Opening a padel club: the operating decisions nobody warns you about
Court count, opening hours, membership versus pay-and-play, and the handful of settings that decide how busy your courts look in month three.
7 min read
Decide what a court hour is worth before you build the schedule
Padel courts fill in blocks of 60 or 90 minutes and almost always with four players. Pick one slot length and price it per court, not per player — split billing can share it afterwards.
Set a prime-time band (typically weekday evenings and weekend mornings) and a lower off-peak rate. Off-peak pricing is the cheapest way to lift utilisation without touching your prime hours.
Memberships or pay-and-play?
Most new padel clubs open pay-and-play, then add memberships once a core of regulars appears. That order is fine, but decide early what a membership buys: an earlier booking window, a discounted rate, included hours, or all three.
The booking window is usually the strongest lever. Members booking 14 days out and guests 3 days out changes behaviour far more than a 10% discount.
Open play is your fill tool
Scheduled open play and fixed-level sessions fill the hours members will not book themselves — weekday mornings and late evenings. Publish them as a repeating series and let people join individually.
Set the rules once, in settings
Cancellation windows, no-show fees, guest limits, how far ahead each membership can book: write them down and configure them before you open. Changing them later, once regulars have formed habits, is the hard part.