation included.

For outdoor courts, you must also build a foundation costing between €10,000 and €16,000 (depending on the area) and consider a fixed, certified cover starting at about €40,000 per court.

Padel Corporation will guide you through the entire process, from design to the construction of your sports center, always prioritizing safety and delivering, upon completion, all legal compliance certifications up to the TÜV SÜD certificate, so that you can play safely and rest easy.

The courts require minimal maintenance: surface cleaning, periodic inspection of the net, and replacement of the synthetic turf every 4–5 years.

On average between 2 and 3 weeks, depending on the chosen model and site conditions.

The panoramic court eliminates the side posts, offering total visibility, while the standard one maintains a more traditional structure.

Until 2020 there was still doubt about whether or not to cover padel courts.
Today it is very clear that those who have not covered their courts (unless we are talking about resorts, beach clubs, etc. — therefore “seasonal”) will either cover them or are destined to see their profits drastically reduced.

Wind, rain, cold, and extreme heat are the reasons why the vast majority of padel players prefer a covered court.

On the market there are covering solutions of all qualities and all price ranges, but certainly the better the insulation, the better the playing comfort and therefore the more attractive the club will be.

In our humble opinion, the answer to the question in the title is DEFINITELY Yes!

Padel is the sport of the moment, closely linked to social media and experiencing exponential growth in Italy and worldwide. In Italy alone, we went from fewer than 1,000 courts in 2019 to over 8,000 in 2023. We expect that at full capacity, there will be more than 20,000 courts installed in Italy.

There is therefore a lot of room for those who want to invest in this fantastic sport, perhaps unique in the world as a game suitable for everyone. You can play and have fun from day one, and this is the reason why so many people approach and fall in love with padel.

The economic return of a padel court ranges from €2,000 to €10,000 per month, a very wide margin that depends on many factors:

The quality of the courts installed (textured synthetic turf, safety glass, galvanized anti-rust structure)

The services offered by the center (comfortable changing rooms, restaurant or bar, swimming pool, gym, shop inside the club, high-level coaches, secure internal parking, children’s play area, winter and especially summer air conditioning, tournaments supported by top sponsors, etc.)

The region and area of the city where the center is located (in Cagliari, the average cost of a game is €7–8, while in Milan it can be up to €20 per person)

The presence or absence of a covering that allows the club to be active 365 days a year regardless of weather conditions

The quality of management (managing a sports center—which is essentially a real business—requires professionalism and cannot be improvised)

The presence or absence of strong competitors nearby (opening a club with 2 courts in an area where 2 other facilities with 8–10 courts already exist makes the challenge harder but not impossible. It’s not uncommon for small clubs with 5-star services to outperform mega centers where quality is lacking; at the same price, customers will always choose the most comfortable club)

The more these factors are met by the new club, the faster the investment will be recovered and the higher the profits will be.

Padel is today considered one of the best investments for those who have savings and wish to start an entrepreneurial activity, and especially for sports centers with multiple tennis courts that are no longer as profitable as they once were.

The investment is often recovered within the first year, and at most by the second.

A well-known tennis racket manufacturer has just published its 2022 sales data in Spain (the most advanced European country in this sport), and sales of padel rackets accounted for 60% of the total compared to tennis, beach tennis, etc.

We could even say it is almost essential for all resorts and hospitality facilities that want to offer a sporting alternative within their centers. Nowadays, many customers ask at the very moment of booking whether the facility has padel courts, and the answer influences their choice.